Dance of the Winnebagos - Ann Charles

   2011; 366 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Book 1 (out of 6) in the “Jackrabbit Junction Humorous Mystery” series.  Genres : Romantic Mystery; Humorous Fiction; Beach Read.  Overall Rating : 6*/10.

 

    Claire Morgan is about to experience the longest month of her life.

 

    She’s agreed to stay with her grandfather, Harley “Gramps” Ford for the entire month of April.  In an RV park somewhere in Arizona, in some podunk town called Jackrabbit Junction, mostly filled with retirees.  Where gray-haired geezers get their biggest daily thrills by watching blue-haired geezerettes sashay up and down the street.

 

    33-year-old Claire would love to meet some handsome guy her age, as she’s currently unattached.  But none seem to live in Jackrabbit Junction, to no one's surprise.  Oh well, it’s only for a month and come May, she can return to North Dakota having done her familial duty.

 

    You don’t know it, Claire, but Jackrabbit Junction holds some deadly secrets, just waiting to be dug up.  And we know just the dog who will do the digging.

 

What’s To Like...

    Dance of the Winnebagos is the opening volume in Ann Charles’s 6-book “Jackrabbit Junction Humorous Mysteries” series.  The series’ title notwithstanding, I highly recommend you read this book when you’re in the mood for a Romantic Mystery tale.  More on that in a bit.

 

    The story is set in the copper-mining area of southern Arizona, with Tucson being the nearby big city.  That resonated with me, since I reside in Arizona, and once upon a time, the company I worked for supplied a number of chemical products to the copper mines.

 

    The Mystery angle starts right away.  Gramps’s beagle, Henry, digs up a bone while nosing around in an old mine, and Claire recognizes it as a human femur.  Questions arise immediately.  How old is it?  Where’s the rest of the skeleton?  Will this affect the value of the mine, which belongs to Ruby, a current Jackrabbit Junction resident, and who is contemplating selling it for some much-needed debt relief.

 

    That’s a very promising start, but it takes a back seat to the Romance angle.  Mac Garner, nephew to the mine’s owner and all-around hunk, shows up to help his aunt determine the maximum worth of her two mines.

 

    Claire and Mac meet, gets the hots for each other, and a series of misunderstandings and misadventures give rise to the Humorous angle.  If you like Hallmark Romance movies, you’ll love this plot thread; there’s even a precocious little girl that every Hallmark movie has.  Supplemental humor comes in the form of Chester and Manuel, two of Gramps’s Euchre-playing (and women-chasing) buddies.

 

    The ending is a three-phase affair.  The main mystery storyline (whose femur is it) is resolved in Chapter 24; and the Romance and Money plot threads are dealt with in the next, and final, chapter.  “Extras” in the back of the book include “About the Author”, and “Five Fun Southwestern Facts about Ann Charles”, both of which I found fascinating to read.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.3/5 based on 2,320 ratings and 717 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.95/5 based on 3,357 ratings and 473 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    “Are you some kind of freak who plays with dead animals?”

    While most of Claire’s family considered her to be a few cherries short of a fruitcake, that didn’t mean she had to take any crap from this kid.  She glared at the girl.  “Who are you?”

    “I’m Ruby’s kid.”

    That explained the hair and freckles.  “You have a name?”

    “Jessica, but my friends and family call me Jess.”  She batted her eyelashes and offered Claire a want-to-be-my-friend-too smile.  (. . .)

    “Thanks for the lemonade, Jessica.”  (pg. 23)

 

    Gramps shot Claire a frown.  “What did you do now?”

    “What?  I didn’t do anything.”  Claire made a last-ditch attempt at playing the ‘I’m-innocent-I-swear’ routine.

    “Child, I wasn’t born yesterday.  When I walked up here, you two were circling each other like a pair of hungry hyenas hovering over a hunk of raw meat.”

     Claire sighed.  “Couldn’t you compare me to a prettier animal?  A cat would be nice.  Maybe even a swan.  Do swans fight?”  (pg. 191)

 

Kindle Details…

    Dance of the Winnebagos sells for $2.99 at Amazon.  The rest of the other books in the series are in the $3.99-$6.99 price range.  Ann Charles has two other e-book series: a 14-volume Deadwood Humorous Mystery (prices range from $2.99 to $7.99); and a 4-volume Deadwood Undertaker (prices range from $4.99 to $6.99).

 

If she ever saw Mac Garner again, she was going to cram her underwear down his throat until he choked on them.  (pg. 351)

    There’s a lot of cussing in Dance of the Winnebagos.  I counted 30 instances in the first 10%, which felt excessive.  Sexual innuendos abound, but to be fair, there was only one "on-screen” roll-in-the-hay, and you can guess who that involved.

 

    There were quite a few typos, including lightening/lightning, chords/cords, queue/cue, florescent/fluorescent, and pouring/poring.  Those last two occurred three times each.  Another round of editing would be beneficial.

 

    Plot twists are sparse and Claire’s sussing out of the various mystery questions was more a matter of convenient luck than skillful sleuthing.  Character development was blah: you know from the start who the good guys and baddies are, and that never changes.  The Romance and Mystery angles were both predictable.

 

    The writing style felt like it needed another round of polishing.  A plethora of literary devices were overused, including excessive similes, music references, cartoons on Claire’s t-shirts, Claire's craving of cigarettes, amorous thoughts, and the precocious little girl sassing about her mom’s poor parenting skills.

 

    So, does that mean this was a terrible book?  Not at all.  Despite the technical quibbling, Claire and Mac’s investigations into the mysteries and each other kept me turning the pages.  Dance of the Winnebagos may not be a deep taleread, but it is an ideal beach/airport read and I plan on reading at least one more entry in this series to see whether the writing and storytelling improve.   And to see what else Henry digs up.

 

    6 Stars.  One last thing.  At one point the word “snogging” finds its way into the text.  This is one of my favorite “Britishisms” of all times.  Kudos to Ann Charles for using in this story!