I finished the final two entries for the Wren Winters series, at least up to now.
In the second outing, Wren and her friends are thrilled at the invitation to appear on the podcast of a popular influencer. But Noelle collapses and by the time the police arrive, she is dead. Noelle, it becomes clear, was being threatened online. Further investigation turns up a jealous ex, a former business partner, and a sister determined to force Noelle offline.
Then Wren’s. pink haired librarian friend begins to display similar symptoms. Now Wren and her friends have to hurry before Esther follows Noelle to the grave.
Wren and her friends head off to a gaming con. Wren is reluctant, because this was the exact convention her beloved husband Marcus attended before his death. Wren soon realizes that the jealousies and rivalries between the members are dangerous and when two of the women are murdered, and then Wren herself is attacked, she realizes the case goes all the way back to Marcus and his death. Once declared an accident, it is obvious he too was murdered. Was it by the same person? And why?
I really enjoy these books. The gaming world is a fresh and original setting (and one I, a former D&D player revel in) and the mysteries are complicated and intriguing. I hope this is not the last we’ve seen of Wren Winters and her posse.
The two books I read this past week couldn’t be more different.
Turkey Trot Murder takes place as Tinker’s Cove, Maine, is gearing up for Thanksgiving. But the community is rocked by the murder of a young college student, Allison Franklin. Her father, the wealthiest man in town, puts the blame squarely on the immigrants. He includes a restauranteur, although his family could trace their heritage pre-United States. Emotions run high and soon Allison’s father is also found murdered.
Who could be the murderer of both Franklins? The immigrants? Or the many other people in town, including Franklin’s estranged wife, with whom both battled?
I thought Turkey Trot Murder would be cozier than I usually read. And it did follow several of the cozy rules: the violence takes place mostly off scene and there are plenty of homey domestic touches throughout. But the depiction of the opioid crisis gave the story much more weight. I found this aspect very realistic and really more interesting than the mystery. In fact, the mystery ended up being overshadowed by the rest of the story.
Recommended with that caveat.
Wasp Trap couldn’t be more different.
In 1999, 6 students are chosen by a charismatic teacher to work on a special project, developing a test to discover psychopaths. But Sebastian shuts down the project very suddenly. No one knows why.
The six students, now adults in their forties, meet at a dinner party planned by two of the so-called revolutionaries. The visit quickly goes sideways when the six are isolated in the house by two genuine psychopaths and told to confess a secret from 1999. The situation rapidly spirals into murder.
I thought this book started slowly but once it picks up steam, it is unputdownable. There are several surprising twists before the secret is revealed and the psychopath is revealed. Recommended.
Sam, Candie and the gang are involved in another adventure. In this outing, Hank’s brother Aaron (Hank is Sam’s squeeze) is in town and involved with Joy, the daughter of the owner of the diner. A barbecue contest sees a bank manager make a pass at Joy. Aaron leaves in to defend his girlfriend. When the bank manager is found squashed to death by a pumpkin, Aaron is a prime suspect.
But there are many suspects, all with strong motives for wishing Edgar dead.
Lots of fun. The pet parade with all the pets in fancy costumes was a highlight. And I have to give Kazlo credit for finding some of the strangest methods of murder ever. Not only the 2000 pound pumpkin, but an outhouse, a bag of dogwood and so on.
In 1621, the Governor of Plymouth Colony wrote a letter in hopes of attracting more colonists. In it, he described a three-day feast shared by the Plymouth settlers and the local tribe. The governor sent out four men who provided a variety of fowls, sufficient to feed the colony for a week, while tribal hunters killed five deer. In the 19th century, this event became associated with the idea of a Thanksgiving feast. Thanksgiving is traditionally associated with New England and the Pilgrims, but Jamestown, Virginia and other locations have also been suggested as the the places for the first In New England, I expect seafood would have been on the menu.
Although Thanksgiving was not made a National Holiday until 1863 (by Abraham Lincoln), it was celebrated prior to that date. A novel published in 1826, Northwood, a tale of New England, discusses Thanksgiving with many of the foods that are traditional and still eaten today.
Many of the dishes in a traditional Thanksgiving dinner are foods native to the Americas. The turkey (although having eaten a wild chicken I’m sure the turkeys were much different from our own), potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, squash (including pumpkin) green beans and cranberries. Besides tradition, many of these foods are eaten because they are affordable. (Although I regularly hear on the news how much the cost of turkey has risen from year to year.)
