A Deceptive Devotion by Iona Wishaw - 20BOS26-12

It’s been six years since I visited Lane Winslow and her neighbors in King’s Cove, British Columbia, where she settled after WWII, hoping to find a peaceful place to rebuild her life. She has been partially successful: she is living in a shining white, old-fashioned house nestled on a dappled, sunlit green lawn, which she is extremely fond of; moreover, she has made numerous new friends and, in the previous book, became engaged to Frederick Darling, a former bomber pilot, who served in the RAF, now a police inspector in his native Canada.

It’s a Great World! by Emilie Loring #20BOS26-9

Eve Travis has always admired Jeff Kilburn and is worried that his heart is broken when her cousin Moya dumps him for a British peer. After the wedding, she impulsively offers to marry him instead so he is not alone and vulnerable when he leaves for a business trip to South America. Jeff is startled by her suggestion because he has just learned Eve’s guardian has embezzled her $2 million fortune (and imagine how far that would have gone in 1935) and was asked to break the news (why there are no legal proceedings against this guardian is a mystery Loring never addresses) to her. 

A Wartime Marriage, aka Flight from Bucharest, by Mary Jane Staples

Captain Harry Phillips, a British officer, is a prisoner of war in a German-controlled hospital in Romania. It’s 1918 and while Germany has gone from near-victory to an unsuccessful Spring Offensive on the Western Front leading to eventual defeat, its army and military intelligence are still feared. Harry is recovering from being shot in the thigh but has been treated well, so is not worried when he is summoned to meet with the German officer in charge of the hospital, Captain Carlsen.

I, Spy, an impressive debut by L. M. Kemp

Kendal Carter is at a playground on the outskirts of Zurich with her four-year-old, Rosie, when she notices two men in suits lurking nearby who appear very out of place. She is instantly wary, especially because if the men are a threat, they are between her and the apartment where she has a “go bag.”

The Double Image by Helen MacInnes #20BOS26-8 and Paris in July

April in Paris, and a sprinkle of rain, a sudden whip of cool breeze, a greying sky to end the bright promise of the evening. John Craig decided that his saunter along Boulevard Sant-Germain might come to a quick end any moment now, and began looking in earnest for a place of retreat.

The Kindness of Strangers by Emma Garman

This historical novel, set in 1952, begins dramatically with a dead or nearly dead body. Honor Wilson, a seemingly respectable widow, inherited a large Victorian house in London after her much-older husband died but little in the way of other assets. She takes in lodgers: George (Georgina), ostensibly studying art but actually posing in the nude as an artist’s model, a shady occupation for Lord Mountford-Owen’s daughter; Robbie, estranged from his wife, living in Honor’s attic; teenage Mina, trying to better herself through elocution and deportment lessons while she works in a Cinema; and Saul, a Holocaust survivor from Romania, who lost his wife and daughter.

Everyone is helping to dig a hole in the garden to bury the most recent addition to the household, Jimmy Sullivan. The question is how did he get there, who killed him, and why?

A Murder in Marylebone by Emily Sullivan #20BOS26-4

Alas, A Murder in Marylebone barely mentions Marylebone and is too obviously written by an American, although it began promisingly. Minerva Harper, a widow with two children, has returned to London after some 15 years in Greece. Her husband, Oliver, was a diplomat but left the British Embassy and retired with his family to Corfu. Minnie remained there after his death, against the wishes of her family, and recently undertook some typing for a mystery writer, Stephen Dorian. 

The Clairvoyant Countess by Dorothy Gilman #20BOS26-2

Moira Redmond recently wrote about fortune tellers in her Clothes in Books blog, and that got me thinking about a two-book series by Dorothy Gilman that begins with The Clairvoyant Countess. I couldn’t remember if I had read it so I requested it from the library and included it in my 20 Books of Summer.

“Change Your Life for €1,” the headline had read . . .

When she was at her lowest emotionally, Skye saw a competition to win a cottage in Greece for one euro, and entered. How she won and how the paperwork was completed quickly and without publicity requires some suspension of disbelief but, why not, every book needs a plot, and apparently this is an actual thing:

The Ivy Tree by Mary Stewart, for the 1961 Club

My first book for the 1961 Club (in which we read books published in a certain year), hosted this week by Simon at Stuck in a Book and Karen at Kaggsy’s Bookish Ramblings, is The Ivy Tree by Mary Stewart, an enthralling impersonation story set in Northumberland. Mary Grey, recently arrived from Canada, is sitting against Hadrian’s Wall, contemplating the countryside when she is accosted by a handsome man who thinks she is his cousin Annabel.

