Moonflower Murders

 Moonflower Murders (2020) by Anthony Horowitz

At the end of Magpie Murders, Susan Ryeland had retired from publishing and joined her partner Andreas in a venture to run a hotel on the island of Crete. The Polydorus has beautiful views and the weather is lovely and everything should be just marvelous. Except--it isn't. The help is not reliable. Deliveries are not reliable. And the tourists aren't filling the hotel the way they'd like. She and Andrus are so busy trying to make things work that they don't have the time for each other that they need. Susan is feeling restless.

That's when the Trehernes show up at the Polydorus. And they've come specifically to see Susan. About eight years ago, there was a horrible murder at the hotel they (the Trehernes) own back in England. It occurred on the day of their daughter's wedding and the result was that Stefan Cordescru, one of the hotel's employees, was convicted of the murder. Alan Conway, one of her former authors, had later visited the hotel, talked with various people who were around on the day of the murder, and wrote a mystery which featured characters loosely based on them. The Trehernes daughter Cecily recently read the book, Atticus Pund Takes the Case, and called her parents to say that she was right all along, Stefan didn't kill Frank Parrish and the answer was staring at her from the book. Cecily disappeared that very afternoon.

Now the Trehernes want Susan to come to their hotel, talk with the people involved, and reread Conway's book--and tell them what Cecily found out and what has happened to their daughter. They believe that since she worked with Conway she'll know how he would have hidden the answers. And they'll pay her 10,000 pounds to do it. Susan & Andreas could definitely use the money. So, despite Andreas's misgivings (when she looked into Alan Conway's death in Magpie Murders, she found herself in danger...), Susan agrees. But when she begins investigating she finds everyone, including the Trehernes, would prefer not to answer her questions. Why would the Trehernes ask her to do the job if they weren't going to support her efforts? The further she digs, the more motives she finds for Parrish's murder, but she still can't see what Cecily saw "on the very first page." And when she does see it, there isn't much in the way of proof. So, how about a nice, gathering of the suspects, point the finger of suspicion this way and that....and after all the build up the villain will confess--just like in Alan Conway and Agatha Christie novels.

Horowitz provides another unique mystery-within-a-mystery--a technique he seems to like. In some ways this was better than Magpie Murders. I completely missed all of the clues hidden the Atticus Pund story, both those that pointed to Pund's murderer and those that pointed to the killer Susan was trying to spot for the Trehernes. So, Horowitz did an excellent job of distraction. But I did spot the "real-life" murderer even thought I attributed a completely different motive to them. I found it difficult to like or root for any of the characters this time. Even Susan and, while her editor's eye gave her an investigative edge--spotting discrepancies in witness's statements, for instance--the pacing of her investigation seemed slow, almost plodding. It's been a while since I read the first book, but it seemed to me that the Pund story and the "real-life" framing story meshed better. The mysteries are still pretty absorbing and well-done, just not quite as strong as Magpie.

The best part of the book is the homage Horowitz pays to Agatha Christie and other Golden Age mystery writers. The gathering of the suspects at the end is very appropriate and in keeping with the Golden Age feel. I do wish that the Conway story had actually played a much bigger role in Susan's wrap-up.  ★★★ and 1/2

First line: The Polydorus is a charming family-run hotel, located a short walk away from the lively town of Agios Nikolaos, one hour from Heraklion. 

Last lines: "Then let's go." And that's exactly what we did.
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Deaths = 11 (one hit on head; five natural; one shot; two strangled; one stabbed; one hit by train)