Historical

The final novel in Maureen Jennings’ fine Tom Tyler trilogy is every bit as gripping as the first two – in each, Jennings explores different aspects of life on the home front during WWII. In the first, she looked at the Land Girls; in the second, at a munitions factory; in this novel, perhaps the most heartbreaking at all, she takes us to a wounded veterans home, where the men and women have mostly been seriously disfigured, blinded, crippled, or all three by their war experiences.

Jennings’ skill as a traditional mystery writer is at the forefront here. She is brilliant at constructing a story with various clues and red herrings, almost daring the reader to figure it out (I sure didn’t). This book reminded me most strongly of one of my favorite books, Christianna Brand’s Green for Danger, which is also a kick ass detective story set inside the confines of a wartime hospital. read more

Willig is following up last year’s strong stand-alone, The Ashford Affair, with another great entry.  Using a similar story structure – one section in the past and one in the present – she skillfully ties the two threads together as the story progresses.  I liked both parts equally, which is not always the case, and was happy to re-join either character.

While neither this novel or The Ashford Affair can strictly be called a mystery, both novels center on a mysterious and unresolved disappearance that may or may not also be a death.  So there’s a mysterious nugget in each story, though, much like a Jane Austen novel, it’s the relationships and how they may or may not work out that supply the true intrigue. read more

There’s just one word for this book: delicious.  The thirteenth installment in Rhys Bowen’s fine Molly Murphy series finds Molly at home with her new baby, Liam, when all hell – literally – breaks loose.  Molly is missing her friends from across the way, Sid and Gus, who are away in Paris; and she’s missing her husband, Daniel, who is away at work almost all the time.

When Daniel stops by for a quick bite to eat, the sound of breaking glass is the last thing Molly knows before she realizes her house has blown up and is on fire.  Baby Liam is still inside as is Molly’s maid – the baby makes it out fine.  Daniel realizes he’s the target of the Cosa Nostra, and he thinks it’s a good idea to send Molly and baby Liam off to Paris to stay with Sid and Gus while he works things out at home.  They’ve already begged her to visit. read more

It’s been awhile since I’ve checked in with Charles Todd’s Ian Rutledge – he hasn’t changed much, though Hamish, the voice inside his head, has retreated a bit.  He’s still a thorough and careful detective.  Todd is great at set-ups, and this book has a really good one:  a man is shot and killed by a sniper on the way into a wedding.  In 1920. There’s apparently no rhyme or reason to it though the book opens with a prologue at a funeral where someone is full of flat out hatred for the dead man.  The mother and son behind Charles Todd are far too clever to give away who that might be, however. read more

No offense to Mr. Thomas, but it’s sometimes hard to believe that he is a male writer, so completely does he embrace his female protagonist and get inside her skin, while at the same time illustrating through action the variety of obstacles that faced a woman in 1640’s York.  It helps that his Bridget is a midwife, the most female of professions.  It’s not questioned when Bridget goes to all parts of the city, or that she has enough familiarity with the human body to serve as an advisor in the case of a murder.  She has some high up connections as well, making her, for a mystery character, perfectly placed. read more

Lyndsay Faye is one of the more original, beautiful, bold and interesting new voices in mystery fiction.  Her novels are set in 1840s New York City when the police department was just being formed – and she’s being compared, inevitably, to Caleb Carr.  I think a more apt comparison would be to the historical novels of Hilary Mantel, who, like Faye, employs beautiful prose, tells a cracking good story, and drenches the reader in atmosphere and character development.

Her hero, Timothy Wilde, is a reluctant member of the brand new police force, who were given Copper Stars to wear (hence the term “Copper”).  As the book opens, Tim is a bartender, with savings, an apartment, and an eye on one Mercy Underhill.  In a second, his fortunes change, as his workplace and his apartment – complete with his savings, all in silver coin – are wiped out, and Tim wakes up in his brother Val’s apartment to also discover that a large part of his face has been burned.  He feels he has nothing now to offer Mercy and keeps away from her in shame. read more

I can’t think of a more delicious way to allocate your book buying budget than to buy a Tasha Alexander novel.  Alexander, who began this Victorian series with her central character of Lady Emily falling in love with her recently dead husband after the fact, has only continued to spice up her characters.  Lady Emily’s love of all things Greek and the scholarly attributes that come with her passion make her a believable investigative partner for her husband, Colin Hargreaves, who works undercover for the crown. read more

Like Tasha Alexander’s debut (And Only to Deceive), Anna Lee Huber’s novel has a unique and memorable premise.  Young, widowed Lady Darby is staying with her sister and her husband at their castle in Scotland.  She’s recovering not from the loss of her husband, but from the slings and arrows thrown her way by disapproving members of high society.  Lady Darby was married, as the title suggests, to an anatomist, and being a skilled painter it’s thought (but not proven) that she did the drawings for his anatomy guide.  In 1830 or thereabouts, that was a scandal of the highest order.  There’s more to the story but I don’t want to give away details that Huber has been at pains to tease out throughout the story. read more

This is a fun mix of romance, mystery and a cracking good ghost story.  I enjoyed the fact that the author unabashedly buys into the whole ghost paradigm – there’s not an ounce of irony here, which serves to make her ghost far more scary. Set just after WWI, the main character is a young woman at Somerville College, Oxford, part of an illustrious group of women who were the first to get a university education at Oxford.  In real life their numbers included Dorothy L. Sayers and Vera Brittain, author of the classic memoir of WWI, Testament of Youth. read more