Ted and Eumie Brainard-Green, both eminent members of the Cambridge-Harvard mental health scene, start things off when the last in their long string of housekeepers quits. They call on Holly Winter, trainer par excellence, to deal with their lovable dog Dolfo--oops! He's not a dog, he's a "fur person", an untrained, uncollared, always happy golden Aussie Huskapoo. Holly doesn't care much for what she calls costly-poos, but when Eumie dies suddenly from a drug overdose she's stuck with Dolfo. Worse yet, she takes in Caprice, Eumie's daughter, whose disfiguring obesity problem arouses all her generous instincts.

Ted, "being a Cambridge therapist and therefore phobic about reality", is left at home with his son Wyeth, who is as untrained as his dog. Unlike Dolfo, Wyeth is as nasty as they come. Caprice finds Holly and her housemates, five wildly different canines, a cat and a husband, more than congenial, and benefits greatly from Holly's training methods. But Holly, whose curiosity is right up there with that of her beloved purebreds, finds evidence that points to nearly every character. She even learns who poisons the celebrated Cambridge black squirrels.

The finishing touch is a classic gathering of the clan for the unmasking of the killer. Holly's therapist friend Rita brings all the psycho-this-and-thats, the ex-spouses, the children, the dogs, and affable Cambridge cop Kevin Dennehy together to sort out their problems so they can be a truly loving network once again. Needless to say, that results in some fierce infighting, and Holly is finally able to name the perpetrator.

Holly, who in her devotion to goD (God spelled backwards) and all his subjects seems a little ADHD herself, takes the stage and never vacates her position. But she makes some crack, or states some truth that will make you laugh, in every other line--she's what they call a character. Her several short imaginings of other people's lives may detract from rather than help the story, but that's a minor defect.

Nowadays nearly every cozy mystery is as instructive as it is puzzling. Readers learn about scrap-booking, cats, home renovation, gardening, what-have-you. This one lets us in on a great many secrets about the right way to handle boisterous Malamutes and costly-poos that are well worth knowing, especially for people in the market for a dog.

If this work is typical of Conant's "Dog Lover's Mystery" series, anyone newly introduced to her books is likely to read enough of them to become Holly's best friend. She can't help being funny, but she's a darling, and she's a fine detective as well.