Chet

Chet is a big black dog with one white ear. His partner is Bernie Little, a wounded war veteran and ardent environmentalist. Together they run the Little Detection Agency somewhere “in the valley” in Arizona.

Chet and Bernie are the characters in a series of mystery books written by Spencer Quinn, which is the pen name of Peter Abrahams, an Edgar award-winning writer. I, however, strongly suspect Abrahams is really a dog cleverly masquerading as a human.

Of these books, Stephen King says, “Without a doubt, the most original mystery series currently available.” I totally concur.

I’ve just finished my eleventh book, “Tender is the Bite”, and it is a witty delight like all the books in the series. Every word in every book is written from the dog’s point of view. How Mr. Abrahams got so totally into the mind of a dog is the real mystery here.

I have never had a dog, but I love dogs and have known many. I have no doubt whatsoever that these books unlock the workings of a dog’s mind. (And that is why I have never had a dog. They need “their person” around all the time, and I can’t be there 24/7 for a dog. Road trips happen.)

Here are a few excerpts directly from Chet’s brain. If you are a lover of dogs, I’m fairly sure you will smile as you read them. And you might want to give the Chet and Bernie books a try.

“We took the ramp onto the freeway, headed to the orange tip of the sun, just over the edge of…of whatever the edge is, where you can’t see any farther. The edge itself is very hard to get to – in all our time on the road we’d never quite reached it. There’s lots to look forward to in life.”

“I think we’re being followed,” Bernie said. “We were creeping along at walking speed on the East Canyon Freeway at rush hour, stuck in an endless river of traffic. Of course we were being followed, followed by too many cars to count! Not only too many for me to count- I don’t go past two- but also for Bernie. And Bernie’s always the smartest man in the room, one of the reasons the Little Detective Agency is so successful, leaving out the finances part.”

“There was a bowl of kibble with- oh how nice- some crumbled biscuit treat mixed in waiting for me in the kitchen. Can you go from feeling no hunger to being out of your mind with it in no time flat? Oh, but yes! Try it sometime!.”