Death of a Doll

 Death of a Doll (1947) by Hilda Lawrence

Hope House, a boarding house for young women, is run by the very genteel Monica Brady and her assistant Angelina "Angel" Small. Seventy girls are given bed, two meals a day, hot water and the opportunity to make friends. The story opens with Ruth Miller, a clerk at Blackman's department store, who has been able to take advantage of an opening at the boarding house. She is so pleased about the fact that she's finally found a place with hot water that she tells her favorite customer, the wealthy young Roberta Sutton, all about it. Roberta has taken an interest in the girl and isn't sure that Hope House is the paradise Ruth thinks. She promises herself to check in on Ruth when she returns from a visit to the country, but when she gets back Ruth is no longer at the store. She is shocked to discover that the young clerk has died from an apparent suicide. 

The doctor on the scene and the police quickly declared it a suicide-though why she should have jumped from her seventh floor room window during costume party where all the girls were dressed as rag dolls is hard to fathom. But Miss Brady and Miss Small both say that Ruth was having trouble fitting in and seemed very withdrawn, nearly depressed--and that is that. Except--Roberta doesn't believe it for a minute. When she left Ruth, the girl was excited about her new living arrangements. And--just the day before the party Ruth had bought a new blue suit that shed been saving up for. Roberta asks her friend Mark East, an investigator, to nose around and see what he can find out. Why would a girl whose luck was on the upswing jump to her death? What the reader knows--but Mark will have to find out--is that in the short time Ruth was at Hope House she had found someone from her past. Someone who scared her upon sight. But who in Hope House is the menacing figure from the past and why did Ruth have to die?

Hope House is full of tension and unexplained suspicion. Beulah Pond, friend of both Mark and Roberta, says that the house "stinks" with an unpleasant atmosphere and once he starts investigating Mark can't disagree. This is in effect even before Ruth meets up with the enemy from the past. I suspect Lawrence was trying for suspense, but I just found it overly oppressive without building any desire in me to investigate the source of the atmosphere. And Mark's detective work, paired with that of Beulah and her tag-along Bessy, seems even more lackluster and haphazard than in the previous book I read. 

On the positive side--there was a major clue to the culprit's identity dropped right in my lap and I missed it. So, Lawrence did a nice bit of misdirection there. But overall I just can't say I recommend her books. When I read my first Lawrence book, Blood Upon the Snow, I said that it was an "almost" kind of book and I gave it 2.5 stars. I followed that with a non-Mark East book, The Pavilion, and it was a bit better--but given that I awarded 2.75 stars, I'd say it still didn't quite hit the target. And here we are again. Death of a Doll is even less captivating than the previous two, so I suspect Hilda Lawrence is an "almost" kind of detective novelist. I've still got one more Lawrence mystery on the TBR stack: A Time to Die, the second of the Mark East books. Maybe that will wind up being her masterpiece...but I'm not going to hold my breath. ★★

For different takes on this novel, please see Kate's review at Cross Examining Crime and John at Pretty Sinister Books.

 

First line: Angeline Small stepped out of the elevator at five o'clock and nodded to Kitty Brice behind the switchboard.

Last line: He answered Roberta, but to himself. He said, Poor Monny.

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Deaths: one fell from height 

The Third Policeman

 The Third Policeman (1967) Flann O'Brien (Brian O'Nolan/Brian Ó Nualláin)

O'Brien's novel, originally written in 1939/1940, did not find a publisher until 30 years later. It is a novel about crime and punishment told with a combination of stream of consciousness, bizarre humor, and Alice in Wonderland dream-like qualities. Our unnamed narrator opens by describing how he and his friend John Divney killed old man Mathers for the fortune they believed he had in a black cash box. The rest of the story tells us what happened when it came time to divvy up the booty and what happened to our narrator afterward.

"It is nearly an insoluble pancake, a conundrum of inscrutable potentialities, a snorter."

For anyone reading the story unawares (don't read the intro! see complaint below), it definitely is a conundrum. Making sense of the events that follow the narrator's return to Mathers' house is going to take all of the reader's attention. There are policemen and one-legged men and bicycles. The policemen are recording measurements of a mysterious nature. And when they're not doing that they are hunting for stolen bicycles or stolen bits of bicycles such as lamps or seats or wheels or pumps. The policemen don't seem to know that Mathers is dead. They don't seem concerned about where our narrator came from or what his business is--unless it has to do with a bicycle. And does our narrator ever find the missing cash box?

