jennaria | Entries tagged with mysterious mystery

THE CONCUBINE'S TATTOO, by Laura Joh Rowland.

Cover copy: Twenty months spent as the shogun's sosakan-sama -- most honorable investigator of events, situations and people - has left Sano Ichiro weary. He looks forward to the comforts that his arranged marriage promises: a private life with a sweet, submissive wife and a month's holiday to celebrate their union. However, the death of the shogun's favorite concubine interrupts the couple's wedding ceremony and shatters any hopes the samurai detective had about enjoying a little peace with his new wife.

After Sano traces the cause of Lady Harume's death to a self-inflicted tattoo, he must travel into the cloistered, forbidden world of theshogun's women to untangle the complicated web of Harume's lovers, rivals, and troubled past, and identify her killer.

To make matters worse, Reiko, his beautiful young bride, reveals herself to be not a traditional obedient wife, but instead, a headstrong, intelligent, aspiring detective bent on helping Sano with his new case. Sano is horrified at her unladylike behavior, and the resulting sparks make their budding love as exciting as the mystery surrounding Lady Harume's death.

Amid the heightened tensions and political machinations of feudal Japan, Sano faces a daunting, complex investigation.

Gender of detectives: two male, one female

This is another series that I'd tried picking up, but which hadn't caught my interest. This time around, however, I had a specific interest. According to the same fannish scuttlebutt that had recommended the series to me, Reiko was a total Mary Sue.

Is she? She certainly has elements in that direction: an expert martial artist, as clever and observant as Sano. But the part that really makes me raise my eyebrows is how gender issues are handled.

Women's power, in Japan of this era, seems to have been entirely indirect -- they could act only by influencing a man to do what they wanted. At least, this is how the roles of women-who-are-not-Reiko are portrayed. Reiko, however, has supposedly been brought up as if she were a son instead of a daughter. This ~~miraculously~~ gave her the outlook of, well, a modern woman. Sano realizes, remarkably quickly for so great a change, that the traditional life of a woman kind of sucksa, and thus agrees to all of Reiko's demands. "We will both have to make changes," Sano says, but where are the changes Reiko is making?

So. For I ARE INDEPENDANT WOMAN HEAR ME ROAR, I'd put her on the borderline. But not past it, not yet, not for this book alone. The next book...well, I'd have to read it.

DEAD WATER, by Ngaio Marsh.

Cover copy: It was one of those moments without time that strike at body and mind together with a single blow. A black shape, half-inflated, pulsed and moved with the action of the spring...

Alleyn had to get through the turnstile. He picked up a stone, hit it home and wrenched at the handle. There was a click and he was through and running to the spring. She was lying face down in the pool, only a few inches below the water. Her sparse hair rippled and eddied in the stream...The gash in her scalp gaped flaccidly and before he had moved the body over on its back...he knew whose face would be upturned towards his own.

Gender of detective: male

Wow, there's telling you nothing, and then there's telling you nothing! Take it away, Amazon:

FAITH HEALING CAN BE FATAL - When intrepid octogenarian Emily Pride inherits an island, and the miraculous properties of its "Pixie Falls" healing spring, she is shocked by all the vulgarity. The admission fee, the Gifte Shoppe, the folksy Festival, the neon sign on the pub, all must go! But local opposition runs high, death threats pile up, and Miss Emily's old friend Superintendent Roderick Alleyn arrives just in time to discover a drowned body and a set of murder motives that seem to spring eternal. The one other key fact that's left out: the dead body isn't Miss Emily's, but that of her most vocal opponent, the owner of the Gifte Shoppe.

This novel isn't set early in the series -- I suspect it's rather late, actually, but I couldn't prove it except by triangulating via the existence of Alleyn's wife and son. That's the thing with Marsh: she's better about character development and depth than Christie, but her characters don't run as deep (and as dependent on being read in the proper sequence) as Sayers.

It's a good book. A bit predictable -- there's a New Zealand girl, for example, who is involved with someone who is not guilty of the murder in the slightest. But then, the beauty of Marsh is that she is predictable. She won't get too wrapped up in psychology, nor let a character get away from her, nor yank the rug out from anyway. You always know what you're getting with her.

*

Kris is asleep on the futon, so it's down to Stef and me keeping each other awake. ('And sane,' says she. 'Bit late for that now, innit?' says me.) Four and a half more hours. Where's that Barq's?

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swankyfunk!)

THE PATHS OF THE AIR, by Alys Clare.

Cover copy: It is late autumn, 1196. A secretive stranger arrives at New Winnowlands and Sir Josse d'Acquin guesses that he is the servant of a returning Crusader. Josse allows him to stay in an outhouse, but after the sick man disappears one night he seeks the assistance of Abbess Helewise of Hawkenlye Abbey.

Then a merchant and his boy find a body beneath the trees of the forest fringe. The victim had been savaged. When three Knights Hospitallers arrive on the trail of a runaway monk, Josse realizes that his mysterious guest has brought with him danger and a terrible secret...

Gender of detective: female

For all the author boasts in an afterword of her research (my learnings, let me show you them), this is less medieval by an order of magnitude than the previous novel. This is mostly due to a heavy Wiccan/fantasy undertone: there are People of the Forest with clearly magical abilities who worship a goddess, who co-exist remarkably peacably with a Christian abbey, and quite a lot of 'POV character somehow knew X!' with implications of something higher test than just keen observation.

