Some Like It Hawk by Donna Andrews ****

Meg Langslow is in the middle of everything that happens in Caerphilly, VA. So when Caerphilly Days, one of those celebrations of local entertainment, crafts, and food the exist primarily to attract tourist dollars, is planned to raise money for the bankrupt town, she is everywhere, especially in the Courthouse basement when the body is found.

While it is mostly silly and fun, Some Like It Hawk by Donna Andrews is a murder mystery. The good guys are the small town folk of Caerphilly, and the bad guys are the Evil Lender who want to foreclose on the municipal buildings. The town clerk is barricaded in the court house basement and supplied through a antebellum tunnel. Tunnel access is through a trap door with a VERY squeaky hinge. Thus the free entertainment (see above) is auditioned mostly for volume ... bag pipers, 1812 Overture, cloggers, heavy-metal band, church choir, etc. Silly and Fun.

"Parsec Science Literacy Award" in honor of Star Wars' confusion of parsec (3 1/4 light-years or 19 trillion miles) with a unit of time: In this book we have: "Light-years ago, before the murder," yet another confusion with an astronomical distance with a unit of time.