Cat with an Emerald Eye: Midnight Louie, P.I.

Midnight Louie #6

by Carole Nelson Douglas

Is magician Harry Houdini back from the dead?

THE COLORFUL MIDNIGHT LOUIE ALPHABET SAGA CONTINUES…

Follow the clues from the Cat in an Alphabet Soup foundation novel through a colorful kaleidoscope of crimes as the bestselling cat mystery series goes from A to Z to the final book of the alphabet series, Cat in a Alphabet Endgame.

Now, in Cat with an Emerald Eye, “It’s time for that old black magic, Midnight Louie by name, to dazzle his loyal fans once more, this time with a nifty foray into the occult!” —RT Book Reviews

Petite PR powerhouse and amateur sleuth Temple Barr must solve her sixth case when death strikes the assembled psychics at a Halloween séance to raise the famous magician’s spirit. With Temple’s ex, handsome magician The Mystifying Max, showing up to tamper with her emotions and the crime scene, she’ll rely on her resident feline PI, Midnight Louie. He has a mystical side of his own and can help her get to the bottom of Murder Most Magical before they all end up at the bottom of a grave.

"Once again Ms. Douglas comes up trumps with another splendid mystery, an outstanding puzzler chock full of scintillating wit and clever sleuthing. Another bravura performance!”—RT Book Reviews

“Temple’s investigation turns up some surprising links between the dead man and her own erstwhile amour, the magician Mystifying Max. Laced with good humor and Louie’s acerbic observations, this new adventure gives Louie’s fans something to purr about.”—Publishers Weekly

“Midnight Louie is known as a big, bad, streetwise kind of guy, but in his latest antic adventure, the beguiling cat-about-town shows his sensitive side...the motley crew of psychic suspects, Temple’s tempestuous love life (not to mention her world-class shoe collection) and Max and Matt’s past and present problems are just part of the fun...You never know what madness and mayhem you’ll find in Douglas’s mysteries, but you can be sure it will be wild, witty and utterly irresistible.”—Alix Madrigal San Francisco Chronicle

“Mystical doings in the city that never sleeps...that marvelous cat-about-town on a mission of his own...the most erudite feline ever, Midnight Louie.”—Virginia Knight, Mostly Murder

“Though Cat with an Emerald Eye is an interesting who-done-it, the great pet detective Midnight Louie makes this book and the previous five novels into the wonderful mystery series that it is...the sleuthing of Temple and Louie continues to be first-rate. Mystery lovers will enjoy this tale, especially Midnight Louie’s brushes with the supernatural world. Cat with an Emerald Eye is entertainment at its highest level.”—Alternate Worlds

Genres: Mystery, Cats, Fiction, Cozy Mystery, Chick Lit, Mystery Thriller, Romance

434 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 15, 1997

About the author

Carole Nelson Douglas is the author of sixty-four award-winning novels in contemporary and historical mystery/suspense and romance, high and urban fantasy and science fiction genres. She is best known for two popular mystery series, the Irene Adler Sherlockian historical suspense series (she was the first woman to spin-off a series from the Holmes stories) and the multi-award-winning alphabetically titled Midnight Louie contemporary mystery series. From Cat in an Alphabet Soup #1 to Cat in an Alphabet Endgame #28.
Delilah Street, PI (Paranormal Investigator), headlines Carole's noir Urban Fantasy series: Dancing With Werewolves, Brimstone Kiss, Vampire Sunrise, Silver Zombie, and Virtual Virgin. Now Delilah has moved from her paranormal Vegas to Midnight Louie, feline PI's "Slightly surreal" Vegas to solve crimes in the first book of the new Cafe Noir series, Absinthe Without Leave. Next in 2020, Brandi Alexander on the Rocks.

Once Upon a Midnight Noir is out in eBook and trade paperback versions. This author-designed and illustrated collection of three mystery stories with a paranormal twist and a touch of romance features two award-winning stories featuring Midnight Louie, feline PI and Delilah Street, Paranormal Investigator in a supernatural-run Las Vegas. A third story completes the last unfinished story fragment of Edgar Allan Poe, as a Midnight Louie Past Life adventure set in 1790 Norland on a isolated island lighthouse. Louie is a soldier of fortune, a la Puss in Boots.

Next out are Midnight Louie's Cat in an Alphabet Endgame in hardcover, trade paperback and eBook Aug. 23, 2016.

All the Irene Adler novels, the first to feature a woman from the Sherlock Holmes Canon as a crime solver, are now available in eBook.

Carole was a college theater and English literature major. She was accepted for grad school in Theater at the University of Minnesota and Northwestern University, and could have worked as an editorial assistant at Vogue magazine (a la The Devil Wears Prada) but wanted a job closer to home. She worked as a newspaper reporter and then editor in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. During her time there, she discovered a long, expensive classified advertisement offering a black cat named Midnight Louey to the "right" home for one dollar and wrote a feature story on the plucky survival artist, putting it into the cat's point of view. The cat found a country home, but its name was revived for her feline PI mystery series many years later. Some of the Midnight Louie series entries include the dedication "For the real and original Midnight Louie. Nine lives were not enough." Midnight Louie has now had 32 novelistic lives and features in several short stories as well.

