As the country has struggled through turmoil since the financial meltdown of 2008, the greatest toll has been levied on individuals: people who have lost jobs, homes, self-respect and hope.
And they're the focus in "Murder Unleashed" (288 pages, Ballantine, $25), the second installment in Virginian Rita Mae Brown's series featuring elderly Nevada rancher Jeep Reed and her great-niece, Magdalene "Mags" Rogers, their friends and dogs.
When real estate agent Babs Gallagher discovers formerly middle-class folks squatting in vacant homes in a Reno subdivision, with no heat, no water and little food, she's determined to do something about it. But when a laid-off banker is found with his throat slit, it becomes obvious to Babs and her friends that something more deadly is at work than economics. And it's not long before Jeep, Mags and their dogs — and the cops, of course — become involved and learn that greed, as it often is, lies at the center of the mayhem. Add a subplot about a stolen treasure, and you have a contemporary murder mystery, a captivating tale of the Old West and a frightening analysis of the recession and its causes.
Brown, who lives near Greenfield in Nelson County, is adept at fashioning a clever and relevant plot and filling it with amiable people — and animals. "Murder Unleashed" is no exception and adds to the author's large, entertaining body of work.
"Surprises are foolish things," said the estimable Jane Austen. "The pleasure is not enhanced, and the inconvenience is often considerable."
That may be true in real life, but detection fiction is different, and the surprises that Stephanie Barron provides in "Jane and the Canterbury Tale" (320 pages, Bantam, $15), the 11th entry in her series featuring Jane as amateur sleuth as well as author, are agreeable.
It's 1813, and Jane is visiting her brother Edward at his home in Kent. There, the former Adelaide Thane is being married to Capt. Andrew MacCallister, a dashing soldier on the staff of the Marquis of Wellington. Adelaide is only 24 but has already obtained a reputation as an adventuress, having married Curzon Fiske as a teenager and accompanied her husband on his adventures throughout the world, often leaving town with creditors and cops on their heels. But Fiske has been reported dead in Ceylon, and Adelaide seems to have found happiness with her new groom.
Enter a corpse, of course — and it's that of Fiske, dead, but only recently, and Adelaide is suddenly, if unknowingly, a widow. And it falls to Edward's lot, as first magistrate of Kent, to investigate the case.
Barron throws surprise after surprise at the reader as she focuses on suspect after suspect before the truth is revealed. But it's not only Barron's fizzy plots that make this series a proven winner. The author's ability to mimic her subject's prose — in the best way — and her deft touch with the historical mystery make "Jane and the Canterbury Tale," like its predecessors, a lively and literary mystery.
What could be finer than the French Riviera in January? Palm trees, warm breezes, haute couture, elegant dining … theft, treachery, murder?
That's what Lady Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie Rannoch, 34th in line to the British throne, finds when Queen Mary, who's fond of Georgie, sends her to Nice in 1933 to retrieve a valuable snuffbox from the queen's collection. The piece apparently has been stolen during a Buckingham Palace reception by Sir Toby Groper, a wealthy and amoral arms dealer, in "Naughty in Nice" (336 pages, Berkley Prime Crime), $24.95).
The fifth entry in Rhys Bowen's series featuring the sweet and intrepid Georgie finds our heroine in trouble. First, she's persuaded by Coco Chanel, who's staying in Nice, to take part in a fashion show wearing a Chanel creation and a valuable necklace lent by none other than Queen Mary. But Georgie stumbles on the runway, and the necklace is purloined. Later, she learns firsthand that Sir Toby lives up to his surname, and when he's found dead, Georgie becomes the gendarmes' prime suspect. Bailed out by a charming and handsome French marquis, she begins her own investigation.
Georgie, of course, comes through safely, but not before secrets are laid bare and criminality is exposed. Bowen again creates an atmospheric, humorous and twist-filled plot and skillfully blends appealing fictional characters with real-life ones such as Chanel, the enchanting Prince of Wales and his less-than-enchanting friend, American divorcee Wallis Simpson. A glimpse at a world that no longer exists, "Naughty in Nice" diverts, surprises and entertains with Bowen's hallmark wit.
It's ugly and deadly, and it sends Victor Legris on the search of his life.
Welcome to "The Assassin in the Marais" (320 pages, Minotaur Books, $24.99), the fourth entry in Claude Izner's series featuring Legris, a bookseller in fin de siècle Paris, a time when terrorism is running rampant through the City of Light.
But it's not terrorism that's Legris' primary concern in this novel set in 1892. The apartment of his business partner, Kenji Mori, is burglarized, but other than two books, the only thing missing is a goblet with a monkey's skull and a cat's face. As the goblet makes its way across Paris, leaving a string of bodies in its wake, Legris must learn why someone desires it so much.
A pleasing story with well-executed characters, "The Assassin in the Marais" also provides a splendid tour of the Paris of another era.
Rumors of witchcraft are disturbing enough, but when a long-dead body is unearthed from a long-neglected rose garden, Archers Rest, N.Y., is shaken to its quiet core.
And because the rose garden belongs to her grandmother, Eleanor Cassidy, heroine, quilter and amateur sleuth Nell Fitzgerald is particularly worried.
Nell is the protagonist of "The Devil's Puzzle" (288 pages, Plume, $14), the fourth installment in Clare O'Donohue's "Someday Quilts" series set in the fictional town along the Hudson River. When the corpse is identified as that of Winston Roemer — the adult son of Nell's former employer and late friend, Grace Roemer — and when the normally open Eleanor clams up, Nell, as usual, takes it upon herself to help her boyfriend, Police Chief Jesse Dewalt, investigate — but this time with Jesse's blessing.
What follows is another clever whodunit with a slew of suspects, amiable characters, a wealth of local color and a generous helping of quilting. You'll want to snuggle up in "The Devil's Puzzle" as autumn nights turn chilly.
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