A Sukey Reynolds Mystery Book 11
In the sleepy village of Over Hampton lies a small cottage with a picture-perfect garden… but inside the ivy-covered walls a woman is dead on the bathroom floor.
The warm summer weather is giving Sukey Reynolds a chance to enjoy the stunning English countryside around her new home. She has met a handsome local journalist, and there might be a new romance on the cards.
Everything is quiet at work too. So when the village doctor calls, saying he is sure there is something fishy about one of his patients’ deaths, Sukey follows up his claims. Well-liked and kindly Adelaide Minchin was found by her milkman, and appears to have died in a fall. Sukey can find no evidence to the contrary, but promises the doctor she will keep his theory in mind.
Meanwhile, the police force is suddenly very busy after two young girls go missing in the very same village. It’s all hands on deck to bring them home safely, but as Sukey investigates the last place the girls were seen, she realises it was very close to Adelaide’s cottage… Is it possible that the cases are linked?
Sukey’s colleagues are not convinced by her hunch, so she does some sleuthing in her spare time, determined to prove them wrong. In the close-knit village she has no shortage of possible suspects: was it the benevolent builders, the frazzled new father or the muddled milkman…? And can she find the real culprit, and bring the girls back home, before any more innocent lives are lost?
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Review
When I though about the genre cozy mystery, it always meant to me that the sleuthing was done by an amateur. Often it was a chef, or a wedding, planner, an owner of a B&B, a florist,…, but now I come to think of it (it clearly took me a while lol), I realise I can also mean that there are no gory details involved. The investigator can easily be a police officer and for me it throws a different light on the genre.
If I have to make a choice, I still prefer the amateur sleuth, but that is entirely personal.
I know that I said I was not really enjoying the last few books in the series as before. I found they lost a bit of their sparkle, but now Sukey is back with a vengeance and in my opinion this book deserves only good comments.
It was fun due to the little bit of romance thrown in and the cases Sukey had to investigate were very very good. I had no idea at all who could be blamed for all the devastating things going on in the village.
Of course Sukey finds the killer, but not without danger to her own life.
I love this book. It might even be the best of the series for me. 5 stars
Thank you
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About the author
Betty Rowlands 1923-2020
Betty Rowlands burst onto the crime scene in her mid sixties by winning the Sunday Express / Veuve Clicquot Crime Short Story of the Year Competition which shows it’s never too late to start writing. Her success continued with her highly acclaimed Melissa Craig mysteries featuring a crime writer who solves mysteries in Gloucestershire. Her second series, The Sukey Reynolds Stories comprise of thirteen books, featuring Sukey Reynolds, a Scenes of Crime Officer who later becomes a detective. She lived in the heart of the Cotswolds, where her Melissa Craig mysteries are set, and then in Bristol which is closer to Sukey Reynolds patch, where she lived until her death on 29 July 2020, just a few months before her 97th birthday. She passed peacefully in the residential home that she called ‘home’. She will be greatly missed by her two surviving children, her four grandchildren, six great grandchildren, other family members, her friends and you, her many readers. The resurgence in interest in her Melissa Craig and Sukey Reynolds books in her last years gave her immense pleasure. She loved to receive emails from her fans knowing that her writing was being so enjoyed. Betty may no longer be with us but Melissa and Sukey are still there solving those mysteries. Keep on reading!
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Book Link
Amazon : https://www.amazon.co.uk/Death-Village-totally-gripping-Reynolds-ebook/dp/B07WGM7WXV/
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