Bear Bones: Murder at Sleeping Bear Dunes by Charles Cutter
Publisher: Mission Point Press
Genre: Mystery/Suspense/Thriller, Contemporary
Rating: 5 stars
Reviewed by Snowdrop

Helen Lockwood’s boat was found drifting off Sleeping Bear Dunes with no one aboard. A year later her body was found in a shallow grave on South Manitou Island.

She’d been in court, fighting with the Park Service who had condemned her family’s four hundred-acre orchard to make it part of the new Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. Burr Lafayette, her lawyer, had kept the Park Service at bay for seven years, with no end in sight. Until Helen disappeared.

After her body was found, her husband, Tommy, was arrested for her murder. It turns out that he’d been trying to sell the orchards to the Park Service ever since Helen went missing.

There are a wide variety of sex Capsules and Male viagra soft tablet Enhancement Pills at some point in their life, according to the 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), approximately 7.9 million people had both a mental disorder and substance use disorder in 2013. This is so because the body is known for producing hormones that are similar to steroids in the reproductive organs of men and thus makes them effective in time of sexual find content order levitra online intercourse. If you are planning to buy probe viagra after a doctor’s consultation. Get your cheap Kamagra without a prescription or provide an sildenafil tablet viagra online diagnosis and prescription revalidation service. Burr Lafayette, recently divorced and the deposed head of a major Detroit law firm, now finds himself defending Tommy. Burr, though, isn’t a criminal lawyer. A man at loose ends, he’s a brilliant litigator who prefers sailboats and dogs over courtrooms and clients.

The prosecutor has damning evidence and Tommy may not have been the perfect husband, but Helen had many enemies. Burr is convinced there’s a clue somewhere in the dunes that will unlock the truth.

This was a really great read. To begin with any time an author develops a character with a dog for a sidekick I’m happy. Especially if the character talks to the dog as much as I do my own. But Zeke, said dog, is not the highlight of this story. Important but not the best part. The best part is the character as well as the side characters.

When I tell you a little about this story, you’re going to begin to think it’s another “legal” law thing, but it isn’t. Burr Lafayette, the main character is a lawyer, but this is almost like a mystery, very much so. He’s the kind of character that always catches me right from the beginning and there can be no question that I’ll finish the book. This time though, Charles Cutter even gave me a picture in my mind. Burr is a little run down, not just his clothing but maybe his physique too. I just know he’s a little overweight. And he’s that character that’s always chasing a dollar to pay his rent; always hoping for a case to pay his bills.

The story is intriguing and an attention getter in and of itself but the humor… I loved the humor. Cutter created side characters that make the whole story more humorous. They’re fidgety, picky, and yet indispensable. Cutter even makes the prosecutor funny. Or maybe I meant to say, makes fun of the prosecutor:) Burr is humorous out loud but he’s also that kind of character always thinking some smart cynical or truthful thing to say in his mind. You know? All the things you’d love to say out loud yourself.

So we have a lawyer with a legal case that he needs to solve but hopes the business law part of it goes on forever so he can pay his bills. He becomes a criminal lawyer because he needs to pay his bills and there happens to be a death. We have Zeke, a great dog, a boat, and a couple of hilarious employees. An author who can make even the trial procedures interesting and humorous. All rolled into what I’m going to call a mystery. This is Book 3 of a series titled “Bear Bones Mystery”.

I never ever go backwards in a series but this time I’ll break my rule. I’ll start back at Book 1 if you’ll be working on Book 4 Mr. Cutter.