A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie #ReadChristie26

In this mystery set on a fictional island in the Caribbean, Miss Marple’s quiet vacation is (surprise!) interrupted by murder. Her nephew Raymond had thoughtfully paid for her to travel to the West Indies to recuperate after a bad bout of pneumonia, and now Miss Marple is doing what she does best: listening. 

Hello, Summer by Mary Kay Andrews, who reveals her Betsy-Tacy fandom

Given the challenges newspapers have experienced, investigative reporter Conley Hawkins is thrilled to have been offered a prestigious job in Washington, DC. Then, during her actual goodbye party, in the sort of nightmare situation that would normally only happen to yours truly, she learns her new employer has gone bankrupt – so no job in DC and her job in Atlanta has already been filled. 

Two Recent Crime Novels

I've got behind in my reviewing this month but here are two recent books I'd been anticipating; one of which was a disappointment:

No Rest for the Wicked by Rachel Louise Adams (2025)

Dolores Hawthorne left her small town in Wisconsin twenty years ago and built a new life for herself as a forensic pathologist in Los Angeles, although the recent ending of her marriage has left her raw.

Murder Takes a Vacation by Laura Lippman

Muriel Blossom is both excited and nervous about her forthcoming vacation and cruise in France, and is charmed when a handsome man at the Baltimore airport befriends her as they are upgraded to first class. Since her husband died, she hasn’t looked at another man, but Allan is outgoing and attentive. When it seems as if she won’t make her connection at Heathrow, he insists she accompany him to London to spend the day, helps her get a hotel room, and book the Eurostar for the next day.

Murder While You Work by Susan Scarlett, for Dean Street December

Lively and attractive Judy Rest has given up nursing but is still determined to do her bit for the war in this WWII mystery by Susan Scarlett, aka Noel Streatfeild. Judy is heading to the country to work at a munitions factory, and has a meet cute on the train when a studious-looking young man obligingly crawls about on the floor retrieving the lipstick she dropped. 

Gone Before Goodbye by Reese Witherspoon & Harlan Coben

Gone Before Goodbye is an unusual collaboration by actress/producer Reese Witherspoon and mystery/thriller writer Harlan Coben, and the product is a thriller that takes the reader from Baltimore to New York to Russia to Dubai and France. Maggie McCabe is a former Army combat surgeon whose life has fallen apart after a series of personal tragedies caused her to lose her medical license.

The Librarians - a mystery by Sherry Thomas

When Hazel Lee moved back to Austin after years in Singapore, her grandmother suggested she get a job at the library and she finds one at her own childhood branch. Hazel is welcomed by Astrid, one of the librarians; Sophie, the branch administrator; Jonathan, the program director; and several clerks. They think Hazel is elegant and slightly mysterious but have no problem with her work ethic:

The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen

I have enjoyed Tess Gerritsen’s current series, The Martini Club, about retired CIA agents trying to escape their pasts in Maine, so decided to go hear her speak recently at a local library. A former physician, she is best known for her medical thrillers – her books have sold more than 40 million copies worldwide – including the Rizzoli & Isles books that became a hit TV show.

At Bertram’s Hotel by Agatha Christie #ReadChristie2025

Sometimes even Miss Marple needs a break from St. Mary Mead, and when her nephew, Raymond West, and his wife offer to treat her to a holiday, Miss Marple asks them to send her for a week or two to Bertram’s Hotel in London. She had stayed there as a child and heard from friends who’d stayed there recently it was like stepping back into an Edwardian idyll. 

A Case of Mice and Murder by Sally Smith

This debut mystery, set at the turn of the 20th century at London’s Inner Temple, brings to life the arcane, fascinating world of Britain’s legal elite. Sir Gabriel Ward is a quiet but brilliant barrister, sometimes overlooked by his colleagues because he spends all his time in his Temple rooms or his professional chambers, just yards apart. His routine is upended one morning when he finds a dead body on the threshold of his chambers - the Lord Chief Justice, whom he has known since childhood.