Meanwhile, there's a running counterpoint of scenes somehow involving a young Knight Hospitaller at a hostage exchange for a handsome young Arab, who had been a merchant's unwilling sodomite. (Which scenes amuse me, mostly because the subtext in them is so clear that later, when we meet the young Knight, there's a fair bit of NO REALLY THAT YOUNG ARAB HE WAS JUST A TOTAL JERK NOTHING THERE BETWEEN US AT ALL NOSIREE CAN'T IMAGINE WHY YOU MIGHT THINK THAT. See also: protest too much, methinks.

It does not suck. But I also have a much higher tolerance for pseudo-fantasy medieval than I do for gritty authentic medieval politics, so bear that in consideration.

*

Whoops. There was a book I meant to do an hour ago, and missed. Must double back and do that next.

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HANGMAN BLIND, by Cassandra Clark.

Cover copy: November, 1382. The month of the dead. Close to the Feast of St. Martin in the fifth year of King Richard's reign, Abbess Hildegard rides out for York and the Abbey of Meaux.

This is no ordinary journey. It is a time of rival popes, a boy king, and a shaky peace in the savage aftermath of Wat Tyler's murder. As Hildegard embarks on a perilous mission to secure the future of her priory, with only her two hounds for protection, she encounters a gibbet with five bloodied corpses and then the body of a youth, brutally butchered. Who was the boy, how was he connected to the men hanging from the gibbet, and what do these gruesome deaths mean? Hildegard is determined to uncover the truth, no matter how terrible it may be.

When even her childhood home, Castle Hutton, turns out not to be a safe haven from murder, Hildegard realizes she will have to summon all of her courage and wisdom to counter the dark forces that threaten her friends and family as well as her country.

The first in an engrossing new series of medieval mysteries, HANGMAN BLIND introduces a remarkable and unforgettable new heroine.

Gender of detective: female

If one wants to write a medieval mystery, with a female detective, by far your best bet is a nun. As is pointed out in this novel, nuns had most of the same rights that married women did, without having to answer to a husband. So both this novel and the next have nun detectives.

There the similarities pretty much end, however. This one focuses on the politics of the time, both religious and secular. Everything is very gritty, as if to make it more real. Even Hildegard isn't allowed to escape unscathed: not only is there a lovingly described attempted rape, the narrative makes a point of sexualizing her perceptions of her friends and acquaintance, as if Hildegard somehow would be less human if she didn't feel sexual desire, vows or no vows.

I wasn't particularly impressed. Part of it was the self-conscious grittiness, noted above. Part of it was the heavy accent on the aforementioned politics, never my favorite subject. And part of it was the even more gratuitous survival of the villain, for the evident purpose of, well, having a recurring villain. Bah.

*

"Stef, if you're going to keep sexing up Disney songs, at least do it in writing."

(No, really. I already knew that 'A Whole New World' could be really sketch, but 'Be Our Guest'? Poor, poor Lumiere.)

ONLY FLESH & BONES, by Sarah Andrews.

Cover copy: A young girl's repressed memory holds the key to solving a murder in Sarah Andrews's terrific new novel featuring geologist Emily - Em - Hansen.

Miriam Menken, wife of oil millionaire J.C. Menken and mother of Cecilia, died suspiciously of a drug overdose, and Cecilia was the only witness. Traumatized for months afterward, Cecilia has blocked out the entire event and has blamed herself both for her mother's death and the fact that the murder is unsolved.

J.C. also happens to be Em's former boss from back in her Denver oil business days, and he bamboozles the unemployed Em into helping him with Cecilia: if Em can unlock the secrets in Cecilia's grief-stricken brain and help her get her life back on track, hell help Em find a job. Em's desperate, so she's hooked.

Em's task is to get Cecilia to recover her memory and her confidence, but she can't help looking into the crime as well. She soon begins to unearth fragments of truth about Miriam's troubled life, including a tortured relationship she had with a shadowy man from her past. Who is he, what power did he have over Miriam, and where is he now?

Once again, Em quickly becomes wrapped up in a complex and dangerous case - and once again, Andrews delivers a winner.

Gender of detective: female

For some reason, reading the cover, I got the idea that Em would be something like, oh, Aaron Elkins' Gideon Oliver. Solving crimes through the power of Rock Science!

Alas, as perhaps I should have guessed from that same cover, no such luck. It isn't about geology. It's only barely about Cecilia, as Em eventually admits. It's really about psychology - Miriam's, and Em's. Especially Em's. Especially how fucked up Em's is, and how she has Issues.

On the one hand, this is part of a series, so perhaps the author believes (and has reason to believe) that the audience already knows and likes Em, so she can get away with this kind of thing. In practice, I'm only turned off ever seeking out anything more by this author. I read mysteries for the mystery, not for the detective's psychological trauma. (It is, in fact, possible to earn my interest in psychological trauma, but it takes more than authorial fiat.) Thumbs down.

*

Six more hours! ...it's very very quiet outside. :peers out the window:

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TO DIE FOR, by Tessa Barclay.

