Protected: Saint Louis Trip | February 2024
February 6, 2024
Book Review with Spoilers | Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure by Diane Kelly
February 8, 2024
Pride, Prejudice & Poison by Elizabeth Blake
Finished: February 2024
Book Source: Library
Antiquarian bookstore proprietor Erin Coleridge uses her sense and sensibility to deduce who killed the president of the local Jane Austen Society.
Erin Coleridge’s used bookstore in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England is a meeting place for the villagers and, in particular, for the local Jane Austen Society. At the Society’s monthly meeting, matters come to a head between the old guard and its young turks. After the meeting breaks for tea, persuasion gives way to murder—with extreme prejudice—when president Sylvia Pemberthy falls dead to the floor. Poisoned? Presumably…but by whom? And was Sylvia the only target?
Handsome—but shy—Detective Inspector Peter Hadley and charismatic Sergeant Rashid Jarral arrive at the scene. The long suspect list includes Sylvia’s lover Kurt Becker and his tightly wound wife Suzanne. Or, perhaps, the killer was Sylvia’s own cuckolded husband, Jerome. Among the many Society members who may have had her in their sights is dashing Jonathan Alder, who was heard having a royal battle of words with the late president the night before.
Then, when Jonathan Alder narrowly avoids becoming the next victim, Farnsworth (the town’s “cat lady”) persuades a seriously time-crunched Erin to help DI Hadley. But the killer is more devious than anyone imagines.
Trigger Warnings:
Murder, cancer diagnosis
Characters
- Erin – owns a little book store in a small town in England
- Sylvia – president of the Jane Austen Society
- Kurt Becker – turns out to be having an affair with Sylvia
- Suzanne Becker – Kurt’s wife
- Jerome – Sylvia’s husband
- Jonathan – principal, sweet on Erin
- Inspector Hemmings – investigating the crime, sweet on Erin
My Review
I have not read any Jane Austen so I probably would have appreciated this book more if I had. There are quite a few Jane Austen quotes in it.
Few things that I did: What the heck with a 10 year old cracking the password for Sylvia’s email in a couple attempts, Erin refused to go to the hospital after hitting her head during a car accident, the information that Erin hid from the police seemed a little too much for me.
I was underwhelmed with this one… maybe someone who appreciates Jane Austen would like it more?
Spoilers/Summary
Winton got attacked — but he did it to himself
Erin gets run off the road on her bike by a car
Haddie and Prudence were also run off the road while they were dirving
Sylvie and Caroline had an affair previously, Hedi, and prudence get runoff the road. I Caroline and Sylvie had had an affair before. Sylvie decided to marry her husband instead. Sylvia’s husband was having an affair with a professor at his school
The killer is Winton. He wanted his wife, Prudence, to win the presidency of the club. He was diagnosed with cancer so he figured he had nothing to lose.