I was forced to admit I didn't remember that one. (Hey, she has 66 full length novels, 15 collections of short stories, and several plays to her name!) But it did remind me of the Sherlock Holmes story where the criminal force-fed the goose his stolen jewel, the goose was then sold to the wrong person, and mystery ensued. (The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle. I have read all of Doyle's mysteries.)
So I was on that track--the great birds of mystery track. I have never seen Hitchcock's The Birds...mostly because I get nightmares easily and there is at least one murder of crows in my back yard. The next scariest bird in literature or film has to be the Raven who was quoted as saying nevermore. He's all the scarier for being a metaphor for endless grief. I was moved to tears as I drove to the grocery store listening to Garrison Kiellor recite it.
Then there is the owl who poses the great mystery of the 1970s: How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop? We may never know.
My list comes to an end there, but I know it can't be exhaustive and now I am on the hunt. I want to know the most mysterious birds of film or literature! Can you help? If you can think of other birds who have scared, hinted, implied, terrorized, bludgeoned, pecked, skirted, wheeled, nested, cawed, sung, or taunted their way through literature, let me know!
And don't forget the Giveaway Extravaganza going on right now!
Traci Tyne Hilton is a mom, Sunday School teacher, novelist, and award winning playwright from Portland, Oregon. She is madly working on her next mystery series which has finaled in the Books of Hope Contest at Write Integrity Press and has an impending deadline.
Traci earned a degree in History from Portland State University and lives in the rainiest part of the Pacific Northwest with her husband the mandolin playing funeral director from Kansas, their two daughters, and their dog, Dr. Watson.
Find Traci Tyne Hilton's newest mystery The Queen's Snare at amazon.com!
