Letting Go by Debby Fowler

First Line: Harold Rose had been a porter at Warwick College for over forty years and he loved his work.

It takes a while, but new widow Felicity "Fizzy" Paradise has to get out of Oxford and away from her well-meaning friends. Her lawyer husband was recently killed in a hit-and-run, and she just can't get over the feeling that it wasn't an accident-- even though no one else agrees. Going down to Cornwall should allow her to clear her head so she can let go of her old life and begin her new one.

At first, the sea air and sunshine of St. Ives work, but a chance encounter in a local pub leads Fizzy on a dangerous trail of crime with ties to an Oxford college and a famous Cornish garden. This isn't exactly what she meant by getting away and clearing her head!

Letting Go's gorgeous setting in Cornwall, England is almost worth the price of admission all on its own, but there's a lot more to recommend the book than that. Debby Fowler has created an intricate little mystery that harkens back to some of the darker aspects of Cornish history, and while Felicity is in Oxford, mentions of Woodstock Road and Jericho reminded me of Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse and put me in the perfect frame of mind to "help" her solve the crime. 

"Fizzy" is an interesting main character who's sometimes strong and forthright and at others insecure and more than a little bit scared. Thankfully she has a strong secondary cast to support her-- from best friend Gilla to B&B owner Annie, to Detective Inspector Penrose, to a couple of locals in St. Ives, Martin and Billy.

There's a bit of "femjep" (female stupidly putting herself in danger), but I did find it to be... acceptable. The same goes for the tiny bit of the paranormal, which was also within my tolerance limits. Between the setting, the mystery, and the characters, I found Letting Go to be a very enjoyable read, and I look forward to continuing with the series.
     

Letting Go by Debby Fowler

ISBN: 9781850222064

Truran Books © 2006

Paperback, 275 pages

Cozy Mystery, #1 Felicity Paradise mystery

Rating: B+/A-

Source: Paperback Swap 


 

The Lake House by Kate Morton

First Line: Cornwall, August 1933. The rain was heavy now and the hem of her dress was splattered with mud.

On a visit to her grandfather in Cornwall, Sadie Sparrow goes on a walk, discovers the long-neglected estate of Loeanneth, and falls under its spell. She simply has to know more about the place, and when she learns that it's owned by well-known author A.C. Edevane, she asks for permission to go inside the old house, which hasn't been lived in for decades.

The meeting of the two women will begin a series of events that will uncover long-buried secrets. After all these years, Alice Edevane may finally learn what happened to her baby brother back in 1933.

I have enjoyed every single one of Kate Morton's books, and The Lake House is no exception. Extremely few writers have Morton's knack for interweaving multiple storylines, time periods, and characters.

Throughout the entire book the Cornish estate of Loeanneth kept me spellbound, no matter the time period. From beloved home to neglected shell, Morton's descriptions held me in the palm of her hand because no matter the state of the place, Morton described a home that was loved, not hated. All that needed to be done was to have the secrets brought out into the light.

Young police detective Sadie Sparrow is the perfect character to bring those secrets to light. She is an absolute terrier at digging them up... although she has a secret or two of her own that she doesn't want to share.

Pitted against young Sadie is the much older and wiser Alice (A.C.) Edevane-- a strong character no matter the age at which Morton portrays her. We see Alice's parents falling in love, and we see Alice, her parents and siblings happily ensconced in Loeanneth. At the age of sixteen Alice is already writing novels. She's such a bright, inquisitive child, and so eager to become an adult. But her world comes crashing down around her after a party at Loeanneth. Hundreds of people attended, but only one cannot be accounted for: Alice's eleven-month-old brother Theo. The infant is never seen again, and the tragedy shatters the Edevane family. 

The Lake House has so many interlocking secrets and so many possible solutions to what happened to Theo-- more than enough to keep all our little grey cells hopping. We learn about all these secrets as the time period swings to and fro naturally from present day to 1911, 1933, and 1941. Kate Morton has done it again: created a world, characters, and a story that kept me fascinated from first page to last.

The Lake House by Kate Morton

eISBN: 9781451649376

Atria Books © 2015

eBook, 512 pages

Romantic Suspense, Standalone

Rating: A

Source: Net Galley 

In the Blood by Steve Robinson

Title: In the Blood, a Genealogical Crime Mystery
Author: Steve Robinson
ISBN: 9781908603944
Publisher: Feedaread, 2011
Paperback, 316 pages
Genre: Amateur Sleuth
Rating: B+
Source: Purchased as an eBook through Barnes and Noble.

First Line:  Mawgan Hendry was dying.

