People tend to die in Kippy Bushman's life. So when her best friend in brutally murdered in the corn field behind Kippy's house, Kippy takes it upon herself to track down the murderer. What follows is a hysterically irreverent story of a bizarre Wisconsin town. This book is not for everyone, but if you have the right sense of humor, this book will be your new best friend. Here's the litmus test--if you think the cover is funny, in which a handmade sweater depicts the hanging of a knit moose, you will love this book) 
 Kippy Bushman and Ruth Fried were best friends, although that friendship was tenuous at best. It is fitting, then, that the small Wisconsin town where they live is named Friendship. Kippy gets Ruth's journal after her death and is instructed by Ruth's mother to redact all of the sex parts. While deciphering Ruth's impossible handwriting, she learns that Ruth had some mixed feelings about their friendship, which is a lot to handle in addition to, you know, coping with Ruth's death. 
 The complete incompetence of the Friendship police staff drives Kippy and Ruth's brother, Davey, to carry out the investigation on their own terms. They make a pretty good team, actually, what with Kippy's knowledge of human psychology (due to her school counselor father) and grief (due to the death of her mother) combined with Davey's knowledge of human instinct (due to his time in Afghanistan). They run into trouble, though, when other people start to die, too. 
 Kippy's inner dialogue shimmers with the brilliance of a Coen brothers movie. You can practically hear the Midwest accents dripping off of the characters, all of whom embody the inanity of small town life. The romance between Kippy and Davey is fairly dysfunctional, but there's not a single person in this town who isn't dysfunctional. It just fits. One particular highlight is the bit when Davey and Kippy start to spend time with Kippy's old support group for non-violent reactions. (After her mother died, Kippy took to aggressively hugging people and not letting them go. Hence, no one else can have you.) Anyhow, I found the interactions with the group of anger-management-misfits to be particularly delightful. Teenagers would enjoy this book--it's got enough sarcasm and twisted humor in it to be appealing, but I think that adults might get more of a kick out of it.