Gina Parrish

I wanted to read a Christmas mystery and I didn’t want it to be cheesy. This one met my expectations.

It is a classic English country house mystery, very much in the golden age style of detective fiction. The writing is witty and the characters are lively, which made it an entertaining read, but the plotting is slow and repetitive and the reader stays far ahead of the detectives for much of the novel.

I usually don’t mind having it all figured out by the end, but in this one the answer is so obvious and yet the detective keeps saying, “What can the answer be? I feel like it’s staring me in the face!”Tell me about it. Overall, it was a fun read but nothing exceptional.

On a side note, I have read a couple of Georgette Heyer’s romances too, and she’s a good writer of both romance and mystery, but one theme she seems to favor (spoiler?) is cousins getting together romantically, which bothers me since she wrote this in the 1940s. There’s an ick factor there and I don’t understand why they had to be related at all.

I have been reading through all of Christie's mysteries chronologically and this one didn't impress me much. It is called either One, Two, Buckle My Shoe (UK version) or The Patriotic Murders (US version) but neither title resonated. The politics of it are murky. She doesn't risk going into political specifics (which is understandable) so the motives seemed weak to me. It's not a bad read, especially if you are a diehard Christie fan. But it's not one I would recommend to someone just looking for a good one-off mystery to read.

This was a fun and eye-opening read. I laughed out loud quite a bit, and also cringed quite a bit. It really makes you think about how your body could fall apart at any moment—Mimi Hayes had to learn how to see, walk, and talk again after having a brain hemorrhage at 22 years old. She talks about the experience, and what was going on in her own life at the time, with humor and complete openness. Definitely recommend!

Somehow I feel that each book in the series has been better than the last. Maybe I have just grown fond of the characters and ridiculous adventure plots. I really enjoyed that this, the fifth, one because it took place in London instead of Egypt, which made it feel less repetitive. I also think this one wrapped up the handful of storylines better than others in the series, particularly the last one.

I enjoy these comics and find them to be very relatable. She can get a little preachy sometimes though in the pieces when she writes more. Those are the pieces I like the least, though I do feel for her and understand where she's coming from.

This is more or less a coffee table book about the SS Lurline. It's got a lot of information and photographs, which is great for research purposes. It only portrays the ship and everything surrounding it in a positive light, so not exactly nuanced, but great for nostalgia and research.

It's good for what it is: a compilation of lazzi, or what we would call comedy bits, from the Commedia dell Arte. I wouldn't necessarily say it's “dry” but definitely academic. Many of the bits are funny when you put your imagination to it. Many are also timeless. With more than a handful I could recall the same bit on a modern sitcom. For example, “In order to fool the other characters, Fichetto pretends to talk in his sleep.” There's a great episode of I Love Lucy that uses that bit. Actually, I Love Lucy came to mind several times. This is a great resource for playwrights or scholars interested in commedia.

I feel bad giving this one two stars, since I am a fan of the series, and it's not like it offended me or anything, but it felt like Grimes made every mistake in the how-to-write-a-mystery book with this one.

It started off promising, if not a little boring. But then it took 100 pages to even meet the suspects, and after that it was difficult to keep them straight. Add in a lot of scenes describing games of snooker (a sport I know very little about), dramatic outbursts from Jury for no apparent reason (whatever you do, don't bring up mushy peas), and forced references to the wise men in the nativity story (because...?), and it made for a very boring and confusing book.

The mystery itself was easy to figure out, and the motive was a trifle weak for my taste (especially for three murders). In the end, there was a distinct lack of justice served that made it feel like a waste of time.

As for the characters, I can't figure out Jury's relationship with Vivian, and even having read these five books recently, I can barely remember her from the first one. I wish they could interact more so I could understand why they are so awkward around each other. Melrose is always the same and never seems to grow or change. I wish he had added more to the story.

Overall this one was a flop for me and I hope the next one is better.

A good addition to the series. I liked the bits about Elizabethan writers and the tours around Stratford and London. The mystery itself was okay, not particularly intriguing or challenging. Another high body count, which I am not generally a fan of, especially since most of the murders felt pointless in the end. But good writing, which keeps me reading this series. People seem to mistakenly believe that this series is “cozy” (rather than “police procedural” or just plain “mystery”) and therefore it won't have any rough edges to it. It does. This doesn't bother me at all, though.

For some reason I had trouble following this one. There were a lot of intertwining storylines and the reader needed more reminders of who was who and what happened when, particularly in the end. I got the feeling that this one was rushed to be published as there were some significant editing errors in my library copy and it felt less thought-through than some of the previous ones.

I hovered between three and four stars for this one. The writing is always strong from this author, which makes me want to rate it higher, but I don't think I would read this one again.

The characters are fleshed out and the plotting is thorough, as always, but my biggest complaint is that the mystery is sidelined in this one to make room for exhaustive family drama, which has never been my favorite. The murder mentioned in the title happens two hundred pages in, about halfway through, and there are no elements of the mystery you can solve along with the characters.

As for the family drama, it all centers around Verity being gone for five years, which to me doesn't feel that long, especially in the middle of a war. Her family shows little understanding or compassion for her (considering she thought her husband was dead for a year and a half of that time frame) and they have long drawn out discussions about their anger towards one another that could have been edited down. Then in the end, everything is wrapped up neatly between everyone, with love and acceptance ruling the day, which didn't feel authentic to me.

Also, the characters still feel a bit too highbrow, and they are too perfect (skillful, clever, mature, attractive, sexually competent, etc.)—to the point of teetering on unlikeable.

