Dog On It by Spencer Quinn

Every now and then I'll take a chance on a Kindle special - this book was on sale for $1.99 a few weeks ago and I decided to buy it even though I don't usually read mysteries.  It was definitely worth reading, but I'm not sure I'll read the sequels - for one thing, they're really expensive!  The Kindle books are $11.99 and up.  Seems pricey for mysteries that have been out for a couple of years.

Dog On It by Spencer Quinn
(2009, Mystery)  11/6/12
Grade: 3.5

Chet is on the case, helping his private investigator partner Bernie solve the case of a missing teenager.  Unfortunately, since Chet is a dog, he has some trouble communicating with his owner, but Bernie is a pretty good investigator - although he needs Chet to solve the case!

This was a fun mystery that was narrated by Chet, the canine partner of a private investigator.  Chet is a great narrator - it’s a lot of fun to see Chet following clues (and getting sidetracked by stray Cheetos and pet birds).  The problem was that the mystery went very slowly - Chet had the case solved by halfway through the book and then we had to wait... and wait... and wait... for Bernie to catch up.  As much as I liked Chet as a narrator, he had some limitations when it came to solving the crime.  Overall, this was a fun read but it had a few problems as well.

There seems to be a trend of books narrated by animals - I've read a couple of other ones this year.  Although I like the idea, they all seemed to have some flaws.