Ann Littlewood

this is a fun, well written read. not perfect, but definitely well done and engaging throughout. good use of language and a pretty good mystery as well.

iris is 24 or 25 but sounds far older, for sure. it was hard for me to picture her as she was supposed to be, but that didn't interfere with my overall enjoyment. things that might not make sense to readers even 8 years later are that not everyone had a cell phone and that the internet was accessed via modem/ethernet cord. not sure that was the standard 8 years ago, and in 5 years young readers won't even understand what she's talking about there. also iris seemed to respond irrationally snippily to denny, but maybe that reflects reality in how there are some people we are just badly behaved around. those are my only real gripes with this.

i liked it quite a bit, am definitely interested in reading the other 2 in the series, and hope that she continues to write because she's talented and fun.… (mere)

This is the third book in the really entertaining "Zoo Mysteries" series by Ann Littlewood. Ms Littlewood has years of experience working in a zoo in Portland, OR and her experience shows in her books set in a fictional zoo in nearby Vancouver, WA.

In this book, bird keeper Iris Oakley helps the zoo to take in some exotic birds and reptiles discovered at a drug raid. As the officials seem dis-interested in persuing the animal-related charges, Iris starts looking into things. And gets into danger, of course.

Endangered has a lot more character development than in the prior two books. The mystery is well done. There is plenty of animal-related appeal, but there is somewhat less zoo backdrop than in prior books.… (mere)

I started on this book immediately after finishing [Night Kill], the first in the series. I liked [Did Not Survive] even more than the [Night Kill]. It has the same great setting of being 'backstage' at a small Northwest zoo, but the mystery storyline is stronger.

As in the first book, the mystery is the death of a zookeeper. An elephant is the initial primary suspect this time, but it is fairly quickly determined to be a human murderer. There are a number of situations swirling around that may or may not be related to the murder: conflict between crew members (past and present), new crew members with past secrets, things disappearing from around the zoo, and anti-zoo activists picketing the zoo. I did not pick out the culprit on my own, but when the who-dun-it was revealed, I realized I hadn't paid attention to clues that were there all along.… (mere)