Cat Cafe #8
In Shock and Paw, Cate Conte’s Cat Café books, Maddie James lives on the New England coast’s Daybreak Island. She runs a cat café with her cat JJ, Junkyard Johnny, and has developed quite a reputation as an amateur sleuth. Given that she lives with her grandfather, who is retired from law enforcement and is now a PI, it isn’t too shocking that she knows how to investigate properly. But Maddie’s true passion is pets, especially the cats at her café looking for a forever home, which can be difficult when designer pets are being advertised all over the island on fliers. Her friend Katrina isn’t exactly thrilled about them either, and is ready to sprint into battle against breeders, dragging Maddie along with her. Luckily Maddie’s own level headedness wins out and she manages to talk Katrina down from rushing off to do anything too rash – at least for the moment.
There are plenty of other things to distract her as well, such as being dragged into assisting the Christmas event committee. She had intended to stay far away from all committee based things for a while, giving herself a break to focus on the holidays, her boyfriend, business, and family, but her mother manages to push just the right buttons to pull her back in. There are more problems than Maddie had expected. Then everything shifts when Donna Carey, publisher of the island’s only daily newspaper, turns up dead, electrocuted by her Christmas lights. Maddie’s best friend, Becky, is the one who discovers Donna and quickly becomes suspect number one in her death. Christmas committee business can take a back seat to clearing Becky’s name. While local authorities are not pleased to have her inserting herself into the investigation, they know better than to shut her out entirely as she has given them plenty of fruitful leads in the past.
New readers will enjoy Maddie’s secure spot on the island. Long time readers will enjoy watching Maddie continue to make a success of her move back to the island. This is a book for animal lovers, and especially friends of all felines. While Maddie isn’t a fan of breeders, she and Katrina only really have it out for those who do not take proper care of the animals and see them more as dollar signs than pets. Cate Conte really lets readers into Maddie’s head to see how she puts clues together. I enjoyed that there were plenty of aspects of the case that involved expertise that Maddie did not have any clue about, and that she had to rely on experts and friends to help her figure out the technical details to make sense of it all. Shock and Paw takes readers deep into the cat culture and breeding world to see it isn’t all just Christmas collars and cute kittens. My own love of animals made it so I could not put Shock and Paw down until I knew all the little fuzzies were safe and sound thanks to Maddie and her friends. I suggest Shock and Paw for anyone who shares a deep love of cats and enjoys a bit of suspense in their cozy. – Carla Schantz