I like Block’s Bernie Rhodenbarr stories. They amuse me. I have found that I
need to space them out and not read them back to back, however, since he
tends to repeat details from one book to another. It can get annoying if you
don’t give yourself enough space between them. But it’s been awhile since I
last read one and I found this one on my shelf one night as I was prowling around
looking for something to read so I gave it a go.

One thing you have to know is that this series is fairly formulaic.
Bernie is going to burgle, is in the process of burgling, or has just burgled
some place, and someone shows up dead there. Bernie then has to find the murderer or
he’s going to end up taking the blame. That has been the essential plot line of
every book in this series that I’ve read so far. But this one is very
different, enjoyably so.

Bernie has a hot weekend planned with his latest flame in a quiet country
inn in upstate New York. Unfortunately, she cancels on him a couple days
before because she’s, yikes, about to get married. Bernie was not aware of
the other guy in her life and he is understandably bummed out. But he’s not
so bummed that he cancels the trip. Rather, he invites his extremely
short friend the lesbian dog groomer along instead. Not exactly the romantic
weekend he had planned but then the owner of the inn stocks a particularly
fine brand of whiskey which at least makes up for it a little. And there is
this book in the library of the inn that he’s kind of interested in finding.
It’s a book by Raymond Chandler, inscribed to Dashiell Hammett, that may
have been given to Hammett during a weekend they may have spent together
that Hammett may have left at the inn. Maybe. He’s just going to take a
little looksee around.

Things get interesting when they get there. They have to share a room and a
bed. The inn is snowed in and the snowstorm is predicted to last all
weekend. There is an extremely precocious kid that Bernie jokingly tells
he’s a burglar, which she blabs all over the place. Fortunately, it’s such
an absurd statement that no one believes it. Ha! And amazingly enough, his
ex-girlfriend and her groom show up for a quiet honeymoon weekend. Awkward
isn’t strong enough. And then, he finds a body in the library when he’s out
cruising in the middle of the night for the book. No phone, no one in or out
because of the snow and no way to call for help.

I enjoyed this one more than the others. Block is playing around with some
of the basic conventions of mysteries and mystery writers here and still
telling a funny whodunit. And the ending with it’s nod to the deus ex
machina strategy to save the hero is hilarious, especially when you realize
who the deus is in the machina. If you like Block, get it and read.