{"id":7209,"date":"2026-09-21T05:20:39","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T12:20:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=7209"},"modified":"2026-09-21T05:20:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T12:20:39","slug":"dianne-freeman-a-christmas-guide-to-family-and-murder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/dianne-freeman-a-christmas-guide-to-family-and-murder\/","title":{"rendered":"Dianne Freeman: A Christmas Guide to Family and Murder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Countess of Harleigh #9<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>A Christmas Guide to Family and Murder<\/em> is the ninth book in Dianne Freeman\u2019s delightful series set at the turn of the 20th century, about Frances, the American-born Countess of Harleigh, and her second husband, George Hazelton, a younger son of an earl and a secret agent for the British government.\u00a0 The two of them solve crimes together, usually among the upper classes in London, even though the two books before this one have taken them to Paris.\u00a0 This novel introduces a new setting: a country estate in Norfolk.\u00a0 Frances is looking forward to spending Christmas of 1900 in London when she and George receive an invitation from Fiona, George\u2019s sister and Frances\u2019 best friend, to join her and her husband, Robert, at their estate, Hadley Grange.\u00a0 Rose, Frances\u2019 nine-year-old daughter by her first husband, is excited about spending Christmas in Norfolk, as are the two most recent additions to the family: Lissette, George\u2019s fifteen-year-old cousin and ward, and her half-sister Christine, a young woman in her early twenties.\u00a0 Frances\u2019 aunt Hetty joins them as well, after indicating that things are not going smoothly between her and her suitor Gilliam, a theater manager.<\/p>\n

The family, especially its younger members, are looking forward to seeing snow in Norfolk, while London is experiencing warmer-than-usual weather for December, and Rose is happy about spending time with Fiona\u2019s children, Gregory and Grace.\u00a0 On their first night in Norfolk, the family goes to see Grace in a play of A Christmas Carol<\/em> in the nearby village, and meet Fiona\u2019s unpleasant neighbor, Dr. Penhollow.\u00a0 The expected snow fails to materialize.\u00a0 Instead, Norfolk is hit by pouring rain and a violent windstorm, which causes much destruction in the surrounding area, although Hadley Grange and the village are largely spared.\u00a0 George, Robert, and most of the men from the village go to help clear the roads and clean up after the storm.<\/p>\n

The morning after the storm, after the men have left, Frances, Fiona, Hetty, and the children walk from Hadley Grange to the village and, while crossing a field, they find a dead body, which turns out to be Dr. Penhollow.\u00a0 There are no visible wounds on the body, so Frances is uncertain whether he was murdered or died of natural causes.\u00a0 But she notices tracks in the surrounding area, which would indicate the doctor was not alone when he died.\u00a0 Her first instincts tell her that this was murder and, of course, she\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

Frances is left to investigate the murder by herself, with help from Fiona and Hetty, since the police have all gone to help clear the roads after the storm.\u00a0 Dr. Penhollow was the coroner and the only physician in the village, and Robert is the magistrate.\u00a0 Only one retired policeman remains in the village.\u00a0 He is in his eighties and seems all too willing to leave the investigation to Frances.\u00a0 She sends Fiona\u2019s footman for a physician from another village to examine the body, and the body is brought back to Hadley Grange and left in Fiona\u2019s conservatory until the doctor arrives.\u00a0 Frances thinks the death is too suspicious to release the body to the family.<\/p>\n

The children, to Frances\u2019 dismay, are excited about the presence of the body in the house and are fascinated by the murder investigation.\u00a0 Their governess has given them an assignment to write a Christmas story, and they have chosen to write a sequel to A Christmas Carol<\/em> as a murder mystery, where Scrooge is murdered and two detectives named Frank and Georgianna, obviously inspired by George and Frances, solve the crime.\u00a0 Frances is dismayed by the children\u2019s enthusiasm for crime-solving at first, since she has always tried to shield Rose from her activities as a detective to keep her out of danger.\u00a0 She has always thought Rose knew little of her and George\u2019s activities, but this has turned out not to be the case.\u00a0 When Rose tells her the story she and the other children have been writing, though, Frances is proud of her daughter\u2019s imagination and cleverness.<\/p>\n