Cover copy: In London to organize a series of concerts, Greg Crowne - otherwise known as Crown Prince Gregory von Hirtenstein - has befriended a pretty Polish countess, Marzelina. When Marzelina is found dead behind the rolling stacks in the Museum of Music Heritage, Greg is inevitably drawn into the police investigation.

It emerges that Marzelina had been sent to England by an elderly relative, Estelle Wiaroz, a Chopin enthusiast who has learned of the discovery of a lost Chopin manuscript. Armed with a letter of credit, Marzelina had been instructed to buy the scrap of manuscript. Not surprisingly, no sign of the manuscript nor of the letter of credit is found on the body.

It seems that Marzelina and Estelle may be the victims of a complex scam, the unraveling of which will take Greg and his girlfriend Liz Blair to Paris and Scotland on the trail of a thriving Chipin forgery industry...

Gender of detective: male

It's not so much that Greg is a music expert, and the leads are all music-related. That's the way it works with mysteries: you have to have some reason why your detective is the one ferreting out the connections, rather than someone from the police. Unless of course you're writing about a police detective, in which case it's their job, or a private investigator, ditto.

The problem is really that there's nothing in the victim's past, no reason for her to die except the Chopin, not so much as 'whoops, flashed too much cash in front of the wrong person.' Maybe it's just that I'm too used to false leads and red herrings -- but this mono-focus wound up feeling railroaded, with the result of the whole thing ringing a bit false. The writing isn't bad. It's just that her meta-reasoning is showing a bit too clearly.

*

Let's try again on
that whole haiku hour thing.
Yay, I think it worked!

Also, I have had berries and whipped cream. Mariposa is magnificently sprawled out on the couch next to me, fast asleep. Sneak, sneak, sneak, sneak....

ILL WIND, by Nevada Barr.

Cover copy: When national park ranger Anna Pigeon needs to find peace, she turns to nature for solace. Lucky for her, it's close at hand -- but then again, so is murder...

Newly assigned to Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, Anna is enthralled by its ruins: the ancient cliff dwellings of a vanished Native American civilization. But Anna's reverie is shattered by an inexplicable illness affecting visitors to a popular landmark -- and two mysterious tragedies: the death of a child...and the murder of a friend. Now she must find the very human source of the evil wind that is blowing through the ruins. For it threatens more innocent lives -- including Anna's own...

Gender of detective: female

Holy shit, is there a lot left out of that summary. There's the emotional entanglement (not an affair, not yet) that Anna's having with the friend who gets murdered, Anna's other friend who's getting stalked by her ex, the fed who shows up who may or may not have a thing for Anna...I'm probably creating the false impression that this is one of those mysteries with all sorts of soap-opera-esque sub-plots, and it's not true. It's mostly that, despite this clearly being part of a series, it doesn't assume that you know everyone already. The characters are allowed space and depth and agency.

This book was left behind in the break room where I work. I read it there. Go figure.

*

Someday, I promise
to write a haiku for you.
This is not that time.

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HOUNDED TO DEATH, by Rita Mae Brown.

Cover copy: From New York Times bestselling author Rita Mae Brown comes the latest novel in her enthralling series of foxhunting mysteries. Richly imagine and utterly engaging, HOUNDED TO DEATH reveals the cut-throat world of competitive hound shows as both human and animals alike try to solve a series of bizarre deaths.

"Sister" Jane Arnold, esteemed master of the Jefferson Hunt Club, has traveled to Kentucky for one of the biggest events of the season: the Mid-America Hound Show, where foxhounds, bassets, and beagles gather to strut their championship bloodline stuff. But the fun is squelched when, immediately after the competition, one of the contestants, Mo Schneider, turns up dead - facedown, stripped to the waist, and peppered with birdshot. Universally detested by his peers, Mo had no shortage of enemies, making the list of suspects as long as the line for homemade pecan pie at a church bake sale.

Two weeks later, back in Virginia, Sister is rocked when her friend the popular veterinarian Hope Rogers dies from what appears to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Sister refuses to believe that Hope killed herself and vows to sniff out the truth. But before she can make real headway, a wealthy pet food manufacturer vanishes during the granddaddy of all canine exhibitions, the Virginia Hound Show.

Ever reliant on her "horse sense," Sister can't help but connect the three incidents. And what she uncovers will make her blood run colder than the bodies that keep turning up in unexpected places.

Thrilling adventures with horses and hounds, breathtaking vistas, furry friends, familiar faces - including Shaker Crown and the girls from Custis Hall - Rita Mae Brown weaves all these elements into a dazzling novel of suspense.

Gender of detective: female

This is the sort of book that includes a list of characters before the story starts. Unusual, but not unheard of. But this is also the sort of story that includes a list of hunting terms before the story starts. Oh dear, I thought, I'll have to refer back and forth. Except then, as I read, all hunting terms were defined in-text. So what was with the list of hunting terms?

It comes across as a symptom of what the book is like. The characters seem to believe there's something inherent better, inherently more moral about liking and understanding hounds and horse*. On its own, eh. But there's also political soapboxing (worrying about discrimination when there are starving people in the world is selfish, see), and if that's not enough, the animals talk. But you can only sometimes understand them, if you are wise in the ways of hounds and horse, and the moon is full, and the author needs a plot device. Just to top things off, after the author spends the entire book telling us how intelligent "Sister" is, she only solves the murders because she literally stumbles across another one in progress. Not an impressive showing, that.

