Book 13, 2021

Cat's Eyewitness by Rita Mae Brown

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



On Wednesday night, I finished reading Cat's Eyewitness. Coincidentally, the thirteenth book I read this year was the thirteenth book in Rita Mae Brown's "Mrs Murphy" mystery series.

With the holiday season upon them, Harry and her BFF, Susan Tucker, visit the monastery in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Crozet, VA. While admiring the statue of the Virgin Mary, the two women are there to bear witness when the statue begins crying tears of blood. Although Brother Handle, the head of the monastery, wishes to keep the miracle under wraps until they have time to ponder its significance, word leaks out, and the monastery is overrun with people wanting to see the spectacle for themselves. After one of the monks is found dead at the base of the statue, it is initially determined he died of natural causes. When a murder takes place soon after, Harry smells a rat. At her insistence, the monk's body is exhumed...but the coffin is empty. Harry's insatiable curiosity leads her to nose around, much to the chagrin of her pets: Mrs Murphy, Pewter, and Tee Tucker.

In addition to the miracle and the murders, Harry is worrying about paying her bills. Now that she's quit her job at the Post Office, all she has for income is her small farm. Her ex-husband, Fair, has asked her to marry him again, which is something else for her to stress over. It will be a miracle if Harry survives the holidays this year.

This story was just as quaint and lovely as all the others have been in the series. The murderer was rather easy to suss out, but not so much the motivation. I always enjoy getting reacquainted with the familiar characters in the series, as well as meeting new ones.

Favorite lines:
♥ Mrs Murphy gleefully imagined the state house overrun by rioting cats.
♥ If you didn't show up at the post office, it meant you were involved in a flaming seduction or too sick to walk.
♥ "That's why people are what they are...They can rationalize anything. Reality is pretty much irrelevant to them."
A couple of these quotes are quite relevant, considering the book was written in 2005.

Very good, four stars.