Pawing
Through the Past (Age of Unreason) by
Rita Mae Brown, Sneaky Pie Brown
When a mystery author claims her cat as
coauthor, it's a fairly safe bet that the team won't be producing
disturbing psychological thrillers or hard-edged legal
procedurals. And indeed, Rita Mae Brown and her cat, Sneaky Pie,
have carved out a comfortable niche for themselves in the cozy
category, spinning tales (Cat on the Scent;
Murder, She Meowed;
Claws and Effect (Age of Unreason),
Murder on the Prowl) around the goings-on in
Crozet, a small Virginia town where everyone knows everyone else
and recipes and gossip are exchanged over the post office counter.
Mary Minor Haristeen ("Harry") is Crozet's postmistress
and the proud owner of two cats, Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, and one
corgi, Tee Tucker--animals with an uncanny ability to sniff out
secrets and hidden motives as well as mice and roast beef.
Pawing Through the Past capitalizes on
the myriad subtle relationships that form the backbone of
small-town culture, and which Brown and Sneaky Pie have carefully
woven throughout the Mrs. Murphy series. In a nicely appropriate
nod to that culture's rivalries and alliances, Brown has chosen a
high school reunion--traditional hotbed of simmering unease--as
her mise-en-scène. When each member of the Crozet High Class of
1980 receives an anonymous note stating, "You'll never get
old," most take it as a joke or a compliment. But when the
class womanizer turns up with a bullet between his eyes, and more
notes--and more bodies--start appearing, Harry and her menagerie
find themselves at the center of a revenge plot 20 years in the
making.
Brown's latest is replete with the sly asides
that have endeared her to animal lovers--"Cats are by
instinct and inclination dedicated anarchists"--and with the
naively humorous "conversations" between the animals
themselves. When Pewter, watching a team of police officers
wrestling a stiff corpse out of a dumpster, wonders, "Why
don't they just break his arms and legs?" Murphy replies
knowingly, "They'd pass out. Humans are touchy about their
dead." Unfortunately, these favorable attributes can't quite
mask an incoherent plot, nor Brown's awkwardly pompous social
commentary: "By and large, the women looked better than the
men, testimony to the cultural pressure for women to fuss over
themselves." But Brown's legions of fans will doubtlessly
forgive these shortcomings, concentrating instead on the antics of
a memorable four-legged and furry trio. --Kelly Flynn
