The Curious Eat Themselves (Cecil Younger Series #2) Book

'The Curious Eat Themselves' is one of the oddest titles for a book I have ever come across and I've read at least thousands of books! I still don't know wtf it means.

'The Curious Eat Themselves' by John Straley is the second book in the Cecil Younger series. I still don't understand Younger as a character, but at least Younger is sober and more coherent in this book, unlike in The Woman Who Married a Bear, the first book in the series. Being sober, Cecil acts more like a private detective instead of just a drunk stumbling around and solving his client's case by simply irritating people.

The real attraction in the Younger mysteries is Alaska. Cecil Younger is based in Sitka, Alaska, but like most Alaskans, he travels everywhere, and frequently, by boat or plane. For them, getting in a plane or boat and going somewhere is like catching a bus. People live "in the rough" whether they have a house in a town or cabin in the country. Drinking is very much an occupation as is hunting for most. But the author writes of the land with love and of the people with balanced realism. Readers see the towns, the mines, and the oil fields as if looking at a photograph. The characters are people who you'd swear were standing in front of you. Gentle reader, either you will like this series or not depending on whether you can tolerate a realistic depiction of Alaskan people and how they live in Alaska.

I've copied the book blurb below and it is spot on:

P.I. Cecil Younger is in a jam. Louise Root had hired him after she was raped at the Otter Creek gold mine where she was working as a cook. She was the best friend of his ex-girlfriend, Hannah. Louise had come to him for help, and now she's being fished out of the ocean, her throat slashed.

He has disappointed Hannah once again, yet suddenly everyone wants Younger's help: his old friend, Doggy, the D.A.; his autistic roommate, Toddy, whose Labrador retriever has disappeared; an image-conscious environmental activist; even the sleazy executives of Global Mining, whose interest in the case is suspicious. This is no longer a simple investigation, but a complicated murder case involving Global's environmentally incorrect waste disposal program and the implications of dumping cyanide into the ground. Dead bodies are piling up faster than Younger can count and he has his hands full just trying to stay alive, tracking down the suspects and some missing documents which could lead to the truth.

The plot begins to twist and turn about half way into the book. Each turn leads Cecil into interesting places which actually exist, or did exist (book was first published in 1993) with some names changed. Prudhoe Bay and its oil rigs exist, for example, one of the more interesting places Cecil finds himself.

I think some of the descriptive writing by the author becomes too abridged and brief in spots, but in other areas he sketches out the action and setting perfectly. Small quibbles. I am enjoying the series despite that I want to know WHY Cecil is such a damaged sad man! Is it really only the drug/alcohol addiction, and the trouble he got into because of that? (Previous book hints at what happened in Cecil's past, sort of.) Anyway, I plan to read the next book in the series.