I have to start my take on the book with a complaint. I hate introductions that spoil the story. I don't know why Denis Donoghue thought he needed to tell the world what was going on in this bizarre little story--but I certainly wasn't pleased. One of the major points of O'Brien's narrative is that the reader is supposed to be wondering the whole time what in the world is going on. Where is our unnamed protagonist? Why are there policemen? What's the deal with the bicycles? Why is everything so weird? When you know the hook from the get-go, you just want to cut through all the weirdness (or at least I did). In fact, you kind of wonder why you're bothering to read this at all. Oh--and by the way--the spoiler is not the first line quoted below nor in my description of the novel above. Since O'Brien tells us upfront that our narrator killed someone, it is obvious that that is not the big mystery to be solved. 

Overall, this is an interesting book and with a unique method for comment on crime and its just punishment. We also take a look at the nature of reality, death, and what comes next. ★★★ (probably would have been higher if I'd skipped the intro and experienced the book as it should have been experienced).

First line: Not everybody knows how I killed old Phillip Mathers, smashing his jaw in with my spade; but first it is better to speak of my friendship with John Divney because it was he who first knocked old Mathers down by giving him a great blow in the neck with a special bicycle-pump which he manufactured himself out of a hollow iron bar.

Last line: "Is it about a bicycle?" he asked.

*************

Deaths =  5 (three natural; one hit on head; one blown up)

You'll Be the Death of Me

 You'll Be the Death of Me (1979) by Miriam Lynch

 A twenty-year high school reunion is paired with the retirement ceremony for math teacher Sarah Plunkett. Mrs. Plunkett had a huge effect on the students of Belltown High School--whether for good or ill. A number of the kids seemed to get under her skin over the years and she was periodically heard to tell them, "You'll be the death of me." And now, apparently, one of them has. When comes to the podium to acknowledge the parting gift--a set of luggage for her anticipated retirement travels--she dies from what is suspected to be poison before she can say "thank you."

Nell Willard, reporter for the local newspaper, had been assigned to cover the event and of course she can't resist investigating even though her steady date, Lieutenant Gerold Holloway tells her to stay away from crime reporting in lieu of her usual society news beat. Nell just can't help wondering if Marlene Hallison, organizer of the event, had been nursing an ancient grievance against her former teacher. Or if one of the Corbett twins, owners of the downtown drugstore, used their knowledge of drugs to keep her from revealing a fatal secret. Or maybe Suzanne Dixon, young wife of the town's richest man, had a skeleton in her closet (or her husband's) that she couldn't afford to have exposed. Nell's determined to help Gerold find out...whether he wants her to or not.

This another of a series of Zebra Mystery Puzzler Books that I got in an assortment for Christmas last year. As indicated on the cover, the set-up for these books is that all the clues necessary for the reader to solve the mystery before the final reveal are given in the cover photo, various illustrations within the story, and, as with good mysteries clues given in the text. I obtained and read one of this series a very long time ago (over 30 years) and enjoyed it (thus the request for my hubby to order up the Zebra books on Ebay last year). And I read The Final Appointment earlier this year and found it to be a decent mystery as well. But Miriam Lynch doesn't do this mystery thing quite as well as Marcia Blair (Marc Baker) did.

Our protagonist Nell seems prone to immediately jump to the worst conclusion with the least amount of reason. She immediately speculates that one of the twins is responsible because she saw a light late in the pharmacy. She immediately thinks that Suzanne Dixon is having an affair with Dr. Gregory because she sees her leaving the house early in the morning. Nell is supposed to be a reporter and should be looking for facts--with a capital F. But as a reporter (and an amateur detective), she leaves a lot to be desire. One point in her favor, her relationship with Lieutenant Holloway is easier to take than that of the pair in the earlier read. At least they're not shouting at each other all the time.

But what really keeps the book from a higher rating is the solution. Which I can't discuss without spoilers, so I've encoded it using ROT13. V'z abg n sna bs gur "Bbcf, V xvyyrq gur jebat crefba" fbyhgvba. Jr fcraq gur jubyr obbx gelvat gb svther bhg jub unq n zbgvir gb xvyy Zef.Cyhaxrgg bayl gb svaq bhg gung bhe phycevg zrnag gur cbvfba sbe fbzrbar ryfr. Ner gurer pyhrf gb guvf fbyhgvba nf cebzvfrq? Jryy, V thrff. Grpuavpnyyl. Ohg V unir tenir qbhogf gung znal (vs nal) ernqref ner tbvat gb erpbtavmr gurz nf pyhrf orsber gur nafjre vf erirnyrq ng gur raq.