Overall, another series that failed to impress me nearly as much as the cover copy thought I should be. Bah.

*Ironically, I've encountered this attitude before in fiction - there's a certain kind of Regency romance wherein the heroine adores horses and doesn't understand anyone who doesn't.

UNKNOWN MEANS by Elizabeth Becka.

Cover copy: In Elizabeth Becka's latest highly suspenseful novel, forensic scientist Evelyn James returns to investigate a harrowing series of crimes - only to find that no one is safe.

Evelyn James is a forensic specialist in the Cleveland Medical Examiner's office who's juggling a demanding workload, a teenage daughter from a failed marriage, and a homicide detective boyfriend. And somehow she always happens to be involved in some of the twistiest, most challenging crime scenes imaginable.

This time around she's called in to investigate what appears to be a locked-room mystery: A wealthy woman is murdered in the penthouse suite of a luxurious, high-security building. The building's intricate surveillance system didn't pick up anything, the entrance wasn't forced, and the victim's husband has an airtight alibi. Cases like this, Evelyn knows, can turn on the most microscopic piece of evidence, if she can find it. Then Evelyn's best friend is attacked - and things get personal. When another body is found in an apartment across town, Evelyn realizes the killer's choice of victim is anything but random...

Gender of detective: female

Despite all recent rants, I do not actually object to heroines who go off on their own, boldly investigating even when their overprotective boyfriends tell them not to. Well. Not too much.

On the other hand, this actually manages a nice balance of personal stuff with a puzzle-type mystery. And while the heroine does go off on her own, she and said homicide detective boyfriend come to the solution at the same time, totally separately. ...of course, then the heroine goes off to confront the murderer and winds up accidentally on purpose slicing him in half with an elevator and I, uh, guess she doesn't get convicted on manslaughter charges? Could you claim self-defense if someone was totally willing to chop you into elevator goo?

*

Thia, reading: Stef, I think you meant 'faun' with a 'u', not a 'w'.
Stef: Oh. I thought that looked weird.
Thia: I mean, otherwise... "Bambi! Jack, what have you done to Bambi!"
Stef: I'm fixing it!

Team Mariposa: not letting sleep deprivation get in the way of important editing.

BREAKING FAITH, by Jo Bannister.

Cover copy: When she called her business "Looking For Something?" Brodie Farrell hoped to receive challenging commissions from interesting clients. Even by her standards, though, demon rock musician Jared Fry is hard to please. Fortunately his manager, the charismatic Eric Chandos, is easier to like, and it's with him that Brodie works to find a new home for the rock star.

An old coaching inn on the Downs seems the perfect choice. Though the locals are appalled - and their teenagers thrilled - at the arrival of the self-styled Satanist, Fry's primary concern is his new swimming pool. And that's when he realizes that the protestors outside are the least of his problems.

Brodie's troubles are only just beginning, too. She has a long-term relationship with gruff, hard-working Detective Superintendent Jack Deacon and an important platonic friendship with Daniel Hood, a quiet teacher with hidden depths. So why does she find herself so drawn to Chandos? And how much is she going to risk before the real trouble stars?

Gender of detective: male

Brodie isn't actually the detective, really. She's the main character, but either Jack or Daniel is the detective. I think. It's not entirely clear.

I suspect part of the reason I'm so willing to believe Brodie isn't the detective is because she's so blind to Chandos for most of the book. He's bad news, and not even subtle bad news. Consequently, when Brodie falls for his magnetism, it doesn't make him more impressive: it just makes her look stupid.

Then again, I'm really not clear on why either Jack or Daniel adore Brodie. Pretty much everyone admits she's a bitch, with the possible exception of Brodie herself. We're told she's intensely loyal, but mostly we just see her making more difficult the lives of those she supposedly cares about.

I did adore Daniel, though. We're not only told he's intelligent, we get to see him being intelligent. And he's the one character who's actually allowed to get the better of Chandos in a slanging match.

*

Ian is engaging in Wii Baseball, which at least makes sure I can't fall asleep, not if he's waving a Wiimote around like that.

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EXIT THE MILKMAN, by Charlotte Macleod.

Cover copy: Charlotte MacLeon possesses the "gift of farce," says the HOUSTON POST. In her Professor Peter Shandy mystery series she delivers it with "generous dollops of...warmth, with and whimsy" (SAN FRANCISCO SUNDAY EXAMINER & CHRONICLE). Now her newest book puts horticultural professor Peter Shandy, America's homegrown Hercule Poirot, on the trail of a missing bovine expert at Balaclava Agricultural College. And Shandy is sure to step into a heap of, well, trouble, during his tenth and most baffling case yet...

Professor Jim Feldster will do anything for his cows and his students of dairy management...and anything to avoid an evening at home with his bossy, house-proud wife, Mirelle. A member of every lodge in the county, he's out of the house most evenings, and on this particular night, escaping to a meeting of the Scarlet Runners. On the way, he bumps into a neighbor, Peter Shandy, who is out strolling with his cat, Jane Austen. Professor Feldster never arrives at his meeting.

Meanwhile, at precisely 2:47 A.M., a distraught Mirelle arrives at the Shandy household pounding at the front door and accusing the Shandys of harboring her wayward spouse. Before he knows it, Peter and his librarian wife, Helen, are knee-deep in another mystery.

