Murder, My Tweet
This is one in a series of Chet Gecko mysteries. Chet is a private investigator at his school. His partner, Natalie Attired, is in trouble and he sets out to clear her name so that she can return to school.
Most of the time, I tend to avoid books where animals take on human-like characters, which is what happens in this book. Chet Gecko, Private Eye, is really some sort of small, green animal. He is never really identified, but his illustrations make him look something like a frog. Although most of the animals in the story appear to be some made-up combination of different animal types.
Chet's first case involves a parakeet and a ring tail (an combination of cat, fox and raccoon). The animals are students in an elementary school where even the teachers are some sort of animal.
In spite of the animal characters, this story reads well. I followed along through Chet's case as he tries to clear his partner's good name. He has to do this during recess and before and after school. In between working on the case, Chet attends his classes and tries to appear attentive. Something he didn't seem to be very good at.
There are some cute jokes shared between the partners and the humor is clean and well constructed. The characters could be compared to any group of elementary school children on any playground; the typical bully, the show-off, the good student and, of course, the caring snoopers, which includes, Chet, of course.
This book is one in a series of Chet mysteries. Even though it is part of a series, it reads well on its own. Unlike so many series novels where one has to read all the books to understand what is going on.
