As someone who got her first dog last year, I was super excited to check out Blake Mara’s The Dog Park Detectives. Crime fiction that combines dogs with a cosy murder mystery? Count me in!
I was even more excited to see a staffy included- represent! He’s not the main character’s dog- that’s a daschund, appropriately named Klaus- but he’s in there. That’s the main thing.
In fact, there’s a lot of different dogs, and they take up a good part of the novel. There are a lot of dog- themed puns, which become increasingly frequent as the book moves on.
The plot revolves around a group of relatively wealthy dog owners living in London, who have a group WhatsApp chat and call themselves ‘The Pack’. The group is led by Louise, CEO and owner of Klaus, the group also includes a Russian Lawyer with a scottie, a Journalist, and multiple of other women who are peripheral to the story.
There’s also a London hard man with an affenpinsher- of all dogs- and a creepy womaniser with a jack Russell. They’re the main blokes- among the women, most are pretty interchangeable and identified by their dogs- Tank, the frenchie, Nala the cocker spaniel, Banjo the Romanian rescue and two black labs named Jimmy Chew and Bark Vader, of all bloody things!
When Lousie and Irina, the Lawyer, find a dead body in the dog park while on a walk after a drunken night out, they immediately start poking their noses in. As you do.
When the body turns out to be none other than a former member of The Pack, whose young cockerpoo died earlier and who ultimately stopped coming on the walks as a result, the group becomes determined to find out what’s going on.
As the investigation goes on, suspects include the man’s ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend, his colleagues at his fintech company and the vets who treated his dog before she died.
In tandem with the investigation into Phil’s death, The Pack also has to contend with someone poisoning their dogs! None die- don’t worry- but there’s a lot of distress and the group becomes a sort of vigilante band to uncover the truth and work out if the two crimes are connected or not.
With clever writing and a focus on the dogs as well as the humans, Mara is able to make the dozens of characters easy to follow. While the women are interchangeable and the men one dimensional, the dogs really make the novel. They’re given personalities, and if you’re a dog owner yourself you’ll see a lot of passion and love for dogs in this book.
One thing that does bug me is the dialogue. Everyone, whether it’s the American Louise or the Russian Irina, or the London geezer Gav, all talks the same, using similar cheesy expressions. There’s so much exposition in the dialogue that it’s like nothing you’ll ever hear from a real person.
Also, no one, not even serious a serious dog lover, refers to their dogs as ‘Hounds’. And I’m not just talking the actual dogs that are part of the hound group- characters in the novel will just go ‘we must protect the hounds’, which no one says in real life. It’s the most bizarre way to refer to dogs that I’ve ever heard.
All that said, it’s not a bad book. As mentioned, the characterisation is thin but engaging, and the plot is easy to follow and surprisingly engaging despite the appealing dialogue.
At the end of the book, it’s clearly set up for a sequal and frankly, despite its issues, I’ll be reading the next one. It’s a good way to pass a long train journey and easy to follow, making it ideal for when you’re not paying full attention and trying to figure out where to get off during a thunder storm!
Ultimately, The Dog Park Detectives is an easy read that’s great for dog fans. It’s not the most intelligent, well-written cosy crime fiction novel ever, but it is a nice way to pass the time if you adore dogs and want to get your teeth into a book to pass the time.
