Nic Saint Presents The Mysteries of Max Series - First Three Books

 

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“Aw, she looks so sweet,”

Just then, Dooley wandered into the room. Dooley is Odelia’s mom’s cat, a beigeish ragamuffin and not the smartest cat around. He’s also my best friend. “Hey, Max,” he said now as he leisurely strode in. “What’s up?” “What’s not up is the more apt question,” I grumbled, gesturing at Odelia, who turned and clasped her pillow with a beatific expression on her face.

“Aw, she looks so sweet,” said Dooley, looking on from the 

My name is Max, by the way

bedside carpet. “We’ve got an important interview scheduled in an hour, and if she doesn’t get a move on she’s going to miss it.” “One hour? She can make that. Easy.” “Well, unless she gets up right now she won’t,” I insisted. And then I got it. Maybe we could serenade her. Dooley and I had recently joined the cat choir. We got together once a week to rehearse, and even had our own conductor. We sang all the old classics, like Cat’s in the Cradle, Year of the Cat, What’s New Pussycat and things like that. The good stuff. Since we usually practiced at night, though, we were having a hard time finding a regular spot to get together since the neighbors didn't seem to

appreciate our nascent talent as much as we did. “What was that song we did last night?” I asked Dooley. He looked up at me. “Mh? What song?” “For the cat choir. What was that last song we did? The one that made the mayor throw that old shoe at you?” Dooley frowned at this, and rubbed the spot on his back where the shoe had connected. 

“That wasn’t funny, Max. That really hurt, you know.” “Yeah, but what was the song?” I insisted. “Wake me up before you go go,” he said. “The old Wham! classic.” “Of course,” I said with a grin. “Let’s do it now. I’m sure it’ll be a nice way to wake Odelia up, and put her in the right mood for her interview.” I jumped down from the bed, and took up position next to Dooley. We both cleared our throats, just like our conductor Shanille, Father Reilly’s tabby had taught us, and burst into song...

Odelia

“Wake me up before you go go,” I howled. “Don’t keep me hanging on like a yo-yo,” wailed Dooley. And even though we hadn’t practiced the song a lot—the mayor’s shoe had kinda ruined the moment—I thought we were doing a pretty good job. It probably wouldn’t have carried George Michael’s approval, as cats don’t exactly sing like humans. When we sing, it sounds more like… a bunch of cats being strangled. Nevertheless, the effect was almost magical. We hadn’t even gotten to the chorus yet, when Odelia buried her head in her pillow, then dragged the pillow over her head, and finally threw the pillow at us. “Stop it already, you guys. You sound horrible!" she muttered. "It's Wham!,” I told her. “So it can’t be horrible. And if you don’t get up right this minute, you’re going to be late for your important interview.” At this, she darted a quick look at her alarm clock, and uttered a startled yelp. The next moment she scrambled from the bed, practically tripped over Dooley and me, and raced for the bathroom. “Sh... “Why didn’t you wake me?!”

Odelia is the lead "human" in this series, The Mysteries of Max, by Nic Saint. However, the true main character is Max, who appears on each book cover. This is the first time reading Saint, so I started with the first three bundle set. I enjoyed meeting each of the cat characters, with the top three, besides Max, Douley and Hester who are part of the family, as pets to Odelia's mother and grandmother. 

Odelia is a reporter, or I should say, the only reporter, for the local newspaper, the Gazette, in Hamilton Cove. She is also from a long line of female family members who are able to speak, Cat. So, many times, it is actually Max who chases the stories down and presents them to Odelia for inclusion in the news. Additionally, Odelia's uncle, is the local police chief, who shares anything and everything about all official police issues of importance. But one key gift that Odelia has is that she is able to use all the information she gains from this place or that, and is able to put together a terrific story of interest to town residents.

Especially, since a murder recently occurred that was the first in town in recent memory... 

But that is not the only thing that has occurred, a new detective has been hired by her uncle! And he is not happy to have a local reporter having complete access to his investigations!

What's worse, for Max and Dooley, that is, is that he has a cat, Brutus, living with him! And Brutus proves to be just as macho in his opinions as the new officer, Chase Kingsley. Rumors are flying quickly about Brutus because he is not only a bully, but has set his eyes on the beautiful Harriett! And she is responding to his attentions! Dooley, of course, has been in love with her for ages, so is immediately upset, while Max is much more concerned about how he is attempting to take over the town as the new "cop cat..." 

Harriett

Brutus

Now, here's the thing for me... This series has about 50 books, so, assuming I would be interested in the entire series, I started from the beginning... Indeed, I was prepared to enjoy a new series that I had not heard of... As many of you know, I've been reading cat mystery books for about 20 years now... And I hadn't found a book that I didn't enjoy... Until now...

First, I realized after finishing the third book, that they could be what has been called, 

formula writing... Note that I don't know whether this changed later, but I had already made my decision after three books. The books are long on characterization, without much of a plot. Each book brings in somebody from outside the community--notably somewhat famous and then a murder occurs. 

The first book was a writer, who turned up dead after many years resting in the remains...in an outhouse... 

The second was the murder of the "star" of a reality show. All of the family characters were there... It wasn't even disguised much, for surely the family was the Kardashians...

The third was a pop singer--I figured out who it probably was, but since the star was supposedly drugging and sexing all night every night... I won't designate who...

In any event, I found that dwelling on the negative aspects of who we might be "fans" of, felt...just...wrong. And, frankly, it doesn't take much ingenuity to select who was going to be the next victim, and then do a satire of the real-life individuals...

As if, garnering laughs was to be the main thrust of the victims... Frankly, since I'm not known for my sense of humor based upon "trashing" the image of anybody, I was turned off by the exaggerated portrayals... To me, that whole decision to dwell on somebody who could be identified from the book is way outside of the common "cozy" genre that we all love to escape into...

Additionally, the second book had really bad formatting issues, so much so that I had to begin to guess what had been said since you could tell that the transfer of the manuscript into ebook form had been extremely mishandled... BTW, I tried to get a refund on this book and haven't heard anything. By buying a set, you risk missing the short deadline that Amazon has for returning books, even though, in this case, it was natural to read the first book first!

Finally, I was offended by the characterization of an elder in the book as being more like a "cougar" of an age which could be caused by the onset of memory issues. It was ok for a grandmother to declare the new police officer a hottie in order to tease her single granddaughter... But when this is belabored, just to produce a laugh? I found it lacking in good taste. Frankly as was much of the satire of supposed stars who visited this well-known area...

I was also offended by the details of cat life in general. Some was funny, like the cat choir, who were annoying all the neighbors, but, for me, a cat person, to include how cats spend grooming or greeting each other simply was not necessary. Even cats deserve privacy...and this author did nothing to give any of his characters somewhat of a "mystery" to be learned, little by little as the series continued. And pitting two cats against each other in order to supposedly solve the mystery was overkill in my opinion... Cats activities dominating books and I'm not impressed? Well, that just means that I value the mysteries and how they are written much more than trying to win a following by lack of respect and common courtesy... So, just my personal opinion, of course...

I won't be binging on this series...There are too many others out there that provide exactly the right balance between the animal and people characters...and the mystery solving... Having cats "tell", after hearing as "confidential informants,"  the amateur detective and/or official police officers, is "cheating" in my opinion... Else, it really isn't a mystery--just a fantasy of a tattle-tale group of cats who happen to have a "witch" as an owner... Naah...