Brief Mention: THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB, Agatha Christie-Style Update from Robert Thorogood

It's time to build up the summer reading stack -- and if you savor a good traditional British mystery with neat clues and a somewhat eccentric sleuth, then the newest from Robert Thorogood should top that heap of books by the hammock. THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB offers 67-year-old widow Judith Potts, who likes to skinny dip in the Thames at night and who hears an outcry and gunshot that signal the death of her riverside neighbor.

Potts is a regular creator of crossword puzzles, so she's good at puzzling out a clue. (She's also fond of a shot of whisky for any reason that comes to mind.) To sort out what's actually taken place next door, though, in her town of Marlow (UK), she recruits a local dog walker who knows a little about everyone who owns a dog in town and a few who don't. When she adds a third to this team, the careful but also very knowledgeable wife of the local clergyman, there's no stopping their investigation. Fortunately, unlike the situation in "cozy" mysteries, none of them need to marry, date, or seduce a police officer to hear them and collaborate -- because DS Malik, the investigating officer, is also female and swamped with three murder cases, and she definitely needs all the help she can call in.

Thorogood has a tidy track record of previous mysteries and is credited with creating the BBC TV show "Death in Paradise" (now running on PBS). He has a gift for the gently absurd, a comfortable pace, and a nice armful of clues and red herrings. Most of all, in THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB, it's the dialogue that adds delight, as with this interchange between DS Malik and Judith Potts. Malik is trying (without success) to shoo Judith off the case, and she begins:

"We don't know Mr. Dunwoody was murdered."

"Are you saying the bullet hole appeared in his forehead as if by magic?"

"Well, no, but we can't rule out that his death was a terrible accident. Or what if he did this to himself?"

"You think he committed suicide?"

"It's a possibility."

"Poppycock!"

DS Malik blinked in surprise. Had the woman in front of her just used the word "poppycock"?

For light entertainment in an updated traditional British mystery, THE MARLOW MURDER CLUB is a great choice. Just released by Poisoned Pen Press in America, a year after its British debut.

PS: Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

New Twist on a Village Mystery, at Maryland's Keepsake Cove with Mary Ellen Hughes

Mary Ellen Hughes, author of three other mystery series, brings Agatha Christie up to date in her Keepsake Cove series, which features Callie Reed, owner (due to murder in the preceding book, A Fatal Collection) of a shop selling highly collectible and enchanting music boxes. With A VINTAGE DEATH, Hughes makes it clear that the tourist-attraction cluster of shops forming Keepsake Cove might as well be a village: Everyone knows a little about each other, but there's a tradition of respecting privacy about "back stories." So when the merchant group invites an author of spooky novels, Lyssa Hammond, to give a reading at Halloween, the sudden menace and murder emerging within the group has no obvious source.

Callie is unwilling to let her much-liked fellow merchant Dorothy be blamed for the murder, even though the victim is Dorothy's obnoxious estranged husband. An inheritance and a pair of antique scissors from Dorothy's shop tighten the noose ... but Callie knows there must be some other explanation, and begins to poke around. She's too young to be a Miss Marple type, but her naive assumptions about the shopkeepers slide to one side as she digs for other possible motives.

Looking for a pleasant distraction from holiday to-do lists, or a charming Maryland mystery as a gift? Pick up a copy of A VINTAGE DEATH and relax in the hands of a seasoned storyteller who adds a hint of romance and just enough risk to spice up the action. It's a Midnight Ink publication, new this month.

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

Classic Village Mystery Turns Dark and Irish, with Andrea Carter's Debut, DEATH AT WHITEWATER CHURCH

Sometimes a review runs later than the release date -- just because life gets hectic. And that's the case here for Andrea Carter's stunning debut crime novel DEATH AT WHITEWATER CHURCH (Oceanview Publishing). The US edition came out a few weeks ago, and it's well worth grabbing a copy. Despite being a debut, the book from this barrister-turned-novelist took laurels at the Irish Writers Centre Novel Fair, and is tautly plotted and a great new twist on the traditional village mystery.

When solicitor Benedicta ("Ben") O'Keefe tags along on a last-minute check of an old church being sold, the last thing she expects is a set of bones, wrapped tenderly in a blanket, in a crypt that hadn't been on the property map. Looks like the sale may not consummate. Meanwhile, along the coast of Inishowen, "everyone" expects the bones are proof of murder -- of a missing bridegroom from six years earlier. After all, who else could it be?

But soon there's another death in the village, and like any good Irish complication, it looks like a political twist underneath, one that may have its source in Ireland's terrible grief-stricken history. Or could it be just the results of the usual drinking and grieving? Ben's in the midst of it all, as a friend and neighbor as well as lawyer, and nothing seems straightforward:

"Well, what's happened?" I prompted.

Molloy took a sip of his coffee and leaned back, shaking his head as if in disbelief at what he was about to say.

"It looks as if we won't be opening a murder investigation in relation to the bones in the crypt, after all."

"How come?" I asked. "Last time I was talking to you, there was still no cause of death."

"That wasn't entirely true," Molloy admitted. "We'd established that the body had head injuries and a broken neck, which were probably the cause of death. We now know they were fatal injuries incurred as a result of a car accident."

I was confused. That sounded uncannily like Danny Devitt's injuries and circumstances of death. 

It's no coincidence. And Ben's effort to keep up with what the investigation reveals will turn inside out a lot of her relationships with what she thinks she knows about her home and her friends.

Carter's debut has already been followed by two more crime novels, and it's tempting to try to order them from across the Atlantic, since it will be a while until they arrive in "the States." Meanwhile, here's DEATH AT WHITEWATER CHURCH to savor -- an up-to-date and sophisticated re-braiding of what Agatha Christie did so well. My only wish would be to find more depth in Ben O'Keefe -- but maybe the sequels will satisfy that hunger. I hope so!

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.