Where is Professor Feldster? What dark secrets could possibly be lurking behind his life of grain supplements and electric milking machines? Peter and Helen's good friend, mystery writer Catriona McBogle, is serendipitously plunged into the case, and all three begin to plough through what appears to be a herd of lies. Soon Peter discovers that Jim Feldster, assuming he is not dead already, is in terrible danger. Mirelle faces perils as well - and they're a lot more serious than someone tracking mud on her white carpet.

A passion for cows is a fine thing, but when investigating criminal motives, Professor Shandy knows to look for more fundamental impulses, such as love, green and revenge. In EXIT THE MILKMAN, he does it with elan and tongue-in-cheek, as Charlotte MacLeod once again pens a mystery filled with delicious wit, good to the last satiric bite.

Gender of detective: male. Mostly. With lots of help from a woman.

The woman in question is the mystery writer Catriona. (Who coincidentally has the same initials as the author, gets along with everybody, has the world's worst sense of direction which still gets her to where she needs to be, in a cosmic sense...) She literally stumbles across not only the reason why Jim was vanished, but also Jim himself. She avoids Mary Sue-dom by the narrowest of margins, mostly the fact that the book isn't about her, and she seems gracefully aware of that.

The Peter Shandy parts, on the other hand...the style is very reminiscent of THE CAT WHO..., except this book actually remembers it's a mystery. It's still cutesy as hell, most notably with its footnoting of references to previos events with the title of the book in which said even occured. But it keeps the focus on the mystery and solving it, not on the Peter Shandy is Cuter Than You Show.

One final interesting element: Jim lives. Mirelle winds up dead, rather messily so. Neither of them are exactly saints. The cynical part of me wonders why the author chose to kill her off, rather than, say, just have her attacked. I suppose if she lived, it wouldn't be as much of a happy ending for Jim... [/cynical]

FITNESS KILLS, by Helen Barer.

Cover copy: Nora Franke is a New York food writer stuck in a rut. Hoping to get rid of a broken heart (and the extra pounds that came with it), she accepts a job as a menu consultant at an elite fitness ranch in Baja. With any luck she'll shed the weight, make some friends, and maybe even find a way to get over her ex-lover.

But Nora soon finds there's more than just yoga classes, morning hikes and liquid fasts among the flowers and herbs - someone's put murder on the menu, and unless she can solve the mystery of who's behind the death of two of the guests, Nora may just be the next victim.

Gender of detective: female

Oh dear God. You know how I said I rarely actually get angry at a book? This is the other exception on my list.

For the first third, it could be pretty much women's fiction, with the exception of a casual mention of a missing man, eventually found and presumed dead in a hiking accident. There's a mild air of Wacky Hijinx, but not unendurable. And then someone dies actually in front of our heroine, and everything goes off the rails.

Seriously. Rather than use her existing skill-set to solve the mystery (food reporter, if you'll remember), our heroine decides that this is the perfect opportunity to prove she has the stuff to be an ace investigative reporter! So she runs around poking her nose into places where it explicitly isn't wanted, pissing people off and not even finding out every much. Her mostly-ex boyfriend comes down, and come to find out he's working with the feds and the local cops and everything she has managed to find out, they already know. And just to top things off, even when she refuses to give up her investigation, she knows she doesn't need to investigate her new friends that she made here at the spa, because she likes them, so they couldn't possibly have done it. No, I am not joking. No, sadly, I'm not exaggerating either.

There is a difference between a detective heroine being a lovable ditz and being a flat-out moron. This one falls so far to the wrong side of that divide that it can't even see the line any more. The sole resemblance to a saving grace that it has is that it doesn't inflict pointless recipes on us.

*

'Heading for the back 9' sounds a lot better when that's not the number of hours until I can sleep. Must make tea, methinks.

THE TORCH OF TANGIER, by Aileen G Baron.

Cover copy: War time Tangier, policed by Franco's Guardia Civil, thick with many nationalities, including Germans and Allies, bitter with the insults of Colonialism, is a dangerous place. Archaeologist Lily Sampson, recruited from her studies in Chicago to the enigmatic Dr. Drury, finds herself in Morocco digging up Neanderthal artifacts at the Cave of Hercules. Quite soon, she's summoned to help the American Legation with an undercover mission linked to Operation Torch. The target date: November 8, 1942. The mission: to control French Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, squash Rommel, and thrust into Europe's underbelly. Out in the Atlantic, General Eisenhower wil rely on relayed communications. But Lily's mastery of code is interrupted by murder -- not one, but two -- which not only imperils her, but Operation Torch itself.

Aileen Baron introduced Lily in A FLY HAS A HUNDRED EYES (2002), a drama of pre-World War II Jerusalem.

Gender of detective: female

This one, unfortunately, does not get it right. She's done her research - and wants to show it off. She wants both a puzzle-box and fascinating characters, and unfortunately cannot quite keep her footing on the tightrope between.

It's getting late and I'm getting poetic. Let's try this again.