However, Will Rees and his family would not have had the lavish feast we think of when we think of Thanksgiving. The huge feasts were a feature that came in during the nineteenth century. And, as I mentioned, seafood would play a large part in their meals, as it still does in New England.
With the USA’s 250th birthday coming up, there has been several books about the American Revolution.for example: The American Revolution: An Intimate History, by Geoffrey Ward and Ken Burns and a new Burns’ documentary. I was particularly interested in the section on smallpox.
Like Covid-19, smallpox was a viral disease and greatly feared.The initial symptoms were similar to the flu, Covid-19 and many other viral diseases: fever, muscle pain, fatigue and headache. Before the distinctive rash erupted, small reddish spots appeared on mucous membranes of the mouth, tongue, and throat.
The characteristic skin rash form within two days after the reddish spots on the mucous membranes. The rash was formed of pustules with a dot (that became filled with fluid) in the center. These spots scabbed over and then the scabs fell off, usually resulting in scarring. In Murder On Principle, Constable Rouge suffers a case of smallpox and becomes terribly scarred.
The origin of smallpox is unknown although the theory says the virus developed in certain African rodents 60,000 or so years ago. The earliest evidence of human illness dates to the third century BCE with Egyptian mummies It is a lethal disease with a fatality rate for the ordinary kind of about 30 percent. Higher among babies. The Malignant and Hemorrhagic forms are over ninety percent fatal. Occurring in outbreaks, it killed hundreds of thousands, including at least six monarchs in Europe. In the twentieth century it is estimated to have killed 300 million alone. As recently as 1967, 15 million cases occurred worldwide.
During our Revolution, General Washington realized that a. smallpox epidemic would kill many of his troops. Accordingly, he had his soldiers vaccinated against the disease. They used a live virus so the risk of contracting smallpox was a possibility although usually the disease was less severe and less fatal.
In 1796, Edward Jenner discovered that milkmaids who had contracted cowpox, a much less serious disease, did not come down with smallpox. He began a trial and proved that inoculation with cowpox prevented smallpox. The cowpox was safer than the live virus..
Later, the vaccine was made of the killed virus. In Great Britain, Russia, the United States vaccination was practiced. However. My father contracted small pox as a toddler and lived to tell the tale. When he volunteered for the Army during WWII, they tried to vaccinate him but of course it never took because he was already immune.
A concerted global effort a to eradicate smallpox succeeded with the last naturally occurring case in 1977. (The last death was in 1978. A researcher contracted the disease from a research sample.) WHO officially certified the eradication of smallpox in 1980.
At Death’s Dough is the fifth in Mindy Quigley’s deep dish mysteries. Delilah runs an upscale pizza restaurant. But it is winter, and custom is slow. She is gearing up for Valentine’s Day, and hoping for a good turn out. Dominick Capone, Delilah’s boyfriend’s cousin, has a plan. But a few days later, his body is discovered frozen in the frozen lake outside.
Even more than who murdered him is the why. As Delilah pokes into it, she discovers his murder leads to a long ago death, and a treasure.
I did not even come close to identifying the killer. The characters are engaging and the recipes are good too. Recommended.
I read the Lace Widow on the recommendation of a friend. This is a historical mystery that takes place just after the American Revolution and involves the duel between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton.
Eliza Hamilton, Alexander’s widow, is almost prostate with grief at the death of her husband. But she is convinced her husband was murdered and is determined to bring Burr to justice for it. Her questions bring her into contact with a house of widows on Pearl Street, but also to the notice of a band of conspiracists. A brick with a warning note is hurled through her window. And her son, Alexander Junior, is targeted as the murderer of several other men, all friends of his father.
I found the details of early New York City fascinating. The Hamiltons lived in Harlem, which was the country then! Each trip back and forth takes hours. But I didn’t love the main character who, although she is praised for her strength, is always falling into tears, fainting, and sleeping. I would give this a mixed review. Parts are very good, others not so much.
Vera Wong runs a failing tea shop in Chinatown with only one regular customer. Then, one morning, she discovers a dead body lying on the first floor. The police come and are not grateful she tried to help by drawing an outline around the body with a Sharpie!
