The solution to this mystery lies in the theft of only the surviving copy of an historic book and its delivery to a group of trafficked Somalis who find it inspirational. That the Somalis could read a book written in archaic English stretches the imagination as does the notion that anyone would give the fantastically valuable book and not photocopies, to people living in squalor and misery. Selling the darn thing would have provided money to rescue the whole lot with some left over.

I don’t hang out with owls much but I find it hard to believe that a recently captured owl of a non-burrowing species would calmly allow itself to be schlepped through a narrow underground tunnel. Maybe I don't know enough about owls but if the book were tightly written I wouldn't be asking.

Frank Pavlicek and his daughter Nicole are good characters and I have no beef with them but I like my mysteries to be a bit more believable.

I received a review copy of "A Night Falconer: A Frank Pavlicek Mystery" by Andy Straka (Brash Books) through NetGalley.com. "A Night Falconer" is one of the older detective novels that Brash Books is reissuing in paper and ebook. Five Star was published in hardcover as "Kitty Hitter" in 2009. It was reissued in 2013 in paperback as "A Night Falconer" by Cedar Creek Press. The Brash edition I received had numerous copyediting problems, most notably the spelling of "Dominick" which half the time had no "K." These may have been cleared up before the book was released. ( )