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Avery Andrews is busy unpacking her office in Dacus, South Carolina when a new client comes in, widow Maggy Avinger. Maggy wants to stop her late husband's last wish. He had ordered a large statue be erected above his grave carved with the message proclaiming that his wife poisoned him. After looking into it and finding out that the husband really did die of his disease and not from any foul play, Avery tries to figure out how to get around the last wishes. Avery joins some other people from town to volunteer to help save some local vegetation from lands sold off to a developer, Lionel Shoal. Shoal had gotten the land but assured the owner that he would leave some of the wetland alone and make it a reserve, but it's soon discovered that he isn't going to protect any of the fragile wetlands and will develop all of it. The woman who sold Shoal the land is devastated and asks Avery to stop him. The next day, as people are saving more plants, the body of an abusive man is found shot and stuffed into a deserted mine. Soon the town has another unnatural death to deal with, as the story of a local woman who has died in a gruesome way is uncovered and then, to the horror of the community and the police, yet another person is found murdered. On top of all that, Avery gets a poisoned pen letter warning her about how bad it looks that she is sharing business space with an unmarried man. Before long Avery discovers that other people in town have also gotten nasty letters, including the people who have been murdered. Avery can't help but wonder if her life and the lives of other people who received the poisoned letters are in danger. And, as the title of the book mentions, a grown-up potbelly pig has gone wild in town, raiding the local vegetable gardens and outrunning the local police. HOG WILD is the latest in the Avery Andrews series and writer Cathy Pickens has managed to create yet another well-crafted and thoughtful story. I only wish that another title had been chosen. HOG WILD sounds like it is a light-hearted wacky cozy and this book is much deeper and more profound than a simple story dealing with a pig gone feral. Along with her job as a lawyer, Avery has to think about the whole issue of family and how an adult has to come to terms with the reality of those relationships. In this book, the subject of family abuse, bad marriages and suicide and how those things are dealt with in the community is also discussed with deep reflection and mature thought. We again meet the regulars in this series, the people who are family and friends of Avery, and the new characters introduced for this book are interesting and memorable people. The small town of Dacus is the location of the story and the charm of the Southern small town can also be thought of as a character in this book. HOG WILD is a solid well-written book, filled with somber issues of the day and written in a thoughtful way. The people we meet here, the way they deal with the problems, and the mystery makes this book a must read.
Reviewed by A. L. Katz, May 2007
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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