Reviews

Vanessa Riley: Murder in Westminster

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Sometimes all it takes is a small change in point of view to make a huge difference.  Vanessa Riley’s lively historical mystery set in 1806 London sets itself apart from the several other Regency historicals out there at the moment, simply by creating a black main character.  At the time the black population in London numbered up to 20,000, out of a population of about one million.  They were referred to as Blackamoors and included Africans and East and West Indians.  (Riley’s notes at the back of the book are invaluable.) read more

Faye Kellerman: The Hunt

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The Hunt, Faye Kellerman’s latest Decker/Lazarus mystery, is barely their story at all. Instead, it revolves around the toxic, layered relationship of Chris and Terry, the biological parents of Peter and Rina’s adopted son, Gabe. Though Gabe is no longer close to either of his parents, when Terry calls him after she is seriously hurt, he turns to the powerful, mob-connected Chris for help. Terry’s younger son, Sanjay, has been kidnapped during the course of her messy second divorce. Chris seems the obvious choice to help get him back. read more

Rosalind Stopps: A Beginner’s Guide to Murder

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This book was – surprisingly – both charming and touching, along with being a suspenseful caper novel. Three older women – Grace, Daphne and Meg – are sitting in a London coffee shop together when a young, frightened girl lurches in.  She heads for the restroom, and not long after a suspicious man comes in, claiming she’s his daughter.  They tell him they’ve seen nothing and watch him leave, then they immediately scoot out the back, taking the young woman with them.

As the title indicates, these women are beginners in the art of murder, but their target is immediately obvious.  What isn’t obvious are the personalities and characteristics of the women, and the author goes back in time to flesh out each character’s backstory, so the reader can see what shaped each one.  While the three hadn’t really known each other well before the coffee shop incident, they are united in their desire to save the young girl, Nina.  The real heartbreaker of the book is Nina’s story. read more

William Kent Krueger and the Enduring Legacy of the series detective

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Many many long moons ago, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle not only created Sherlock Holmes, he created the concept of “a single character running through a series” a.k.a., the series detective.  While of course the stories themselves are wonderful, the creation of this series character has had perhaps the longest shadow over detective fiction, and, I would argue, the most enduring.  Series detectives are not just appreciated, they are beloved.  After a certain point in a series, the point is not really the story, the point is what is happening to the character.  They have their own lives, something which, I imagine, might be irritating for their creators (I know it was for Conan Doyle and Christie).  They can hardly be killed off, Sherlock Holmes being the most outstanding example as pastiches featuring Holmes outnumber Conan Doyle’s actual work. read more

Paula Munier: The Wedding Plot

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Paula Munier’s insanely readable Mercy Carr series has so far never disappointed, and The Wedding Plot is no exception.  As the book opens, Mercy’s mother, Grace, has been meticulously planning her mother’s wedding to her long-time beau Claude at the swanky inn her aunt Prudence runs (with an iron fist).   Between these two intimidating ladies, the wedding is proceeding on a path that looks to have Mercy in bridesmaid’s satin pumps and a blowout hairdo before she knows it.

It would not be a mystery novel, however, if all went as planned.  Frist, the spa’s yoga instructor disappears, and Mercy is pressed into service, leading the wedding guests through the classes he was supposed to take on.  And while all this sounds slightly like a cozy set up – wedding, yoga instructor (and wait, there are goats) – it’s far from it.  Munier takes a normal domestic situation – a wedding, something everyone has experienced as guest or participant – and turns it into an action novel. read more

Carol Goodman: The Disinvited Guest

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Carol Goodman has been killing it.  She’s writing the kind of standalone, psychologically suspenseful novels that are incredibly popular at the moment, but she’s been doing it for twenty years.  She’s a tight storyteller and a smart one, and she’s great with character and setting – in fact, she’s the whole package.  Her new novel, The Disinvited Guest, posits that we have emerged from a worldwide pandemic, albeit briefly, and been plunged into another one.  Her book is set very slightly in an unfortunately believable future. read more

Allison Montclair: The Unkept Woman

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This series goes from strength to strength. Set in just post WWII London, Iris Sparks and Gwen Bainbridge run The Right Sort, a marriage bureau (apparently something that existed at the time). Iris worked in intelligence during the war, and Gwen, a daughter of privilege, is a bereaved widow who lives with her in-laws and young son as they have had her declared mentally incompetent.  The two find solace and purpose in running a business together, and my only actual quibble with this book was that there was really none of the marriage bureau in the plot (or very little). read more

Nev March: Peril at the Exposition

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I am a huge fan of Nev March’s first book in this series, Murder in Old Bombay, but I am a little sad she moved her main characters and newlyweds Jim Agnihotri and Diana Framji from Bombay to Boston.  They are wonderful, vivid characters with an interesting relationship, and in many ways this is Diana’s book, while the first book belonged to Jim.  As the book opens Jim is letting Diana know that he’s heading to Chicago on a job – he works for the Dupree detective agency – and that he’ll be gone awhile.  That’s really all she knows. read more

Elly Griffiths: The Locked Room

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I have devoured every word of the Ruth Galloway series, and each time I pick one up, I am reminded again what wonderful, pure reads these books are.  From the second you crack open the first page to the moment you close the cover at the end, Griffiths as a storyteller holds her reader completely in her grasp.  Under her spell.  Bewitched. This book is no different, though it was, to me, a bit more intense and a bit more grim as she confronts covid front and center.

It is historically significant to have lived through a pandemic – and we seem to be emerging from it at last – but as you live through something historically significant, you have no actual perspective.  A start to gaining some perspective is to read a thoughtful examination of just what happened, which Griffiths provides her reader. As the book opens, Ruth is teaching an archeology class and she gets a call that there’s body on a construction site.  She takes the class along as a learning experience, event letting the students bag up the bones for transportation at the end.  The students are curious to discover if the body comes from a plague pit, a foreshadowing of what’s to come. read more

Dianne Freeman: A Bride’s Guide to Marriage and Murder

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I knew from Dianne Freeman’s first book that this was a special series, and the subsequent books have done absolutely nothing to change my initial opinion.  In this installment, she manages to carry off the wedding of the main character without destroying the interest and tension in the novel.  I can think of other series where a wedding can prove to be a disaster for the characters and only one other historical series, Tasha Alexander’s Lady Emily books, where that was not the case.  So, bravo to Ms. Freeman right off the bat, before I even got to the heart of the book (the wedding happens at the very beginning). read more