19th in the series. of 28 titles thru yr 2019

Agreed that the characters' opinions about life interfere with the pace of the later books in this series - including this one. There was not much compelling suspense in this installment. I keep reading the series, but I did feel like I plowed through this one just to finish it.

Three health care providers who work at the same hospital die, two of apparently natural causes and a third of electrocution in his electric car. Always a pleasure to read about Harry Haristeen and her furry friends, Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker. But sometimes the story lines are hard to believe and this is one of them.

Loved the early books, but recent ones are heavy on political/topical digressions. Characters go off on random half-page speeches about all sorts of things - health insurance, steroids, electric cars. I own the whole series, in hardback, except for the last few - not many series make that cut. I'll still keep reading the series, but I don't think I'll buy them automatically any more. I don't care what the author's politics are, and may agree with some of her views, but they shouldn't be shoe-horned (badly) into her fiction.

Minimal plot, maximum digressions. I miss the early books in the series—the ones where the plot actually made sense and I could keep up with the characters. By the time I got to the end of this book, I had no idea who the bad guy was, let alone why s/he was doing whatever it was that got him/her into trouble in the first place.

The mysteries and murder in the story are secondary to all the details about breast cancer. Ordinariily, I prefer to read non-fiction in non-fiction, but it does go into the emotional and physical aspects from a personal point of view, so I learned something from it. And as it is not a problem I have, I would not have borrowed a book to tell me about it.