A SASSY CAT MYSTERY (SERIES)

Book 1: Mimi Lee Gets a Clue 

 

Mimi Lee (no, not related to Bruce Lee) has a mom who immigrated from Malaysia to the United States. Mimi’s mom keeps setting Mimi up on a series of disastrous first dates, including:

 

• A coffee (“kopi”) date at Starbucks with a creepy jerk, who Mimi’s mom found through a dating app

 

• A food drop-off from a delivery guy, who is the son of someone in Mimi’s mom’s Mahjong group

 

• A library date with a college student who is looking for professional advice

 

“Ma had too much free time on her hands. Dad golfed as a hobby after retiring. Ma match-maked. And she told me she’d up her efforts now that I had turned twenty-five, claiming that after rounding up, I was practically thirty. // Well, I could find guys on my own. Maybe” (15-16).

 

Mimi just opened her own dog grooming business in LA (named “Hollywoof”). She got the funds from her business partner, Pixie, who was extremely grateful that Pixie rescued her shih-tzu (Gelato) from drowning in a lake.

 

Mimi’s first customer is the bubbly and generous Lauren Dalton (wife of a famous movie producer) and her Chihuahua, Sterling. Mimi notices that the Chihuahua has a limp, but Lauren admits that the two of them have too busy of a schedule (filled with dog yoga, charity events, and movie press conferences) to go to the vet and inquire about surgery.

 

Mimi’s second customer is the bold entrepreneur Indira and her Chihuahua, Ash. Unlike the other pet moms in the area (who were either born into money or married into money), Indira worked her way up the social ladder and is stingy with the money she earned. She designs and produces luxury dog purses and pouches. Mimi notices that Ash also has a limp and was bought from the same sketchy local breeder, Russ Nolan. 

 

Mimi pays Russ Nolan a visit to find out why there seems to be a pattern. Marshmallow slyly barges through his door as soon as he opens it to give Mimi an excuse to come in and take a look around. She sees for herself how the dogs are kept in a filthy room, and a lot of the dogs seem to be in pain (which she later finds out is a result from neglect and health issues due to in-breeding). As Mimi retrieves Marshmallow and leaves, she threatens Russ that she’ll hurt him if he continues hurting innocent dogs. Russ’s elderly neighbor (Shirl) overhears their argument.

 

After Mimi leaves, Russ gets a series of visitors:

 

• Kevin Walker, Russ’s landlord, confronted Russ about running his own dog business, which wasn’t in the leasing agreement. Russ smoothed things over by paying Kevin a large sum of cash before urging Kevin to quickly leave (as Russ was expecting a “lady friend”).

 

• Nicola (the “lady friend” and Lauren’s assistant, who has the tendency to secretly borrow Lauren’s expensive jewelry) has feelings for Russ. They’ve bonded over their love for star-gazing and their common allergy to gluten. She feels heartbroken when she suspects that a phone call (who turns out to be from Tammy) is from a secret lover of Russ. Nicola gets in an argument with Russ and leaves.

 

• Shirl comes over to complain about the noise of the dogs. Russ soothes her by handing her Nicola’s 24K gold bracelet (which is technically Lauren’s, but accidentally slipped off Nicola). Shirl plans on getting it engraved with her medical info to turn it into a stylish medical bracelet.

 

• Tammy sneaks in. She is on the brink of divorce, and the Chihuahua that she bought from Russ (Kale) was supposed to help create a bond between her and her husband. Instead, Kale’s unexpected large medical bills put even more stress on their already-fragile relationship. The contract that she signed with Russ prohibited refunds or lawsuits, but Tammy filed a lawsuit anyways (even though she knew it would get dismissed) since it was a cover for her to not want Russ dead (that is, him being dead would mean that she wouldn’t get a penny from suing him). She snapped under the stress, and using a syringe of Kale’s medicine, she sedated Russ and then hit him hard on the head.

 

• Magnus (a legit dog breeder certified by American Kennel Club, AKC, who genuinely cares about the well-being of dogs) sneaks in and rescues all of Russ’s Chihuahuas so that he can better provide for them at his own facility).