I have another Zebra title written by Lynch and I hope the mystery is bit better plotted and the solution more accessible (clue-wise) to the reader than it is here. Fingers crossed! ★★

First line: The banquet was to have begun at seven o'clock, but well after the scheduled time the cocktail lounge was still thronged.

Last line: But that was good enough for the present, she decided; good enough for a start.

******************

Deaths = 2 (one poisoned; one natural)

Only the Good

 Only the Good (1942) by Mary Collins

Ella Rutledge was a good woman with relatives who put her good nature to the test. She's long known how she wanted to leave her worldly goods, but when a letter arrives she decides to gather the family to Oak Hill "on a matter of business." But a stroke interrupts her plans and before she has a chance to recover both she and her faithful maid Parsons are dead. 

Susan is Ella's great-niece, and the only one who really grieves when Ella is poisoned. But, circumstances make it appear that she is also the only one with motive and opportunity to have done the job. Sheriff Atwood doesn't want to believe that Susan is guilty, but the evidence does keep mounting up. Especially when it's discovered that Parsons was richer than you'd expect a lady's maid to be and her will leaves half of everything to Susan. Who would want to frame her if she isn't the culprit? That's what Susan hopes to prove before it's too late.

And, really, there are others who might have wanted Ella Rutledge out of the way before she had the chance to finish her "business." Susan's domineering cousin Bea wouldn't want to lose her place as Ella's heir and her husband, once Susan's fiance, seems eager to believe that Susan is guilty. the Starrs, Will and Mabel, are always on the verge of bankruptcy and had counted on the legacy Ella had always promised them. Except...Ella apparently destroyed her previous will and there's no sign of a new one. Things get really interesting when Susan's estranged mother shows up with a son from her second marriage in tow. And mother dearest hints that she knows a secret or two about the family. Of course, that means she's next on the list of potential murder victims. What secret is worth killing for?

More suspense than detective novel, we spend a great deal of time watching the net draw tighter and tighter around Susan. But there's not an enormous about of actual detective work going on. The sheriff finds himself up against a respected family who won't tell him a thing and it's Susan who keeps discovering clues. Ultimately, there's not enough proof to accuse the guilty party, so Susan winds up the bait in a trap to catch the killer. But...I do like the set up and the characters of Susan and Ella (a shame that Ella has to be killed for the plot). And I enjoyed it a great deal more than the first Collins book I read (Dead Center) back in 2010 when My Reader's Block was just a baby blog. ★★★

First line: "Oak Hill is the most beautiful old house in California..."

Last line: And after the proper interval following my marriage to Joe next spring, I hope very much that Oak Hill's rooms will be filled with cries and laughter of new young lives that will surely drive out the ghosts of old, unhappy ones.

***************

Deaths =  11 (one in the war; two drowned; two stabbed; one poisoned; three natural; one car accident; one shot) 

Fear Nothing

 Fear Nothing Vol 1 (2010) by Dean Koontz; adapted by Grant Alter from the original Koontz novel (1997)

This graphic novel tells the first part of Koontz's story about 28-year-old Christopher Snow who lives in the city of Moonlight Bay, California. Chris has XP (xeroderma pigmentosum) a very rare genetic disease that makes light deadly to him. He has lived his life in darkness, using candlelight instead of regular light and covering up as completely as possible when forced to go out in daytime. The story opens with the death of his father. Both his father and mother have succumbed to cancer and, while Chris is saddened at their deaths, he doesn't think there is anything nefarious about the circumstances until....

Directly after his father's death, he witnesses an exchange in the hospital parking garage that leads him to believe that all is not as it seems. Before he knows it, he's being stalked by military-types and family friends who help shelter him begin dying. He teams up with his best surfing buddy Bobby in an attempt to find out what's going on before the stalkers catch up to him.

Full disclosure: I needed a Dean Koontz book for a reading challenge. Otherwise, I would never have picked this one up--I didn't think Koontz would be my cup of tea. Now I'm disgruntled to find out that this was volume one in what was supposed to be a complete graphic novel series based on the original book. But Koontz never finished the graphic novels. And now...I think I'm going to have to get the original book because Koontz hooked  me and now I want to know what happened to Chris's parents and what the big secret about the military base at Moonlight Bay is. So, Dean Koontz, you did your job. You got me interested and now I have to read the rest. It may not be my standard type of mystery, but there's definitely a mystery to be solved. It may have a weird solution (not having ever read a Dean Koontz book before, who know?), but as long as it makes sense I'll be satisfied. Off to figure out if my library has the original novel....  ★★★★

First lines: I am not psychic. I do not see signs and portents in the sky.

