The Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict

March 20, 2025

The Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict

In order to gain the respect of their male counterparts, five female mystery writers from the Golden Age of mystery - Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Emma Orzcy, Margery Allingham, and Ngaio Marsh - join forces to solve the mystery of a young English nurse found murdered in Boulogne. 

Disappointing. Loosely based on an event in Dorothy Sayers' life. I usually really enjoy the author’s books but this one was slow moving, and the mystery itself was not compelling. Usually Benedict writes about real women who worked in areas that were normally reserved for men, and yes, the five women writers had to fight against sexism just to get their books published, let alone be accepted by their male peers. But unlike her previous books, I didn’t learn much about the characters’ lives. I guess I expected more from a story about the five major women mystery writers of the Golden Age - there were a lot of descriptions of where they were having high tea and shopping, and what they were eating and wearing (don’t get me wrong, I love a high tea). They just didn’t seem as sharp or clever as a mystery author should be, and Dorothy seemed like she was constantly prodding them along. Loved the cover, although it reminded me of Laurie Notaro’s The Murderess. 

Many thanks to Edelweiss for providing an eARC for review.

Dorothy Sayers

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

May 29, 2022

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Several seemingly unrelated characters and events, beginning in 1912 and moving forward 300 years, and set in places from a forest to the moon, come together to form a narrative. Time corruption occurs at various points, when characters hear the same music and experience the same forest while they are in totally different places. What happens when someone makes a tiny shift in history (or the future)? Does it change how the future spools out? Does it really change anything?

Loved this one. The plot of this book is very hard to describe, just like the author's previous book Station Eleven, to which it is similar in style. Characters from the author's previous two novels (Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel) appear here and figure in each others' past and future stories. I loved Station Eleven, but The Glass Hotel not so much. Mandel's style isn't for everyone, but I really enjoy her stuff.

Sea of Tranquility on the moon

Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

March 4, 2021

Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Retired book editor Susan Ryeland is living on a Greek island with her boyfriend, helping him run a boutique hotel. She is not getting much job satisfaction out of her duties and is exhausted. When a wealthy couple comes to stay at the hotel, they tell her about a murder that occurred at the hotel where their daughter's wedding was held. The circumstances of the murder are eerily similar to the plot of a book by Alan Conway, the author of the Atticus Pund series and the subject of a previous mystery that Susan solved (in The Magpie Murders). They implore her to come back to England and investigate the crime.

It's a novel within a novel, a literary thriller. This is the second book in the Susan Ryeland series, and I loved the first book. Although the plot isn't as good as the first book, I was glad to read another Atticus Pund mystery - I hope there will be more.