Englishman’s wife Judy, after an especially amorous morning, announces she and Englishman are booked on a flight to Paris that evening and she is going with or without him. Judy then gets a dramatic haircut and inadvertently robs the local bank.

Englishman’s two eighteen-year-old daughters (both named Heather) run between their parents in an attempt to make sure both are on the plane to Paris and wreak all kinds of havoc. And just to keep things interesting, a mad bomber is on the loose and Mad Dog’s high school sweetheart has returned, announcing Mad Dog has both a son and a daughter.

All of this occurs within the course of one day, the question looming is: will Englishman make the plane to Paris and save his marriage to Judy?

Plains Crazy goes back and forth being darkly comic at times and slapstick at others. Occasionally, it becomes difficult to tell which situations are meant to be more lighthearted. Different things that occur during the day that are seemingly unrelated events, yet by the end of a very mixed up day, all is explained, though there may have been a few too many incidents cluttering up the plot than necessary.

After the murder on the “This Old Teepee” set occurs, it is relegated to the backseat, as if it where just a springboard for the rest of the plot.

Readers will find the characters very likeable and will want to get to know them better, but will be disappointed when they are allowed only glimpses of them. Judy is obviously desperate to get to Paris, but it is not until the two Heathers read e-mails she wrote that readers begin to learn just what is going on with Judy. It is at that point that we become privy to Judy’s thoughts and reasons for her escape. Mad Dog enjoys being the town eccentric very much, and seeing him ponder the road not taken when he learns of his son makes him all the more real.

A setting of the flat Midwest plays well off of the confusion and complicated plot. The mad capped antics of a mad bomber and the two Heathers tearing about town in a police vehicle may appeal to some readers, but others may find it gets in the way of enjoying a carefully plotted, well-thought out mystery.

--Jennifer Monahan Winberry