Woof at the Door
Laura Morrigan

Genre:
Mystery
Rating:

Animal behaviorist Grace Wilde keeps her ability to psychically communicate with furry and feathered critters under wraps. But when a Doberman turns out to be the only witness to a crime, Grace will have to let the cat out of the bag in order to catch a killer.

Grace Wilde’s job is anything but normal. When she’s not helping out at the zoo by comforting agitated lemurs, she’s listening to the woes of annoyed house pets. Grace’s life gets even more complicated, though, when the cops summon her to a crime scene to help deal with the murder victim’s terrified Doberman.

The pooch turns out to be the only one who saw what happened the night of the shooting—and only Grace can get the information out of him. The problem is, how will Grace tell the distractingly gorgeous Sergeant Kai Duncan that it’s the dog who’s giving her the intel without spilling her big secret or sounding crazy? Left on her own, Grace will have to follow the pup’s lead to track down the killer. But she’ll have to be careful—or curiosity may end up killing the cat whisperer.

Review

Grace Wilde is an animal behaviorist who has a wide range of clients including distressed animals in the local zoo and misbehaving pets. Her latest “patient” is Jax, a distraught Doberman, who is the only witness to his owner’s murder. Grace is not an ordinary pet therapist, though. She is able to psychically communicate with animals, and she has been working with Jax to help him deal with his trauma and also to see if she can gain any clues about the murder. Although her skills as an “animal whisperer” are helping Jax, they are causing problems for Grace. Only her best friends know about her special talent, and she doesn’t want to admit to Kai Duncan, the handsome crime lab sergeant assigned to the case, that she can communicate with animals. So when Grace gives vague answers to Kai as to the source of some of her information, she appears guilty when all she is trying to hide is her psychic abilities. In addition to getting unwanted attention from the cops, if the killer realizes Grace might be able to get information from the murder victim’s dog, she may be putting herself in danger.

I was a bit skeptical about the premise that the main character can “talk” animals, but this book is better than I could have imagined. Grace’s special talent is handled in a believable and entertaining way. She isn’t debating world politics with the animals, but communicates with them through simple words and images and it’s really fun to read. Grace is a likeable character. She isn’t perfect, but she isn’t afraid to admit when she makes mistakes and seems to be learning and growing as a character throughout the book.

Grace’s interactions with animals are definitely the best parts of the book. She communicates with animals throughout the book, including Jax and her own dog Moss, a lemur, a Jaguar, and even Sergeant Duncan‘s cat Dusty. In addition, Grace has a great relationship with her more fashionable and confident sister Emma as well as Grace’s childhood friend Wes, now a successful attorney. Sparks fly from the beginning between Grace and Kai and there seems to be a possibility for romance in the future, but I’m glad this book revealed chemistry between the two without throwing them into a full-fledged romance. This is potential that can be visited in future books in the series, which hopefully will be coming soon!
I had a couple suspicions about the murderer of pro football player Mark Richardson, but the story was much more complicated than I thought. There are enough suspects to keep you guessing and the motive was unexpected, resulting in an interesting mystery. Grace doesn’t limit her questioning to four-legged witnesses; she questions many of the humans involved, too. I think Grace relates well to people, even if she isn’t confident in her social skills, and it helps her to get information about the murder. As an animal lover, I really enjoyed this book from the beginning until the very end, and look forward to reading future books in this unique new series.

Fans of books by Judi McCoy or Cynthia Baxter will also like this debut by Laura Morrigan.

Reviewed by Christine K