The Hunt Ball: A Novel (Foxhunting Mysteries)
by Rita Mae Brown
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Book Summary Information
Author: Rita Mae BrownEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2006-09-26
ISBN: 0345465504
Number of pages: 352
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of The Hunt Ball: A Novel (Foxhunting Mysteries)
Book Review: The Hunt Ball
Summary: 4 Stars
Rita Mae Brown writes a sparkling mystery that takes place in the world of Virginia fox hunting society. This is a unique setting, with well-off to wealthy people that keep horses on their estates. The hunting season is in the winter, so the riding and the jumps are dangerously exciting.
The animals converse with more style than the humans do in this story. Like the black fox, Inky, and her daughter Georgia, talking about human ideas on the afterlife:
"Some believe they go up to the sky and play harps. Other think they go to paradise and have forty virgins if they die a martyr's death," Inky wryly commented. "And then there are those who think they come back in some other form at some other time."
"We could have been humans?" Georgia thought out loud.
"I don't know. They call it reincarnation, and if it's true and a human comes back as a fox, it would be a step up, " Inky confidently replied.
The foxes, by the way, are not killed. In fact the main character, Sister, feeds the foxes in the wintertime when food is scarce. She even includes de-worming medication when needed.
Sister is the master of hounds, which means she breeds and raises a number of foxhounds, and she trains them to hunt. She is the person in charge during the hunt, and the position is a responsibility she takes seriously. And as if all this weren't enough, there is murder most foul at a local exclusive girls' school.
And very soon, Sister is on the scent of the murderer.
I like this series because it takes me into a world I never knew about. There are enough twists and turns to keep reading, right on through. As a dyed in the fur animal lover, I find the conversations among dogs, horses, foxes, and even Sister Jane Arnold's cat to be fascinating.
Great fun reading.
Summary of The Hunt Ball: A Novel (Foxhunting Mysteries)
?A rich, atmospheric murder mystery . . . rife with love, scandal . . . redemption, greed and nobility,? raved the San Jose Mercury News about Outfoxed, Rita Mae Brown?s first foxhunting masterpiece. In The Hunt Ball, the latest novel in this popular series, all the ingredients Brown?s readers love are abundantly present: richness of character and landscape, the thrill of the hunt, and the chill of violence.The trouble begins at Custis Hall, an exclusive girls? school in Virginia that has gloried in its good name for nearly two hundred years. At first, the outcry is a mere tempest in a silver teapot?a small group of students protesting the school?s exhibit of antique household objects crafted by slaves?and headmistress Charlotte Norton quells the ruckus easily. But when one of the two hanging corpses ornamenting the students? Halloween dance turns out to be real?the body of the school?s talented fund-raiser, in fact?Charlotte and the entire community are stunned. Everyone liked Al Perez, or so it seemed, yet his murder was particularly unpleasant.
Even ?Sister? Jane Arnold, master of the Jefferson Hunt Club, beloved by man and beast, is at a loss, although she knows better than anyone where the bodies are buried in this community of land-grant families and new-money settlers. Aided and abetted by foxes and owls, cats and hounds, Sister picks up a scent that leads her in a most unwelcome direction: straight to the heart of the foxhunting crowd. The chase is on, not only for foxes but also for a deadly human predator.
No one has created a fictional paradise more delightful than the rolling hills of Rita Mae Brown?s Virginia countryside, or has more charmingly captured the rituals of the hunt. No one understands human and animal nature more deeply. The Hunt Ball combines a rounded, welcoming world with an edge of unforgettable white-knuckled menace.
From the Hardcover edition.
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