Lie Down with Dogs

by Jan Gleiter

Book Overview

Someone dangerous is after Luke McCain, the four-year-old boy Robert Cooper encounters late at night on a desolate country road. But neither Luke, nor Lisa Jacobi, his attractive blonde caretaker, can tell Cooper who--or why. As they search for the mysterious pursuers, they uncover evidence of a murderous conspiracy. Winner of the St. Martin's Malice Domestic Contest for the Best First Traditional Mystery. Martin's Press.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312140037
• ISBN13: 9780312140038
• Release Date: January 1996
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Length: 225 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.8" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Malice Domestic winner

Winner of St. Martin's Malice Domestic Contest for first traditional mystery, Gleiter's deftly plotted novel pits a disparate couple and a small boy against a well-organized and deadly group of conspirators. Running out of gas on a country road, Chicago businessman Robert Cooper is startled to meet Luke, a small terrified boy who says he's running from men who are out to get him. Luke's father left him with a friend, Lisa, and Lisa put him out the window when thugs broke into her cabin. Taking on the boy, Cooper is nearly brained by Lisa who has managed to escape her captors. She can tell Cooper only that Luke's father, Carl, left him with her for safekeeping. Carl is in trouble but what kind or why is a mystery. Unable to go back to her cabin, she decides to go to Chicago to look for Carl. Although Lisa dislikes uptight "suits" and Cooper finds her defensive, prickly and impractical, he invites Lisa and Luke (and Lisa's huge dog) to stay at his house until Carl is found. Gleiter deftly develops this relationship through domestic details and setbacks while the pair pick and blunder their way deeper into the mystery and the conspirators zero in on them. Pacing is suspenseful, the mystery is absorbing and the characters are appealing, although their defensiveness occasionally seems forced. Readers will look forward to the next Jan Gleiter mystery.

My favorite mystery ever and not just because Jan's my mom.

Yes, yes, Jan Gleiter is my mother, but I can honestly say that that fact in no way influences my opinion of the book. I absolutely loved "Lie Down With Dogs." I've read it only twice because after I finished reading it the second time, she got "A House by the Side of the Road" published and I read that twice and now I'm in college and my professors kind of like me to read things that are directly applicable to their classes. I think the reason that this book is my favorite instead of "A House by the Side of the Road" is just because I read this one first. I love "A House by the Side of the Road", too. (Check out my review for that one.) "Lie Down with Dogs" kept me reading from page one. I was in eighth grade when my mom found out it was going to be published. I convinced my mom to let me read a copy of the manuscript which she had in a binder. I started reading it one night and was so involved in it that I had to carry that big, bulky binder to school with me the next day so I could finish reading it on the bus ride and during lunch. The characters are so interesting and likeable and the plot is amazingly smooth and suspenseful. It is a book that can be enjoyed by all ages. My grandparents loved it every bit as much as I did, maybe even more. I highly recommend this mystery. My only suggestion is that you don't start reading it the night before an important meeting, because you won't be able to put it down and go to sleep; you will want to finish it right away! If you would like to talk about the book or my mom, feel free to e-mail me.

Wonderful characters & a compelling story. Worth a read!

Jan Gleiter's LIE DOWN WITH DOGS is peopled with characters you'd like to know personally and a story that keeps you turning the pages. A fluid, literate, and witty mystery. Great summer reading.

Seneca was wrong.

This is another book review by Wolfie and Kansas, the boonie dogs from Toto, Guam. The title of Jan Gleiter's "Lie Down With Dogs" comes from a quotation from the Roman philosopher Senecus, which is reprinted at the start of the novel: "Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas." Grrr . . . . No sane flea would ever abandon one of our furry hides in favor of some relatively hairless noncanine animal of primate derivation.From this inauspicious beginning, "Lie Down With Dogs" improves rather quickly. These days, one would expect a book in the mystery/thriller genre entitled "Lie Down With Dogs" to include a heavy dose of bestiality. Instead, the canine character, Sirius, is treated throughout with proper respect, although he fades too much into the background for several chapters. This book has no sex, drugs, profanity, severed body parts, or Hannibal Lecter wannabes. Instead it has a plot that moves along quite nicely, and a couple lead human characters who grow on the reader more quickly than they grow on each other. "Lie Down With Dogs" is a book that adults will enjoy but that can also be shared with human puppies in the "young adult" age range

witty, suspenseful, characters to care about, good food!

This is the best mystery novel I read in 1996, and I read a lot of them because I'm always looking for a new author (and seldom finding one who can write a coherent English sentence and whose characters aren't a complete waste of time). Do you find yourself throwing mystery novels at the wall and shouting "Give me a BREAK"? If so, try "Lie Down with Dogs." You'll love it, and you won't get up with fleas