Owl Be Home for Christmas

By: Donna Andrews

Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne

Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins

Publisher's Summary

While trapped by a snowstorm at a conference, a visiting ornithologist is murdered. Now, nobody may make it home in time for Christmas...unless Meg comes to the rescue.

©2019 Donna Andrews (P)2019 Dreamscape Media, LLC

I love this series!

I love all the characters in this series. I’ve listened to the entire series 3 times and some of the books more than that. I hope it will continue and Meg will continue to be her same snarky self!

Another excellent installment

Donna Andrews has crafted another excellent installment in her Meg Langslow series. Bernadette Dunne, once again gave a stellar performance giving distinct voices to all the characters. I enjoyed this production as usual as I always do with this series.

Just keeps getting better!

There is so much here. The family is as interesting as the Durrells of Corfu plus a murder mystery plus a terrorist plus educational plus natural disaster. Every time I read it I find more to interest me!

Worth waiting for!

Not a dissapointment! Donna Andrews writes yet another funny, imaginative, and original mystery that I will be rereading soon. It was that good.

One of Donna Andrew’s Best!

Owls be Home For Christmas had new characters, a surprise ending,and plenty of Meg’s family members. Meg and Rose Noir seemed to have matured into believable individuals I would like to know.

Another great listen!

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.

Great author

Love it great story line kept me guessing through the whole book great ending, reader.

As usual

I think that this one was the most fun yet. Anxiously awaiting the newest version

cute enjoyable

enjoyed this light read with bits of interesting owl information nice read for a car ride.

Puntastic!

puntastic, situational-humor, verbal-humor, amateur-sleuth, family-dynamics, murder-investigation, blizzards

Come for the laughs and puns, stay for a good mystery, and perhaps to learn some things!
It's nearing Hanukkah and Christmas and India holidays, plus Japanese and vegetarian interests when everyone wants to be with their friends and family in their own homes in the US, Australia, Japan, and elsewhere. But instead they are stuck in a five star resort in Caerphilly, Virginia snowed in by an unexpected pair of blizzards while attending a scientific conference, Owl Fest, for ornithologists and others chaired by Grandfather Montgomery Blake, the acclaimed zoologist. It's a good thing that Cousin Horace is there with the Langslow family since he is a Crime Scene Tech and the only law enforcement on scene because the landlines and cell phones are out and there are only two satellite phones. Of course Dr Langslow is there, and that's a good thing because he's also the county's Medical Examiner and the death is not a simple one (and not just because 200 of the guests are suspects).
Let the sleuthing begin!
Bernadette Dunne continues to be totally fantastic as the voice of Meg Langslow and entourage!