Gaits Of Heaven [Hardcover]

I have read and enjoyed all of the previous books in this series, so much so that I pre-ordered this one and eagerly awaited it. But I found it not up to the previous standards. For me there was too much ado about

dysfunctional, doped up psychotherapists and their distinctly un-charming disfunctional children, and not nearly enough about Holly and Steve and their relationship, and not enough about the delightful Malamutes Rowdy and Kimi.

Often in books and on TV, when a romantically charged relationship results finally in marriage things become

less interesting, and that has happened here. I missed Holly's hilarilously awful father, and his amusing

second wife. My favorite characters got short shrift in favor of a not very appealing cast of misfits.

The brightest spot for me was Dolfo, a bizarre-looking mutt who had been passed of as a hot new dog breed, a Golden Aussie Huskapoo, to his clueless owners, who don't want to inhibit him by making him wear a collar

or leash.

In an unlikely ending a platoon of therapists meet in a vain attempt to unite the unpleasant troubled family,

but most of them are too drugged to care.

Any good series is allowed one weak one, and for me, this was it.

I really wanted to like this book.

I know that Holly as a character is written to be rather superficial. She's dazzled by big names and celebrity, whether it's Julia Child or famous dog trainers, fashionable street addresses, educational and dog institutions, brand named dog food or titled pooches. All have gotten her gushing approbation, and for the most part, her naive enthusiasm has been a fun ride.

The flip side is that she just as strongly sounds out against anything she doesn't like: cheap addresses and clothing, poor hygiene and personal habits, garish jewelry and stereotypical characterizations have all gotten a lot of page time. Most of the books in the series seem to rise or fall on a maniac/depressive line. When Holly (or Susan?) is up, she gushes about what she loves (dogs usually, or whatever) the carping asides are minimal and the books are interesting and fun.

When she's down, the characters are drawn harshly and critically, Holly dwells on unpleasant details, asides and negative or even prejudiced descriptions and the book is not fun.

This book is not a happy one. Holly starts off the book being critical of her mother, surprisingly since formerly she always spoke of her in glowing terms. But now she blames Marissa for posthumously causing her ring nerves, and for being a "hypercompetent martinet". I admit I got tired of Holly complaining in past books about her father, who seemed generally good hearted, and whose pull with the AKC she never hesitated to draw on when needed, but was so embarrasing to her in other ways that she tried to avoid him the rest of the time. I was hoping after her marriage to Steve she'd reconcile more with Buck, grow up a little. Instead it seems she's now started after Marissa. Not that we couldn't read through the lines about that relationship in previous books, but at least Holly always spoke well of her. So that started off the book with a disappointing jolt.

Virtually every newly introduced character after that unauspicious start is dysfunctional as well, even the featured dog. And while praise of her own dogs usually adds amusement and uplift, there's very little of them in this book. Instead Holly spends a lot of her time at "home" when she used to obsess over her dogs (or her email), instead obsessing over one of her many other pet peeves, weight, in the person of an overweight houseguest, describing how she throws out much of her own food, cooks green beens, and counts every bite the character eats. She actually uses the word "disfigured" to describe her. Her own dogs come into it when one gorges on the guest's secret foodstash. The other new characters are given the same unloving detail, with something dysfunctional brought up with all of them. Without spoiling the plots to describe this, when *every* new character is introduced in a negative way, there's something wrong.

I'd hoped that Holly's obsession into negativity in the latter part of the series was due to her disappointment over Steve's marriage to another, or her previous head injury, or something related to a series plot that now that she was married to Steve or recovered from her concussion, the character's former likability would return. I.e., a plot point. It would be hard to keep reading her otherwise. But instead of marriage soothing Holly's lapse into crabbiness, and swinging her mood up, the author seems now to be using Steve for more of the same critical asides. Steve delivers a long lecture to the houseguest that sounds more like Holly "channeled" instead of his formerly mild mannered self.

People read series cozy mysteries for entertainment, and often for character development. Holly's character started out a bit strange, but often fun, and usually likeable. Even the murderers at times had a redeeming quality or two. But now Holly just isn't likeable, and even the non murderers are drawn harshly. She seems to see characters now always negatively, often stereotypically and sometimes in a downright prejudiced light that seems out of base with supposedly liberal Cambridge. She has everything she could want, (except perhaps a bigger yard) but she continually finds faults to dwell on, to obsess over. If she's angry at her mother for being a "hypercritical martinet" she needs to stop channeling that critical nature in her own fictional life. Or the author should stop channeling it in her books.

Carping isn't a very admirable quality in any character, much less being entertaining. A whole book of it without relief is not a pleasant or fun read. I know this author has written good books, and I hope she gets over her funk and writes them again. This series deserves better, as do the readers. But this book was not one of them.

Susan Conant, Gaits of Heaven (Berkley, 2006)

I was prepared to give this a mediocre review and pass it off as a relatively unmemorable mystery until Conant started talking about how awful it is to be overweight. From there, the longer the book went on, the more offensive it got. And it's not a case of Conant making fun of fat people. It's worse than that-- it's pity. Cloying, stinking pity that glops all over everything else in the book. It's at that point that the book goes from being mediocre to being terrible. I'd planned to give this my usual review, with a paragraph of plot summary and then a breakdown of the book's good and bad points, but I find that I can no longer remember any good points. Aside from the obvious (pointed out above), the pacing is godawful, the mystery setup is handled clumsily, and the resolution, as it does with so many bad mysteries, involves getting everyone into a room and having the solution to the mystery spoon-fed to them. (And us, of course, for the few who didn't see it coming a mile off.) I read a book or two as bad as this in the last month, but I didn't read any that were worse. *

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