Vane Pursuit

The Peter Shandy Mysteries, Book 7

By: Charlotte MacLeod

Narrated by: John McLain

Antique weather vanes point Peter and Helen Shandy toward a gang of thieves in a mystery that's "the ultimate escapism...utterly hilarious" (Publishers Weekly).

The weather vanes of the famous craftsman Praxiteles Lumpkin are one of the great cultural treasures of rural Massachusetts. Helen Shandy, librarian at Balaclava Agricultural College, is roaming the countryside, camera in hand, capturing images of these lovely copper sculptures, trying to give them the attention they deserve. But each time she takes a picture, the featured vane vanishes. Could there be a gang of breezy-minded burglars on her tail? The night after Helen photographs the vane atop the famous Lumpkin soap works, the building burns to the ground. With the help of her husband, Peter, she tries to track the thieves-turned-arsonists. But when the things take a dangerous turn, Helen doesn't need a weather vane to see that a deadly wind is blowing.

©1989 Charlotte MacLeod (P)2021 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

A great story, but the narrator didn’t do such a good job

I love this story! A great adventure, and full of fun facts and delightfully erudite references as well as some sweet insights into living in harmony with the land.
The biggest annoyance to me was that the narrator mispronounced the name of a major character.
Catriona is an unusual name in the U.S. , that’s true, but I believe the proper pronunciation is “Ka-TREE-na” and not katroyna.
Also, I think Praxiteles is pronounced “Prax-IT-el-ees” but that’s not as big a concern as the name isn’t used as much.
It’s too late now, I guess, but I wish the narrator had found a way to say the words right.

Cozy and Smart

McLeod has built a small world peopled with interesting people inside the bounds of Balaclava Agricultural College. Balaclava is a good name for this school because it is in the coldest part of Maine, which McLeod obviously loves.

In this series, she has created an enclosed community filled with people we have all met and enjoyed or tried to avoid. Her situations are a bit outlandish, her characters are not.

In this book Helen Shandy, wife of Professor Peter Shandy and librarian of the college, finds herself stalked by thieves who are using her research to steal the antique weathervanes that she is documenting. From here we follow Helen to a reunion with her college roommates on a whale watching trip, where they wind up closer to the whales than expected. They have to be rescued by the Coast Guard from modern day pirates, and uncover an ring a ring of antique thieves. Who knew boring academics could have so much fun. Visiting Balaclava College with its eccentric academics is wonderful. It makes the real world tolerable.

Madcap romp won’t put you in a swivet

Delight in language and silliness threaded with affection for farmers, librarians and other eccentrics make this series a fun escape from reality. The reader does a pretty good job despite not always nailing pronunciations or flow. McLeod herself goes a little too far into the puzzle making/solving aspect of the genre, instead of giving a bit more to the captivating characters she’s created. But you the listener must try to make up for that via your own imagination.