Who knew that owls could cause such violent controversy? In Owl Be Home for Christmas by Donna Andrews, eminent zoologist Dr. Blake decides to hold Owl Fest 2019 at the Caerphilly Inn just before Christmas, and ornithologists from all over the world show up. There are strange controversies such as arguments over taxodermic labels of owls and whether to kill the bard owls in order to preserve the habitat for the endangered spotted owls. And of course Meg Langslow has been stuck with the job of organizing this conference, which takes place in one of the worst blizzards the area has seen in years. Her whole family, minus Meg’s brother, Rob, and his fiancee, have settled into the five star inn, so Michael and the twins are nearby. Meg, however, is too busy taking care of the logistics to spend much time with them.
The day of the big banquet, as Dr. Blake is examining the banquet room, he gets confronted by Dr. Oliver Frogmore of Buckthorn College, the most contentious, misogynist, and white supremacist person at the conference. The egotistic Dr. Frogmore thinks he should be seated at the head table, despite the fact that Dr. Blake hasn’t assigned a table as the head table, pushing Dr. Blake to designate the table Dr. Frogmore has chosen as the head table. However, no one wants to sit there with him besides his lacky, Dr. Ned Churney. As the dinner progresses, suddenly Dr. Frogmore falls over dead. And now we have another locked room mystery, since the storm prevents anyone from coming or going from the inn.
Anyone who has followed my reviews will know that I’m a huge fan of Donna Andrews and her books. I find them clever and witty, with characters who truly come to life. Owl Be Home for Christmas is a fun book but not one of Andrews’s strongest. I thought the method of murder was very creative. It was also fun to spend time with Ekaterina, the manager of the Caerphilly Inn, though we don’t see her love of conspiracy theories in this book. It was also nice to see Horace be pushed forward in his role as police officer/ crime scene analyst, despite his nerves and low self-esteem.
I understand the challenges the author faces in including the vast number of characters readers have come to know and love over the course of 26 books, but I do miss getting to spend time with the locals of Caerphilly. I also would have liked to see more involvement by the character of Michael, Meg’s husband, who comes across as flat and makes very few appearances in the book. Further, Meg’s mother doesn’t have the same attitude as grand dame that endears her to us in other books.
I still believe that the strongest book in this series is Lark, The Herald Angels Sing, the Christmas mystery from the year before. That book has a strong message of personal and women’s empowerment. Since the series was heading in the direction of great stories with messages, I was a bit disappointed not to find much of one in this book at all. And incidentally, the cover of the book incorrectly calls the aforementioned Christmas mystery Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, taking away from the theme of the titles’ having puns of bird babes in each one.
The audiobook is performed by Bernadette Dunne, who does an incredible job with this series. Each of her voices suits the character clearly, and Dunne makes listeners feel like a part of the book. I highly recommend the audio edition of this book.
Despite my concerns that the quality of Owl Be Home for Christmas is less than other books in the series, I still enjoyed this fun book. I give it four stars.
