Penned: A Kate Turner, D.V.M. Mystery

It’s Halloween in Brady’s entertaining fourth mystery featuring no-nonsense veterinarian Kate Turner (after 2017’s Chained), and Main Street in Oak Falls, N.Y., is crowded with assorted zombies, princesses, and ghouls. Kate spots a harried middle-aged woman attempting to persuade her befuddled aunt, Gloria LaGuardia, to wait for her while she tracks down her rambunctious teenage children. Kate steps up to help. It soon becomes clear that Gloria is suffering from dementia. She thinks she recognizes a face here and there, but the names are beyond the reach of her memory. Suddenly, she grips Kate’s arm and says, “It all came back to me just now. Someone evil is here. I saw him.” A few days later Gloria is dead, and Kate is roped into a search for a murderer who has been successfully hiding out from the FBI for 21 years. Animal lovers won’t mind that the mystery solving takes a back seat to a wealth of fascinating pet lore, including how to clip a cockatoo’s toenails and the proper method for tick removal. (Oct.)