I can't tell how much of the problem is the old series problem of necessary accretion (i.e. Lily would be more real to me if I'd read the previous book), and how much is bad writing. Inasmuch as most of the rest of the characters feel slightly distant, as if they too weren't entirely real, I'm inclined to blame it on the writing. The idea is fascinating: spies! Colonialism! Murder! But in practice, there's no sense of urgency. Of course she will get to where she needs to go in time. Of course she will solve the murder when she needs to. Of course everything will work out right. It just doesn't quite reach where it needs to be.

*

I hope I pull something I can get passionate about, next. Much more of these 'eh' books will put me to sleep, and that would be even worse than spilled soda.

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GAME OF PATIENCE, by Susanne Alleyn.

Cover copy: Paris, 1796. Aristide Ravel, freelance undercover police agent and investigator, is confronted with a double murder in a fashionable apartment. The victims prove to be Celie Montereau, the daughter of a wealthy and influential family, and the man who was blackmailing her.

Celie's enigmatic and bitter friend Rosalie Clement provides Aristide with intelligence that steers him toward Philippe Aubry, a young man with a violent past who had been in love with Celie. According to an eyewitness, however, Aubry could not have murdered Celie. As time passes, Aristide finds himself falling in love with Rosalie, albeit reluctantly, as he suspects that she knows more about the murders than she will say.

When Aristide uncovers evidence that points to Rosalie herself, he must learn whom she is protecting and why before he can obtain justice for Celie and save Rosalie from the guillotine. From the gritty back alleys of Paris to its glittering salons and cafes, through the heart of the feverish, decadent society of post-revolutionary France, Aristide's investigation leads him into a puzzle involving hidden secrets, crimes of passion, and long-nurtured hatreds.

With elaborate French cultural atmosphere, author Susanne Alleyn has created a sophisticated and stylish mystery set in the uneasy and turbulent years between the Terror and the rise of Napoleon.

Gender of detective: male

This is quite good. Admittedly it falls into one of my preferred tropes: Aristide is very much in the style of Sherlock Holmes, capable of emotional connection, but in the end, the puzzle is all. But it's also well-written. It has the same feeling of being a snapshot of time and place, without pointless infodumps, that I've noted elsewhere.

...I will also note, regarding emotional connection, that Aristide develops a friendship with the official Executioner of Paris, which could be read as totally slashy if your mind chooses to go that way, and given the hour, mine kinda is. (Yes, he develops a friendship with Rosalie as well, but there are Other Circumstances afoot there.)

*

Just managed to spill my soda all over myself. But not over my laptop! Am not sure if this exactly counts as a win.

MURDER TALKS TURKEY: A YOOPER MYSTERY, by Deb Baker.

Cover copy: It's finally spring in Michigan [...] and the locals have only one thing on their minds - the turkey-hunting opener.

But for sheer adrenaline value, not even turkey season can compete with the local Credit Union getting held up at gunpoint. Committing a robbery in a town where everyone is armed for combat is not the smartest thing to do, and the gunman is shot dead right her in the Stonely Credit Union lobby. The only problem is, in a room full of camo-wearing, heat-packing witnesses, the stolen money has mysteriously vanished.

Faster than you can say "Tom Turkey," Gertie, Cora Mae, and Kitty are on the case in this hoot of a whodunit.

Gender of detective: female

There is, in fact, something I hate worse than Wacky Hijinx. And that would be Quirky Characters. The kind that do not bother to have an actual personality, or characterization, because they are quirky and therefore loveable. Except that they aren't.

The first person narrator is horrible at her job. Not that this makes her any different from half the rest of the characters, who are likewise horrible at their jobs. The rest are so focused on being Quirky that it's impossible to tell whether they're naturally idiots or just pretending. Makes it difficult to care about your heroine risking her life when you're kind of hoping she'll die, I'll tell you that.

I do not loathe this the way I loathed, say, Lilian Jackson Braun's book. But that's not saying very much.

*

It's a little worrisome when the mere suggestion of a fandom for her next prompt makes your co-blogger laugh so hard she literally falls out of her chair. (Don't worry, she's better now.)

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BURNING LAMP, by Amanda Quick.

Cover copy: In this second novel of the Dreamlight trilogy from New York Times-bestselling author Amanda Quick, psychical power and passion collide as a legendary curse comes to a burn.

The Arcane Society was born in turmoil, when the friendship of its two founders evolved into a fierce rivalry. Nicholas Winters' efforts led to the creation of a device of unknown powers called the Burning Lamp. Each generation, the Winters man who inherits it is destined to develop multiple talents - and the curse of madness.

Plagued by hallucinations and nightmares, the notorious crime lord Griffin Winters is convinced he has been struck with the Winters Curse. By even as he arranged a meeting with the mysterious Adelaide Pyne, he has no idea how closely their fates are bound, for she holds the missing lamp in her possession.

Their dangerous psychical experiment makes them the target of forces both inside and outside the Arcane Society. And though desire strengthens their power, their different lives will keep them apart - if death doesn't take them together.

Gender of detectives: one male, one female

Don't judge me. :-p

Seriously, Amanda Quick is brain candy. You know exactly what you're getting, and she's fairly good at delivering it: the strong woman (but not as strong as the man), the ambiguously dark (but not too dark) man, the Really Fucking Evil villain (who thinks he's stronger than he actually is).