Last line: I was sure...we were going to find out.

************

Deaths = 4 (two natural; one suicide; one stabbed)

The Four Just Men

 The Four Just Men (1905) by Edgar Wallace

The Four Just Men are killers--but only in the cause of justice. They operate by strict rules--to never kill for personal gain and whenever appropriate to give the marked man plenty of warning. Those on their list are men and women who have committed crimes against the public and yet the law has been unable to touch them. So the Four Just Men dispense the justice due. They have assassinated corrupt military contractors, embezzlers of public funds, and unjust judges. They have killed a murderous despot using his own public gallows. And now they have their sights set on England's Foreign Secretary who is the primary backer of an unjust Aliens Extradition Bill. The four men send Sir Philip Ramon several messages with fairly explicit terms of what will happen if he does not with draw the bill by their deadline. Scotland Yard pulls in every available man to post a cordon around Ramon's house as well as to have a man in every room of the house. And yet Sir Philip is killed in his locked study, with windows sealed and shutters barred, and no entered or left the room. How was it done? And why was one of the Four Just Men killed as well--and who did it?

When Wallace's thriller first came out, that's where the story ended. The public was challenged to submit their solutions for prize money and it wasn't until the contest was over that the final chapter was printed and the solution revealed. I'm pleased to say that I might have won a prize. I definitely spotted the how. I wasn't quite positive about who killed the Just Man, but if a real prize had been dangling in front of me I just might have gotten there. The build-up to the assassination is very good, but given the length of the book it far outweighs the attention given to the actual murder and investigation thereof. It feels unbalanced and while I don't hate inverted mysteries they're not my favorite. When I read one, I at least would like to see more of the detective's efforts in tracking down the culprit/s. However, this was Wallace's first effort and I think it a pretty good one. ★★★

First line (prologue): If you leave the Plaza del Milna, go down the narrow, where, from ten till four, the big flag of the United States Consulate hangs lazily; through the square on which the Hotel de la France fronts, round by the Church of Our Lady, and along the clean, narrow thoroughfare that is the High Street of Cadiz, you will come to the Cafe of the Nations.

First line (1st chapter): On the fourteenth day of August, 19--, a tiny paragraph appeared at the foot of an unimportant page in London's most sober journal to the effect that the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs had been much annoyed by the receipt of a number of threatening letters, and was prepared to pay a reward of fifty pounds to any person who would give such information as would lead to the apprehension and conviction of the person or persons, etc.

Last line: It was Gondsalez who had placed the "clue" for the police to find.

******************

Deaths =  12 (four shot; five hung/strangled/asphyxiated; one poisoned; two electrocuted)

Murder for Two

 Murder for Two (1943) by George Harmon Coxe

Jack "Flash" (or "Flashgun") Casey is none too pleased (see first line below). Uncle Sam has turned him down for military service because of a bum knee. In a fit of good nature (what he subsequently thinks of as soft-headedness), he volunteered to teach a twice-weekly photography class for the American Women's voluntary Services. And now his boss MacGrath has told him that he must allow one of the women whose father has a major stake in the newspaper to tag along with him so she can observe a photographer in action.

Crusading news columnist Rosalind Taylor is always on the hunt for ways to make crime bosses and those who swindle the average Joe pay for their dirty deeds. When an engineering inventor named John Perry is released from jail (for what he claims was a trumped-up charge), she's ready to help. Several years ago, Perry devised a new lubricant which should have made him wealthy and a more suitable suitor for Karen Harding--whose father is none too thrilled at the couple's attachment. But he claimed that his backer, Matt Lawson--a former bootlegger who began investing in more legitimate enterprises just before the war--tricked him when the contract was signed. Perry wound up going to jail for assault.

Taylor has discovered information that will support Perry's claims and she sets up a meeting with one of her sources. She invites Flash Casey, the newspaper's crack cameraman who just happens to be a pretty decent detective as well, to join the meeting and, of course, his assistant for the day tags along as well. But the news columnist doesn't show up for the appointment and when Casey and his shadow go to her apartment, they find the place ransacked and Taylor dead in her car a few blocks from the building. Casey soon finds himself knee-deep in another murder investigation...and so is his shadow. Because she just happens to be Karen Harding and she's still in love with John Perry. 

