Tender Is the Bite

At the start of Quinn’s cleverly plotted 11th Chet and Bernie mystery (after 2020’s Of Mutts and Men), PI Bernie Little of the Little Detective Agency is on the road with his canine partner, Chet, in the unidentified southwestern U.S. city where they live when Bernie realizes that their battered Porsche is being followed. Through some creative maneuvering, they block the car on their tail and thus meet an attractive and very frightened potential client, Mavis, who was driving the car. When Mavis spots a bumper sticker for Griffin Wray, a candidate for U.S. senator, in Bernie’s car, she panics and runs off. In their effort to discover why Mavis was scared of Wray, Bernie and Chet must contend with dead bodies that disappear and reappear in unlikely places, spying neighbors, and job offers that are too good to be true, not to mention a pesky ferret. Along the way, narrator Chet is a source of wisdom and innate doggie joie de vivre, making this a real pleasure for anyone who has ever looked into a dog’s eyes and asked: who’s a good boy? This outing should win this offbeat series new fans. (July)