Some points still live up to my unfavorable memories. I still find Moose County's all-consuming obsession with the "mysterious woman" at the New Pickax Hotel ridiculous to the point of being offensive; even Qwilleran seems to think that, yes, a strangely dressed woman minding her own business at a local hotel is a newsworthy event, and that sending a photographer to take paparazzi-like shots of her is a perfectly sensible action to take in such a situation. Might I add that, though Moose Countians perceive themselves as being "caring" through their gossip, and though many other newcomers to 400 miles north of everywhere have received the full welcome-wagon let-us-show-you-around treatment, no one in all of Pickax takes the time to reason that *maybe* a woman from a foreign country who doesn't speak the native language very well that has suddenly found herself to an obscure, backwater county where she has no apparent connections, family, or friends might be in *some* sort of danger and might benefit from a *modicum* of assistance? The defense and veneration of Moose County's of passively "sharing information" and taking a fellow citizen's misfortune as personal entertainment instead of actually helping someone who's fallen on hard times has always irked me, but its appearance in this case to justify out-and-out harassment disturbs me.
At the other end of the scale, I thought that everyone in Moose County was too idolatrous of Qwilleran this time around. His words and opinions are universally applauded; his appearance at the date auction nets $1,500; the very privilege of visiting his home is deemed worth $300. Hey, I love Mr. Q as much as any other Cat Who... fanatic, but it seems unlikely that every single citizen of Pickax would display the same excessive amount of affection for an outsider, and all this worship would turn off a first-time reader. Another complaint - I also found that Koko's sleuthing skills in Cheese needed fine-tuning. His trick of knocking appropriately titled books off the bookshelf has been stretched about as far as it's gonna go, and his method of fingering the perpetrators here is more than a tad vague - it's the first time when I would chalk up his actions to just regular cat antics instead of attempts to communicate clues to his human.
So far, I've been pretty negative about Cheese. There were, however, two saving-grace elements that shined through and drew me in upon a second read. The first is the date between Qwill and his shy office admirer, Sarah Plensdorf. While I abhor the idea of "bachelor auctions" (both in print and in real life), in this case, perhaps, the end justifies the means, for Sarah wouldn't have gotten any page time with Qwill any other way. Despite her "secret admirer" status, Sarah's not just a sycophant, as so many other Moose County citizens come off as here; she sees Qwill as a real person, not a romanticized idol, with whom she feels comfortable to share ideas and thoughts (and interests - she has many more in common with Qwill than Polly does) and is genuinely interested in what he thinks - in a way, she's as sympathetic a listener as him. She's not obnoxious, overt, or fawning; she's sweet, intelligent, and unpretentious, not afraid to be her own person, and holds her own in conversation. Qwilleran (and Polly-haters) should have given this gal a second look.
The second was beekeeper Aubrey Scotten. Here Braun has given us a gentle giant, life turned upside down by a traumatic accident long ago, simple of thought and demeanor yet with a strong commitment to his job and duties, with only the bees for his friends - Aubrey is a memorable character, and the guileless honesty inherent in his engaging manner of speaking is refreshing.
Other stuff I liked - it's good to finally be able to read an actual "Straight from the Qwill Pen" column. Unfortunately, however, it confirms my suspicions about the dubious warrant of its wide and devoted following; though the subject - nobodies - is interesting, Qwilleran's approach to it is scant, trite, and unsatisfying. The author's touch is not in evidence. Two-thirds of the way through, Qwilleran has a little mental tirade about the techniques network television uses to blow a story out of proportion that's the most precise, trenchant analysis of the subject I've read, and if Braun put Qwilleran's prose at the same level of cutting, wry analysis as his thought, we'd've had something here.
I realize here that my scattershot ruminations don't really draw any definite conclusion about the book. That's because the book is a tad haphazard itself - save for the Aubrey Scotten saga, the various vital events and plot elements - the Food Explo, the Mystery Woman, Lenny Inchpot in Danger, the Sarah Plensdorf date - fade in and out of the limelight helter-skelter, with not much interconnection or smooth narrative shift, and the book, as a result, lacks a strong narrative thread; as a result, The Cat Who Said Cheese ends up as not very memorable and largely unremarkable. In fact, I've spent far more time on this book far more than it deserves, so I'll end my review right here.
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