Frances, always accompanied by either Fiona or Hetty, makes several visits to the village to question suspects.\u00a0 She realizes she is doing the work the police usually do, but they cannot because of the circumstances. \u00a0Usually, Frances listens to the gossip among the women of the upper classes and puts the clues together from what they say, while leaving the direct questioning to the police, so this is a new approach for her, and she is not happy with the results.\u00a0 The villagers are understandably offended by being accused of murder.\u00a0 It turns out that no one liked Dr. Penhollow, except his grieving widow, Ada.\u00a0 But is her show of grief genuine or an act?\u00a0 Even his stepdaughter, Beatrice, the vicar\u2019s wife, hated him because he wouldn\u2019t let her marry the man she loved and instead forced her to marry the vicar.\u00a0 Frances soon finds that the Penhollow estate is entailed on the doctor\u2019s brother, so Ada will inherit nothing and appears to have no motive, while the brother, who has a very strong motive, didn\u2019t arrive in the village until after the doctor was murdered.<\/p>\n

There are other suspects besides the members of Dr. Penhollow\u2019s family, including a man who thought he should have been appointed coroner instead of the doctor.\u00a0 A woman who was a patient of Dr. Penhollow died after taking a medicine he gave her for a lung infection.\u00a0 Has her family taken revenge?\u00a0 But the woman died quite a while ago, so, if they did, why have they waited so long?\u00a0 It seems he was not even a good doctor, and most of the villagers have been going to other villages for their medical needs.\u00a0 Then Frances learns from the postmistress, who is the village gossip and was a good friend of the dead woman, that Dr. Penhollow had been having an affair with the patient who later died, which would give his wife a motive, after all.<\/p>\n

While Frances is trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, the young physician, Dr. Bertram, arrives from the other village and examines the body.\u00a0 He discovers that Dr. Penhollow was poisoned, which Frances had suspected, since there were no wounds.\u00a0 Strangely, the dead man was wearing a pair of boots that were too large for him.\u00a0 Could they have belonged to the killer?\u00a0 Frances tries to discover how the poison was administered, and, of course, who the killer is, before the Christmas celebrations can begin.<\/p>\n

I enjoyed this book very much, and it is always a delight to spend time with Frances and her family.\u00a0 We see more of the younger generation in this book than in some of the others, and there are possible love interests developing for the two young girls, Lissette and Christine, even though, as Frances points out, Lissette is only fifteen and too young to be in love.\u00a0 She seems to be developing a crush on Dr. Bertram, even though Christine is closer to his age.\u00a0 Aunt Hetty\u2019s romance with Gilliam takes an interesting turn, which I will not spoil here.\u00a0 This book represents something of a departure from the rest of the series because of the new setting, and the new role for Frances in questioning suspects.\u00a0 Also, George is absent for most of the book, so we don\u2019t have the witty dialogue between the couple which is such an important feature of the other books.\u00a0 I admit I missed it, but solving a crime in George\u2019s absence emphasizes Frances\u2019 strength as a character.\u00a0 I did not guess who the killer was until the end.\u00a0 In fact, I was sure it was a completely different person, and then there was a twist I didn\u2019t see coming.<\/p>\n

This novel can stand alone, but I would recommend beginning the series with the first book, A Lady\u2019s Guide to Etiquette and Murder<\/em>, to follow the characters and their relationships, and see how they develop.\u00a0 The series will appeal to fans of Tasha Alexander, Anna Lee Huber, Clara McKenna, and Alyssa Maxwell.\u00a0 Dickens fans will especially love the references to A Christmas Carol<\/em> in this one: the village play at the beginning of the book, as well as the story the children are writing.\u00a0 The victim in this book, Dr. Penhollow, is something of a Scrooge: he dislikes everyone, and no one much likes him.\u00a0 But, as with Scrooge, there is another side to him, and he\u2019s more complex than he appears at first.\u00a0 It did seem funny to be reading a Christmas book in August, but that\u2019s what happens with pre-publication reviews.\u00a0 The book is enjoyable no matter when you read it, and I expect it will be even more so for people who read it at the \u201cright\u201d time of year. —\u00a0Vicki Kondelik<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Countess of Harleigh #9 A Christmas Guide to Family and Murder is the ninth book in Dianne Freeman\u2019s delightful series set at the turn of the 20th century, about Frances, the American-born Countess of Harleigh, and her second husband, George Hazelton, a younger son of an earl and a secret agent for the British government.\u00a0 … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2595,2594,398,161,39,10,162,273],"class_list":["post-7209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-a-christmas-carol","tag-a-christmas-guide-to-family-and-murder","tag-christmas","tag-countess-of-harleigh","tag-dianne-freeman","tag-historical","tag-kensington-books","tag-vicki-kondelik"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7209"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7211,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209\/revisions\/7211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}