Coxe as he does with his Kent Murdock series (also a cameraman/detective), provides a tough guy crime novel with a soft touch. Soft-boiled, the story gives us a seemingly untouchable swindler equipped with hired guns and enforcers--and, of course, Casey can hold his own with the bad guys (even if he is a softie underneath). But the mystery is not a simple one. It's not just a matter of the swindler doing in those who might expose him. There's an extra angle on the case and only Casey is able to spot it. This is the first of the Flash Casey mysteries that I've tried and while he is cast in the same mold as Murdock, he's not a carbon copy. The interesting angle that Casey spots, and which I did not, gives just the right touch. ★★★★

First line: Casey was burning.

Last line: Taking pictures for a big city newspaper might be a headache, but for him it was the only job in the world and there was no other that could compare with it.

****************

Deaths = two shot

The Red Death Murders

 The Red Death Murders (2022) by Jim Noy

Okay, let me just get my envy out of the way at the beginning. Taking the setting of Poe's "Masque of the Red Death" and turning it into a Golden Age Era locked room style mystery is just genius. And I wish I had been clever enough to come up with it. But anyone who follows Jim's blog The Invisible Event already knows what a clever fellow he is. And all that training at the feet of locked room masters such as John Dickson Carr has paid off. 

So, for those who have yet to read Poe's story, I'll give you the scaffolding upon which Jim's impressive edifice is built: When the red death plague hits the countryside, Prince Prospero gathers a bunch of nobles, friends, and their servants at his castle to (hopefully) ride out the pandemic and emerge intact on the other side (sound familiar?). He's stored up food and arranged for entertainment and revels to keep the nobles distracted. Then (in Jim's version) after a time, the appeal of the dancing and whatnot palls and all but nine men have left the castle for the outside world. This includes the Prince, his doctor, his body guard, several nobles, and Thomas, the lone servant and our third person POV. And then the deaths begin--no, the plague has not breached the castle walls, murder is reducing the ranks. We have two locked room deaths and a murder that takes place in full view of the remaining company. What clever mind has devised these seemingly impossible murders and, more importantly, why?

This may be Jim's debut book, but he handles it like a pro. The characterization is superb with all nine men well-defined and easily distinguished. I especially enjoyed the relationship between Thomas and his master, Sir William, and Sir William's brother Sir Marcus--even when suspicion fell upon one or another of them. The setting is also well-defined and I easily followed the action and where it happened. I loved that a map was included--just as in so many Golden Age crime novels. It was also fun to have the "Challenge to the Reader" found so often in the early Ellery Queen mysteries. Jim went out of his way to make GAD aficionados happy. 

  

 I have to say that I didn't answer all the challenge questions. Jim had led me all around the castle and I was lost in the details and thoroughly mystified. But that's not a bad thing. I don't mind being mystified if it's done well and the solution makes sense in the end. Well, done, Jim. My only complaint is that I still don't quite see how the first locked room works--but I'm pretty sure that's my inability to properly visualize the mechanics rather than the explanation given. Overall, this is an impressive debut mystery.  ★★★★ and 1/2.

First line: At first, Thomas failed to recognize the blood, it was the rising hair on his arms and the shiver passing through his chest that made him look a second time.

Last line: Thomas Collingwood reached out and grabbed his father's offered hand and they stepped forward together.

*******************

Deaths = 5 (four neck broken; one shot/stabbed with arrows)

2024 Key Word Challenge

 

It's time for another round of the Monthly Key Word Challenge, hosted by Kim and Tanya at Girlxoxo. I encourage you to join us as we read books for the monthly prompts. Just click the link to head to their page for details. I'll list some possible titles and update as I go.

January: The Mystery at Orchard House by Joan Coggin (1/13/24)

February: Gently Down the Stream by Alan Hunter (2/13/24)

March: The Philadelphia Murder Story by Leslie Ford (3/21/24)

April: The List of Adrian Messenger by Philip MacDonald (5/4/24)

May: Bodies from the Library 4 by Tony Medawar, ed (5/13/24)

June: The Rocksburg Railroad Murders by K. C. Constantine (6/5/24)

July: Murder Rides the Campaign Train by the Gordons (8/2/24)

August: Pieces of Justice by Margaret Yorke (9/2/24)

September: Think Twice by Harlan Coben (9/22/24)

