Genre: Mystery
Hardcover; Mass Market Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN #:
St. Martin's Publishing
320 Pages
August 30, 2016
⭐
When flamboyant Texas millionaire Honeybelle Hensley dies a suspicious death, everybody in town is shocked to learn that the sole beneficiary of her worldly fortune is none other than Miss Ruffles - her dog. Miss Ruffles liked nothing better than terrorizing Honeybelle's many gentleman callers who came knocking at cocktail hour, to say nothing of digging up her famous rose garden after breakfast. And chasing the UPS man. And causing commotion, generally, in Mule Stop, Texas. So what gives?
This is the question that Sunny McKillip, Miss Ruffles' unwilling dog sitter, is trying to answer. Suddenly Miss Ruffles is in grave danger, and it's up to Sunny to protect her - at all costs. But Sunny, still new to town, can't make heads or tails of the town's colorful characters, from the sweet-talking yet ruthless ladies of the garden club to the tobacco-chewing curmudgeon at Critter Control. With a killer on the prowl - and a handsome cowboy lawyer with an eye on her every move - there's clearly more to Honeybelle's death than Sunny could have imagined. If she's not careful she might just get killed...or her heart lassoed...
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Sunny McKillip is the personal assistant to the late Honeybelle Hensley, and now dogsitter to her mutt Miss Ruffles. Very few people like the dog; in fact, it seems that only townspeople do - all her friends and relatives hate the dog and it's mutual. So much so, that Honeybelle's daughter-in-law nearly causes a scene at Honeybelle's funeral when Sunny shows up with Miss Ruffles.
But then Sunny is given a surprise: Honeybelle's attorney tells her, along with the cook and butler, that if they'll live in the mansion for a year they'll each get a million dollars. Of course, Miss Ruffles comes along with the deal. So Sunny agrees to do it, even though it means animosity and hatred from Honeybelle's son Hut and his family. But then, Miss Ruffles goes missing and it's up to Sunny to find her before something even worse happens to her...
I don't know if this is the first in the series, and honestly I don't care. The beginning of the book started out fine, but then it went downhill toward the middle, so I just scanned the rest. What I did read from then on made me glad I didn't waste time reading the entire book.
There's a ridiculous scene with the Department of Agriculture digging up Honeybelle's garden because Honeybelle supposedly sent roses from Germany. Sunny tells the woman that Honeybelle is dead and couldn't have sent the roses, but the woman "looks at her blankly" and continues to dig. She's not even concerned that the roses were sent by someone else, that the roses could have been sent there to hide the real destination (after all, someone could have shown up and said the roses were sent by mistake) - anyway, there could have been all kinds of explanations, but it never occurred to her that dead people can't mail things from another country. This seemed kind of odd because if I was told the person couldn't have sent it because they were dead, a whole other set of questions would certainly arise.
But the worst thing was the case of animal abuse and animal cruelty. I don't know why this didn't bother anyone else (of the reviews I read, not a single one mentioned it) but it always bothers me. Especially when it's not necessary to the story. Any book that has animal cruelty that isn't necessary - and it wasn't - will automatically get one star from me.
I've hidden it in a spoiler, but here it is if you want to read it:
Then we get to the ending, if you can call it that. There was a horrible surprise (which I didn't find amusing in the least) and all the questions throughout the book weren't answered. It's like the author didn't care any more and just wanted the book to be over. What a waste of time. I will never read another book by this author.
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