I plan to read the next one but look forward to more action and less face-touching in the midst of grief.

PS In reference to some other reviews I've read... I don't understand why anyone would start with the fifth book in a series, and then complain that they didn't understand the backstory. And I still think this series is far better than Maise Dobbs. I had to give up after the fourth one because I couldn't stand it.

This may be my favorite in the series so far. I didn't find myself getting confused by the names or the overcomplicated plot. The setting was lovely and I enjoyed meeting some new characters.

The circus theme... was fine. Unfortunately, for anybody reading this that doesn't know, there was a real electrocution of an elephant named Topsy at Coney Island in 1903. She killed a drunk spectator who reportedly abused her and the circus decided they could no longer handle her “bad” behavior. The event was by invitation only and filmed by the Edison company in one of the first early films. I had to watch it for one of my classes in film school and I am still scarred by it. Spoiler alert, no harm comes to the elephant in this book, on page at least, but I kept reliving that film in my mind, which I didn't like.

Other than that I am happy with this installment in the series and look forward to continuing.

While I might not directly copy any of the trees in this book, I loved how full of creativity it was and it gave me lots of ideas for the future. I get tired of the same old ornaments and look every year and try to find a theme for our tree instead. This took that idea to a whole new level and inspired me to be more creative. There are so many ways to hand craft ornaments that I had never thought of. I applaud the author for her ingenuity!

This was a well-written addition to the series. It had a strong plot and mystery and the characters had some development, which makes it a strong read, but the subject matter didn't capture me as much with this one. I have never been a fan of the gangsters in the series and this one felt like all gangsters. I just don't root for Archie and Iris, no matter how much I am supposed to. As a matchmaker, I think she should choose better for herself. That plus the amount of detailed snooker games I had to read about (I read another snooker themed mystery not too long ago... had the same reaction but can't remember which it was) and this wasn't the book for me. Still, I enjoyed it. It just didn't thrill me the way I want a mystery to.

This was another entertaining read. It was cruising towards five stars for me but I actually thought the ending let it down a bit in its predictability, as well as Lennox's bad moods. But this series is great and consistently good. Each one is hard to put down.

A good, satisfying mystery, as usual. The villains were particularly awful in this one and Lennox was a particularly hungry curmudgeon. I would like to see more character development from the mains, and more women at the center of the plots. Also, maybe a spin on the format. I like some solid evidence every once in a while.

Another good one. For some reason it didn't stand out amongst the rest but it could be because I am moving so fast through them on my free trial of kindle... I liked the parts about archeology even though they weren't central to the plot.

On the surface this one should have kept my attention but I found it slow and needlessly complicated. I had trouble keeping focused and getting into the story because I didn't feel emotionally involved.

I liked this one better than the last, though I found it difficult keeping the characters straight at times. Every one of them has a silly name and then a silly nickname to go with it and it was hard to keep them straight. I did enjoy the setting and the dip into the supernatural and the plot followed more seamlessly than the last one.

I don't usually read these for the mysteries as much as the light entertainment but I did enjoy the mystery of this one more than the others. Most of them feel too complicated to solve myself but this one felt more balanced. I am not a whiskey drinker but I still stayed interested. By now I am not so captivated by the cutesy titles and ridiculous sobriquets but I enjoy the tone and voice of the stories and I am a sucker for a mystery.

I found this one more entertaining and less complicated than the last one, though the solution wasn't all that interesting. I particularly liked the setting and the introduction of Teddy Quillfeather.

It may be because I am on a deadline to finish this series before my kindle unlimited trial runs out, but this one wasn't my favorite. The plot felt over complicated and relied too much on a single detail (who was where over the course of three minutes). In order to fit in so many red herrings and plot twists, there wasn't as much character development, so I didn't care much about solving the murders. Despite it being as long as the others, I kept thinking “get on with it already.” It wasn't bad, just the best in the series.

I think that this may have been the best in this series so far, despite the fact that it lulled in the middle and I guessed the ending. The plot was satisfying and the author actually laid out clues along the way so that you could try to solve the mystery too, which hasn't been the case for a few of the other books. It was also fun to read how the denouement played out. I went back and forth about whether or not I was satisfied with the motive for the murder. I think I landed on it as interesting. As usual, the relationship between the protagonists was frustrating but maybe it would be boring otherwise.

This is an example of a mystery with the all the right elements that isn't executed well enough. I am three-quarters of the way through reading all of Christie's mysteries and this one came up short. Not only did I guess the murderer a quarter of the way into the book, I also rolled my eyes more times than I could count.

What if you could make someone die just by willing it? What if science advanced enough for our brainwaves to combine with sound waves so that we could kill each other with our minds?

If that sounds at all ridiculous to you, get ready because sentiments such as these are what you will be reading the entire book. All of the puzzle elements of the mystery are replaced with superstitious mumbo jumbo telling of the time, reminding you of how they used to hide under desks under threat of nuclear bombs.

In the end, the solution is the obvious one. The one you have been muttering to the protagonist since the beginning, but he's too caught up in his fear of MAGIC that he doesn't see what is right in front of him.

That said, it probably would make a better movie. It's very theatrical.

Update: Prime did make a film adaptation and, yes, I enjoyed it better than the book. Actually, I have enjoyed all of their Christie adaptations.

For some reason I didn't find this book as engaging as I had hoped, though I'm having trouble pinpointing why. Maybe I had trouble relating to the main character, whose most defining quality was being a teenage boy. And the peculiar children were really defined by their abilities more than anything. The plot picked up at the end and I enjoyed the ride... but not sure my heart is committed to the series. We'll see.