This particular installment reads more like a historical romance with strong mystery sub-plot than a mystery with historical romance sub-plot, but I am willing to be forgiving, not least because her heroine is not a virgin. Usually, despite various poses as being a widow and/or brief stints in a brothel, her heroines are virgins until the hero appears. Having a heroine who takes her 'yes, so, sex can be fun but not necessarily emotional' attitude into a non-theoretical realm is empowering. (This is admittedly because the usual sequence is as follows: heroine explains her attitude, hero has mad passionate sex with her, hero realizes she was a virgin and promptly decides they must marry now, heroine re-explains her attitude with added tremulousness, heroine's objections are overruled and they wind up married.)

There is of course a sequel (see note about 'second in Dreamlight trilogy' above), wherein apparently all the interpersonal gains of this book got wiped out over the next few centuries. But I suppose that's what sequels are for. :cynical:

*

Stef and I may perhaps have been sword-fighting with our little plastic shovels, and Ian may perhaps have recorded it. ...it's not so much the shovel-fighting I regret, it's the victory dance afterwards.

UNNATURAL DEATH, by Dorothy Sayers.

Cover copy: The wealthy old woman was dead - a trifle sooner than expected. The intricate trail of horror and senseless murder led from a beautiful Hampshire village to a fashionable London flat and a deliberate test of amour - staged by the debonair sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey.

Gender of detective: male

"I happened to find out that a young woman had murdered an old one for her money," Peter Wimsey says in the much better-known GAUDY NIGHT. "It didn't matter much: the old woman was dying in any case, and the girl (though she didn't know that) would have inherited the money in any case. As soon as I started to meddle, the girl set to work again, killed two innocent people to cover her tracks and murderously attacked three others. Finally she killed herself. If I'd left her alone, there might have been only one death instead of four."

I was rather surprised to pick up this novel, because I hadn't realized that the summary Winsey gives above was of an actual official (novelized) case. His summary isn't exactly accurate: the whole point of UNNATURAL DEATH is that, due to some then-recent changes in inheritance law, it isn't certain that the girl would have inherited in any case. Likewise, at least one of the attacks pre-dates Wimsey's 'meddling.'

But Wimsey's summary does give a much better sense of the feel of the novel than the back cover does. This is a downright depressing novel, wherein even the best of intentions go astray, culminating in the suicide of the captured murderer rather than face trial and the death penalty. Without the awareness of it being a part of a series - without being able to continue on to GAUDY NIGHT, wherein Peter (and Harriet) face the question of responsiblity for other people's actions, and come out the other side.

Also worth noting: the ambiguously gay relationship between the girl, Mary Whittaker, and her best friend. Miss Climpson, the private investigator that Peter sends down, assesses it as being unhealthily close, a schoolgirl crush that has for some reason outlasted the schoolgirl years. Then again, Miss Climpson also has Firm Ideas about women needing men, and the narrative voice makes a firm point about Miss Climpson not being a Natural Spinster, whatever that might be. It's difficult to judge how much of the subtext is intended, and how much it's simply meant to imply that Mary Whittaker was unnatural (she's also portrayed as trying to seduce Peter Wimsey, and making a bad job of it because she clearly loathes touching him). Mostly this only serves to make an already depressing book even more so.

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AUNT DIMITY SLAYS THE DRAGON, by Nancy Atherton.

Cover copy: As her eighth summer in the charming village of Finch approaches, Lori Shepard finds herself craving something to spice up her all-too-familiar routine. Her wish is fulfilled when a rowdy Renaissance festival comes to town, but Lori never anticipated the sort of excitement -- and mystery -- that the fair brings to the otherwise docile English village.

King Wilfred's Faire is unlike anything Lori has ever seen. The age of chivalry lives again within its faux-stone walls; wizards, wenches, magicians, and minstrals provide fairgoers with lighthearted entertainment. Lords quaff, jesters laugh, and knights do battle in the joust arena. Lori's neighbors are enchanted by the pageantry and accept King Wilfred's invitation to join in the fun. While they eat, drink and make merry, Finch is besieged by tipsy tourists, wandering wizards, and bellicose knights who threaten to turn the sleepy village upside down.

As the villagers attempt to rout the rampaging hordes, Lori discovers a dark layer of intrigue lurking beneath the fair's bright surface. Is a sinister figure stalking young Mirabel, the angel-voiced madrigal singer? Has a jealous rival sabotaged the Dragon Knight's weapons? Is an evil assassin trying to murder Good King Wilfred? Or has Lori's imagination run away with her yet again?

Consulting with her dear Aunt Dimity for otherworldly advice, Lori races to save her beloved village - risking her neck in the process - and attempts to keep medieval revelry from ending in modern-day tragedy.

Gender of detective: female

Lori is the sort of person who is repeatedly accused (by herself!) of letting her imagination run away with her. This winds up meaning that she notices something is wrong, and she's the one who gathers the evidence...and then, between jumping to conclusions and second-guessing herself, she completely fails to put everything together. It's her husband who takes the last step, and is actually the one who makes the accusation.

On the bright side, the novel mostly avoids Wacky Hijinx. I'm not sure how, Lord knows. Ironically, maybe the fact that it's told in first person helps: Lori is very self-conscious about her imaginative tendencies, and does her best to rein them in.