Hollywood and Broadway director, playwright, screenwriter and novelist Garson Kanin took Carole's first novel to his publisher on the basis of an interview/article she'd done with him five years earlier. "My friend Phil Silvers," he wrote, "would say he'd never won an interview yet, but he had never had the luck of you."

Carole is a "literary chameleon" who's had novels published in many genres, and often mixes such genre elements as mystery and suspense, fantasy and science fiction, romance with mainstream issues, especially the roles of women.

Reviews

[Pamela Shropshire · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have been solidly Team Matt (I almost always prefer the Beta over the Alpha), and this book is heavy on Max, so it wasn’t my favorite. Matt barely gets any page time. Lieutenant Molina is also virtually absent.

On the other hand Orson Welles has a supporting role, and I’ve always been a fan, so that was a plus. Interestingly, the Paul Masson wine commercials come up in this book.

The main theme of this one is spiritualism and mediums, also not of much interest to me personally. I’m absolutely a cynic regarding such phenomena; I believe when you’re dead, you’re dead. (As a Christian, though, I do believe in the existence of souls and the resurrection of the body, etc. I just don’t believe souls hang around the living and I don’t believe the dead can speak to or through the living.)

As always, the Midnight Louie narrations are the best parts of the book.

[sophia douglas · Rating 2 out of 5]

got really boring when midnight louie the cat wasn’t narrating

[Meg · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm giving only 3 stars because of a glaring error the author wrote into the climax of the book : Orson Welles is a major feature of this mystery and the 2nd to last chapter mentions Welles' famous "War of the Worlds" broadcast which was on October 30, 1938. This broadcast is so well known that finding facts about it would have been no trouble at all for the author. But, she gets the date for Welles' broadcast wrong and claims it happened in 1939.

Cat With An Emerald Eye had a good mystery idea, interesting characters and locations but suffered from a lot of padding, using words in the wrong context and a few messed up facts.

I think you might still like it, give it a try. Ignore the things I pointed out and just have fun with it.

[LaDawn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Definitely not my favorite Louie book. It took me forever to read it, unlike the others that I finished in a day or two.

[Lucy Takeda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think I’d actually give this a 2.5. There was an overload of assorted famous magicians and mystiques, with the added dollop of Egyptian gods, Bast. There’s also a ton of the mysterious ex, Max.
Temple is asked to assist with advertising a séance focused mob calling up Houdini. Naturally, it’s at Halloween, so she has tried to pen Midnight Louie inside for his own protection. However, the rather spooky Birman cat upstairs is insisting that Louie needs to be involved in the seance. Assorted spirits, supposedly faded and otherwise, appear: Houdini, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Amelia Earhart, Elvis….and someone at the stance ends up dead. Oh, yeah: the somewhat logical make friend, Matt, is relatable certain that he just spotted his evil stepfather strolling down the street in Las Vegas.
Lots of folks chasing ghosts and memories.

[Joan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This story involves seances, Max, Gandolph the magician posing as a famous seer, and of course, Temple Barr, Matt Devine, and, of course, Midnight Louie.

Attempts are made to reach Harry Houdini on the "other side".

One of the 9 handsome Fontana brothers (the most legit, Nick, who with his wife owns the Crystal Phoenix) seem to come to Temple's rescue when she most needs it.

This story has many twists and turns as it spirals towards its ending.

[Michele · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just when this series seems to get a little bogged down with ridiculousness (it takes place in Vegas, how can it not) the multiple plot lines take a turn into depth and substance. Quite well done!

[Linda C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book

What is not to like about this book. Midnight louie is the ultimate furry Sherlock Holmes! The series is a hit .

[Debbi · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was really hard for me to focus on. I dont think it was the writing, more the subject. Guess I just expected something located in Vegas to be more theatrical.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me slightly longer than usual to finish this one, because the kids kept interrupting. I liked the story and I like how each book delves more deeply into the characters and their relationships. I'm not sure I actually like Temple, as her height Napolean complex is a bit off putting, although realistic. The two men she is involved with are interesting- the magician, the Mystifying Max who I favor and the ex-priest, Matt who personally would have too much baggage for me. Each book is another soap opera installment...and this is without even mentioning Louie and his cast of cat friends!

[Eyehavenofilter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Once again Temple has gotten herself mixed up with the seedy side of sim city. Her landlady is trying to contact the spirit of Houdini, a dead body shows up but is not Harry Houdini, of course, and Midnight Louie is back on the case to save his human from tripping over her brand new expensive shoe habit!

[Christina · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have to be honest - I couldn't bring my self to finish this book, so my review is only of what I read. I love cat-mysteries, and have read all of the "Cat Who" series, and was looking for another. This is the first book I picked up in this series. I found the mysticism theme off-putting, and didn't find the people or cat characters convincing.

[Pam Bales · Rating 5 out of 5]

Number 5 in the Midnight Louise cat as detective mystery series, this was a great read. I eventually got tired of them and gave them to the library, but I read seven of them. They are a very good read for those who like their animals sentient and able to solve crimes. Midnight Louise is still going strong. Ms. Douglas has several other excellent series as well.

[Carole · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had a little bit of a hard time getting into this one for some reason, but once I did, I enjoyed it, though not as much as the others of the series. This is not to say that I won't reread it at some point, as I am sure I will.

I did quite like Louie's description of the first seance.

[Pat]

Midnight Louie

[Helen Fleischer · Rating 4 out of 5]

good plor advancing series character relationshipw