Other people arrive to view the location with the body, all, it turns out, with a connection to the dead man. And all, Vera decides, suspects in his murder. An artist, an app created, the dead mans’s wife and his brother.
But the mystery unreels differently than Vera, or the reader, expects.
The murderer is someone totally unexpected. Well plotted, with interesting characters (especially Vera!) and a heart warming conclusion. Highly recommended!
The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt is almost uncategorizable.
After a lifetime of emotional abuse levied upon Harriet by her father, he disappears. She is left alone in a shadowy house with am amazing garden, Harriet’s refuge. The roses, the ivy respond to her, comforting her.
Then Inspector Stokes arrives to question her. He clearly suspects her of murdering her father and besides, she is not a proper lady. To escape Stokes, Harriet marries Mr. Comstock – and jumps from the frying pan into the fire.
A plot against Harriet mixes with a little magic. Recommended.
The slogan above should be familiar to every American since it featured hugely in the run up to the War for Independence. As we approach our 250th anniversary, I thought a review would be interesting.
After the War between France and Britain, Great Britain was deeply in debt. Parliament thought they could raise money by taxing the colonists. The first was the Stamp Act. To make a legal document, the paper had to be imported with a stamp on it, and every document, newspaper, even decks of cards had to use this paper. The tax met with resistance, the colonists believing that since they had no representation on Parliament, that body had no right to tax them.
Although the Stamp tax was mostly repealed, the Townshend Acts soon followed. Although there were several parts, the five most commonly accepted are:
raise revenue in the colonies to pay the salaries of governors and judges so that they would remain loyal to Great Britain,
Create more effective means of enforcing compliance with trade regulations,
punish the Province of New York for failing to comply with the 1765 Quartering Act and
establish the precedent that the British Parliament had the right to tax the colonies.
The Quartering Act was an effort to make the colonies provide British troops with housing and food – in essence inflicting a military force on a civilian population. Needless to say, it was met with stiff resistance.
Although most of this act was also repealed, not all of it was. Parliament felt they had the right to tax the colonists so they kept the tax on tea. We know the result of that. A group of colonists dressed as Native Americans dumped the tea into Boston Harbor.
In response, Parliament passed the Intolerable Acts, also known as the Coercive Acts. These were a series of punitive acts designed to punish especially Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party. Many in Massachusetts considered these acts a ‘virtual declaration of war.’ By choosing to punish Massachusetts, it seemed that Parliament hoped to convince the other colonies to stop resisting British authority.
Instead, these acts further enraged the colonists. They felt that their rights as Englishmen had been violated. The Acts were also viewed as so harsh and cruel that any moderate voices had a hard time defending Parliament.
To paraphrase a line from Star Wars, the more Great Britain tightened their grip, the more colonists slipped through their fingers.
This is a quick summary and the real history is more complicated. But I think the lesson is clear. Increasing repression, rather than quelling resistance, usually serves to encourage it.
Hana Babic îs a quiet, unassuming woman who works in the library. (Not a librarian, actually. No degree.) One day a detective arrives with bad news. Hana’s best friend Amina is dead under mysterious circumstances. Amina has left her grandchild to Hana.
Hana knows she had to discover the identity of Amina’s murderer or the eight-year-old child will never be safe. Hana has the skills to do it for she is more than she appears. During the Serbian/Bosnian conflict, Hana survived when the rest of her family were murdered. She became a partisan, known as the Night Mora, a lethal mythological creature. Now Hana must become the Night Mora again to protect the child and finally find closure for the horrific experiences she endured during the war.
River of Fallen Angels is the latest in Rowland’s Victorian mystery series. It starts with a bang when Sarah, Hugh and Mick find human remains on the bank of the Thames. Not the whole body, mind, but a few pieces. The so-called Torso Killer is back.
Sarah and her posse jump into the investigation. But Sarah and her husband are almost immediately at odds in whom they suspect.And Inspector Reid, who believes the Torso killer and the Ripper are one and the same, takes another tack entirely.
While Barrett investigates suspects from the Ripper murders, Sarah’s sister Sally has the brilliant idea to search the personals. Doing so leads them to a woman who was once missing but now is in an insane asylum. Sarah begins to focus on a strange religion, the Haven of Love, and the charismatic leader who follows it.
Meanwhile, the bitter rivalry between Reid and Sarah intensifies, but results in a totally unimagined twist at the end. Highly Recommended.