Aunt Dimity is a gimmick, nothing more and nothing less. Lori has this book, see, and when she writes in it, someone replies. Fortunately, Aunt Dimity is much more kindly natured than Tom Riddle, and serves as Lori's more prudent side, at least in theory. In practice...well, as I said, she reads as a gimmick, a way for the author to have her ditzy cake and eat it too. There are apparently many, many more in this series, but I don't think I'll be seeking them out.

*

Stef is making whimpery noises. Not so much because the well has run dry as because she's stretching. Tricky thing, stretching.

INTERRED WITH THEIR BONES, by Jennifer Lee Carrell.

Cover copy: A long-lost work of Shakespeare, newly found...a killer who stages the Bard's extravagant murders as flesh-and-blood realities...a desperate race to find literary gold, and just to stay alive...

On the eve of the Globe's production of HAMLET, Shakespeare scholar Kate Stanley's eccentric mentor gives her a mysterious box, claiming to have made a groundbreaking discovery. Before she can reveal it to Kate, however, terrifying echoes of the past break through to the present: The Globe burns, and a body is found inside - murdered in the strange manner of Hamlet's father. Opening the box, Kate finds the first piece in a Shakespeare puzzle that sets her off on a deadly, high-stakes treasure hunt, racing from England to Spain to America.

An expert in occult Shakespeare, Kate knows better than anyone the many secrets, half-truths, codes, and curses surrounding his life and work. On the trail of a four-hundred-year-old mystery, she soon realizes that the prize at the end promises to unlock literary history's greatest secret.

But Kate is not alone in this hunt, and the buried truth threatens to come at the ultimate cost...

Gender of detective (?) - female

This isn't a murder mystery, this is a thriller - basically THE DA VINCI CODE except with Shakespeare instead of the New Testament. And like THE DA VINCI CODE, it's not enough to chase an abstract: you have to bring in identity.

Officially, Kate is chasing a lost play of Shakespeare's. Unofficially, it rapidly turns into an issue of Who Shakespeare Really Is - to which the answer, of course, is not "the actor from Stratford-upon-Avon". In fact, it's the most complicated possible theory on the subject. (Why...yeah, yeah, I know, I asked this just a few posts ago, and the answer hasn't changed. It's still about the best/most dramatic possible story.) Really unofficially, it turns out that Kate's murdered mentor was related to one of the key players, which is either a very nice tying off of a loose end or that little bit too much that pushes things over the top, depending on your relative tolerance by the time you reach that point of the book.

It's well written - certainly better written than Dan Brown. But it still elicits a certain amount of 'seriously? seriously?' at the conspiracy theories it perforce avows with a straight face.

THE BODY IN THE IVY, by Katherine Hall Page.

Cover copy: In the anticipated follow-up to Katherine Hal Page's Agatha Award-winning novel THE BODY IN THE SNOWDRIFT, Faith Fairchild is lured to a remote island to solve a decades-old mystery with ties to those close to her. In a beautifully crafted homage to Agatha Christie's AND THEN THERE WERE NONE, the island's guests find themselves trapped in an increasingly desperate game of whodunit.

In 1970, a popular, wealthy student, Helene Prince, fell to her death just before her graduation from Pelham College. The police ruled it a suicide, but Prin's twin sister never believed the official account of events. Thirty years later, now an internationally known bestselling suspense writer, she's still yearning for an answer.

Enter Faith Fairchild, a caterer, sometimes sleuth, and most significant in this case, the sister of a Pelham grad. Through the Pelham old-girl network, Faith has been hired for a weeklong reunion of eight classmates on the novelist's very private island. The dream job - the house is a mini-resort with spectacular ocean views - turns into an nightmare when Faith discovers she's trapped not with a group of longtime friends, but a group of suspects. None of the women knew the others were invited - and definitely hadn't stayed in touch. With no phone lines, cell reception, or boat, Faith is caught up in a deadly game of cat and mouse as one by one the alumnae fall prey to a madwoman. A disturbed sister's revenge? Faith must quickly unlock a series of past secrets if she's going to leave the island alive!

Gender of detective: female

Pelham isn't necessarily Wellesley. Wellesley is hardly the only all-women college in Massachusetts, after all, nor the only one with a bell tower. But the urge to make certain connections is strong, even though the flashbacks to Pelham are anything but reminiscent of my own college years. Helene Prince was toxic, systematically smashing each of her supposedly closest friends. It's not so much a question of whether Prin was murdered, but who did it.

Which in turn means that Faith Fairchild was actually hired, not so much to cater as to detect. Not that she's told this until nearly the end (which is very bad planning on her employer's part, given that someone is killing off her guests). Likewise, we're told she figured out who's behind both Prin's murder and the current murders, but we're never actually shown how the hell she figured it out.

I enjoyed this, but it was for not-Wellesley and for Helene Prince, and the vicious joy of watching her get hers. Faith remains rather a non-entity, and I have no particular desire to read more of her. (The fact that apparently she is a minister's wife doesn't help: I grew up in that situation and do not trust fictional representations of same, as they get it wrong too often.)

*

Must go get more soda. And possibly break out the WiiFit and attempt some yoga, in an attempt to unknot myself. Stef has already muttered about how if we're doing this next year, we're hiring a massage therapist for pit crew, dammit.

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Dreams of Falling

a woman who never dreams goes slowly mad

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