October: Never Cross a Vampire by Stuart Kaminsky (10/14/24)

November: Scarhaven Keep by J. S. Fletcher (11/25/24)

December: Death Wears a White Gardenia by Zelda Popkin (12/26/24)

Black Friday

 Black Friday (1954) by David Goodis

Hart is on the run from a murder charge in New Orleans. He heads north on a train and when he spots undercover cops he jumps off the train in Philadelphia, leaving his suitcase and everything he has behind. He's got very little money in his pocket (his stash was in the suitcase as well...) and, coming from the south, is not prepared for the wintry weather. He resorts to theft to get himself a warm overcoat and then as he's escaping from the area of the robbery walks into the middle of a gangland "disagreement." He winds up trapped in a suburban house with the gang (four psychotic criminals and two women who run the house for them) who planning a big heist on Friday the 13th--forced to think on his feet, find a way into the leader's good graces, and manage to stay alive. 

I've said this before on the blog, but it bears repeating: I am not a noir/hard-boiled devotee. Most of what I've accumulated in the genre have come in lots of books on ebay where there were some highly desired books in with an assortment of what the seller was pleased to call "mysteries." Would I have deliberately bought this book if it had been on its own? No. But, man, Goodis can write. His first line is so telling of the situation Hart finds himself in--not only is the winter cold closing in on him, but so is the law and the crooks he's gotten himself mixed up with. There is no way out that won't result in heartache (at least) and with Hart in a situation far worse than where he started (most likely). Hart's story is even more affecting when we learn where he comes from and why he killed and is on the run. It's a brutal read--but, oddly enough, beautifully written and it expresses the loneliness and desperation of the man on the run so well. ★★★★

First line: January cold came in from two rivers, formed four walls around Hart and closed in on him.

Last line: He had no idea where he was going and he didn't care.

****************

Deaths = 4 (3 shot; one beaten to death)

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Uncoffin'd Clay

 Uncoffin'd Clay (1980) by Gladys Mitchell

Michael Locherbie is off to the countryside for a nice, quiet visit with his brother Innes and sister-in-law Mary. Innes and his wife are recently retired and recent denizens of Strode Hillary, but they have begun to fit in and get the lay of the land. Their neighbors certainly like them a lot better than the wealthy Middle Eastern sheikh who has bought the local manor house. Especially since he dismissed all the local servants (putting them out of jobs) and brought in his own. It also doesn't help that he also wants to buy up other land to use as grazing for his fancy horses.

It looks like someone is acting on their ill feelings when one of the sheikh's sons is caught in a mantrap set on the manor's grounds and winds up with a badly damaged leg and head injuries. Then the man's land agent is killed as well. Is it a vendetta against the outsiders? When it's discovered that the land agent was implicated in a spate of robberies that have plagued the area, Superintendent Hallicks begins to doubt the motives behind the attack and murder. So, he asks Mary's godmother Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley to come in as a consulting psychiatrist to interview the ruffians suspected of both setting the trap and the robberies. Her interviews lead her to suspect that the motives run even deeper than a vendetta against foreigners or robberies gone wrong. And it isn't long before she has the chance to test her theory.

Michael serves as our narrator in this particular Dame Bradley outing. And, really, I could have done without him. I get why Mitchell used him--his connection with Innes and Mary and their insider view of the village is useful. But Michael is annoying. One thing that irritated me about him was the running commentary that indicates that he secretly (or perhaps not-so-secretly) lusts for his brother's wife. All these little throw-away comments and moments when he kisses her soundly--right in front of Innes--and he's surprised that his brother doesn't seem to bat an eyelash. Maybe Innes is that confident about his marriage. Maybe he trusts Mary implicitly. But, honestly, he ought to pop Mike a good one when Mary's not around. 

The mystery itself is fairly solid. Though I must say, I did spot the culprit straight up. Not because of any brilliant spotting of clues (unless unconsciously), but because of my take on the character when they first showed up and then in subsequent appearances. And once I thought about who, the motive followed. Not a bad for a late entry in a very long writing career, but I do prefer her earlier mysteries and those that feature her secretary Laura. ★★★

First line: It all began last Spring while I was staying with my brother Innes and his wife at the house they had bought in a little town called Strode Hillary.

Last line: As I drove along the lanes, I saw honeysuckle and wild clematis in the hedgerows, yellow iris on the riverbanks, and when I got to the house all the roses were out in Mary's garden.

******************

Deaths = 3 (one auto accident; one stabbed; one hit on head)