 

When Russ’s body gets discovered, Shirl only reports the argument that she overheard between Mimi and Russ. She doesn’t mention that Nicola was also with Russ that night since doing so might mean that she would have to return the bracelet. Shirl’s witness account makes Detective Brown pin Mimi as the prime suspect, and he gets even more set in his belief that Mimi must be guilty when she tries to do her own investigating (which means that Mimi keeps revisiting the scene of the crime and is seemingly trying to blame others).

 

We wonder:

 

• Was the killer one of Russ’s customers, who was unhappy with the unexpected medical conditions of their pup?

 

• Was the killer Nicola, who killed Russ out of a rage of jealousy?

 

• Was the killer Magnus, who Russ was spreading rumors of partnering with to increase his own reputation (and thus tainting Magnus’s reputation)?

 

• Was the killer somehow the new Principal Hallis, a clear villain who is planning to lay off Mimi’s sister Alice from her teaching position for no clear reason?

 

Along the way, some suspects seem to be in the clear:

 

• It seemed suspicious that Indira was able to launch a new luxury bag product line when she didn’t come from a place of money. Maybe she knew about Russ’s secret stash of cash (that he hid in a whole-grain cereal box, even though he was allergic to gluten) and killed him to get her hands on the money? However, Indira admits to Mimi that she gets her fabric from thrift stores, not to be eco-friendly, but to be cost-efficient. She ironically sells back to the rich a product made from their garbage. This means that Indira didn’t need a lot of money to launch her new product line.

 

• Lauren had a solid alibi that night because she was busy complaining to American Dog Makers’ association (ADM), which is less reputable than AKC, to revoke Russ’s membership so that he couldn’t breed/sell more abused dogs. She threatened to use her connections to give ADM a bad rep otherwise.

 

Like most Hollywood movies, everything wraps up in a happy ending:

 

• Marshmallow and Ma’s incessant worrying about why Mimi won’t answer her phone save Mimi’s life when Tammy tries to attack Mimi (since Mimi was being awfully nosy).

 

• Mimi begins dating Josh, a handsome lawyer who lives in Mimi’s apartment complex and is knowledgeable of useful legal advice. He gets the Lee family’s stamp of approval during Family Game Night by bringing food and letting Ma win.

 

• Shirl befriends the new tenant (a friendly and charming elderly man named Henry) who moved into Russ’s old place. Now Shirl isn’t so lonely anymore.

 

• Mimi convinces Lauren, “a person with a big heart and a big purse” (268), to pay for acupuncture appointments for Russ’s dogs to alleviate their pain (since Lauren believes in natural solutions to help innocent creatures, instead of investing in medicine which would be unnatural chemicals floating around their bodies).

 

• Mimi partners with PetTwin (a service that matches rescue animals with new owners, similar to a dating app) to get Russ’s dogs adopted quickly into loving homes. Part of what makes PetTwin innovative is their new 4D technology, where people can view animated 3-D renderings of available dogs.

 

• Magnus and Mimi get more business since a news crew deems them as heroes.

 

• Mimi convinces Shirl to hand over the 24K bracelet (which she didn’t engrave yet) because she showed her how Sterling has a matching dog collar and it’s right to have his owner be able to match with him. This doesn’t get Nicola her job back (since Lauren fired Nicola after Nicola lost the bracelet and seemed to be hitting on Lauren’s husband). Mimi clarifies that Nicola is an aspiring actress who was using the assistant position to get close to a lead producer in hopes for a big break, but this clarification still doesn’t make Lauren re-hire Nicola (since now Lauren knows that Nicola would likely only be a temporary re-hire until she gets an acting gig). Instead, Mimi hires Nicola, who proves to be a big help with the now booming business!

 

• Detective Brown apologizes to Mimi about being so harsh with her. He hands her back her favorite mug (which he had confiscated during a house search and got fixed with kintsugi, where cracks in ceramics are repaired with gold).

 

• Mimi made a deal with Principal Hallis that she wouldn’t reveal her secret that her pet hedgehogs are illegal exotic animals in their state (as Mimi found out through a brochure when visiting a vet’s office) in return for her keeping Alice’s job next year. Mimi threw the brochure in a recycling bin after Principal Hallis agreed, but the secretary noticed the brochure in the bin and continued the good fight. Principal Hallis moved to a different state where hedgehogs are legal, meaning that Alice won’t have a toxic work environment next year and in the future.