Professional genealogist Jefferson Tayte has a rich client who insists on having the research on the family tree completed in time to give as a gift. The trouble is, the trail's gone cold in America and the only thing left to do is to fly to England to see if he can find the missing pieces. Although he hates to fly, Tayte boards a plane and soon finds himself in Cornwall, where it becomes obvious that someone has gone to great lengths to erase an entire family from recorded history. Determined to get the answers to his questions, Tayte doesn't realize that someone else is just as determined to ensure that this is one puzzle that is never solved.

I enjoyed this mystery even more than I thought I would. Jefferson Tayte is an engaging character who has more lives than a cat. When the villain isn't trying to conk him in the head or throw him out to drown in a lake, Tayte works at solving the mystery the way a genealogist should: through lots of research poring over old records and documents. (And that's nowhere near as boring as it sounds.)

The mystery surrounding the Fairborne family was excellent. By book's end I hadn't figured it out, although with my knowledge of Cornish history and of genealogy, I should have. The scenes dealing with the 18th and 19th century Fairborne family members that Tayte was trying to trace gave a rich texture to Robinson's story. The fast-paced, engrossing plot and the winning character of Tayte more than made up for any momentary hiccups in writing style. This is the first book by Steve Robinson, and I am definitely looking forward to reading more!

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The Rose Garden by Susanna Kearsley

Title: The Rose Garden
Author: Susanna Kearsley
ISBN: 9781402258589
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark, 2011
Paperback, 448 pages
Genre: Romantic Suspense
Rating: A
Source: Publicist

First Line: I lost my only sister in the last days of November.

A devastated Eva Ward is given her sister's ashes by Katrina's husband, Bill, with the proviso that Eva take them to the place where his wife was happiest. Momentarily confused, Eva suddenly remembers Trelowarth House, a centuries-old manor house high on a hill overlooking the sea in Cornwall. She and her sister had been happy visiting there as children, and Katrina's first love lived there still.

Welcomed to Trelowarth, Eva decides to spend the summer there, intending to find a local cottage to rent in the autumn, but almost immediately she finds herself seeing paths where none had existed and hearing voices in the adjacent room when no one is there. When she actually finds herself in Trelowarth House in 1715 and meeting its owner, Daniel Butler, Eva has to admit that these aren't simple hallucinations. Daniel, a successful smuggler, is secretly planning to join in a rebellion against the newly crowned King George. As he and Eva try to come to terms with Eva's time traveling, they fall in love. Eva has a decision to make: in which time does she truly belong?

For me, Susanna Kearsley is the queen of romantic suspense. Her Cornish setting is wonderful and the perfect backdrop to both time periods. Twenty-first-century and eighteenth-century secondary characters add richness to the story, and have the added bonus of helping to tug the reader in both directions. When I was reading a modern segment, I wondered what was happening to the characters in the eighteenth century, and when I was back in their time, I wondered about the modern characters. Every chapter was engrossing.

In some books featuring time travel, one period always seems to be stronger and more interesting than the other, but not in Kearsley's books. She knows how to keep a reader's interest throughout her story. I'm not known to read many novels in which a strong element of romance is present because too many writers think they have to include steamy sex scenes to convey how strongly the characters are in love. Kearsley knows how to convey strong emotions and physicality without having anything throb or glisten or heave.

If you're in the mood for a story with a strong sense of place, a cast of wonderful characters, a plot with surprises, time travel and romance, I have just one piece of advice: Seek out The Rose Garden, and when you're done reading it, seek out the rest of Susanna Kearsley's novels.

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Manna From Hades by Carola Dunn

Title: Manna From Hades
Author: Carola Dunn
ISBN: 9780312379452
Publisher: Minotaur Books, 2009
Hardcover, 320 pages
Genre: Cozy Mystery, #1 Cornish mystery
Rating: C+
Source: Purchased from Bookcloseouts.

First Line: "We put in several frogs, Mrs. Trewynn," said Miss Annabel Willis anxiously.

The 1960s find Mrs. Eleanor Trewynn living in the small fishing village of Port Mabyn in Cornwall, England, where she's retired and living above the LonStar charity shop that she founded. She and her husband, Peter, spent many years doing charitable works in third world countries, but after Peter's tragic death, Eleanor and her West Highland Terrier, Teazle, travel the back roads and tracks gathering donated goods for the shop.

One day when Eleanor and the vicar's wife go to the stockroom to sort and price the donations, they find the body of a scruffy-looking young man hidden under bags of clothing. Eleanor's niece, Detective Sergeant Megan Pencarrow, arrives as part of the investigating team, and the Detective Inspector in charge is a big, gruff man who has no use for women in the police force.

The setting for this book is perfect, with a picturesque village and the sea on one side, and the wandering narrow back roads of the countryside on the other. The secondary cast of characters is well drawn and memorable. The murder and the way it ties in to a donated case of jewelry is interesting, but I found the execution of some of the parts a bit uneven.

Eleanor Trewynn, the main character, is in some ways an endearing creature who knows the truly important things in life are people, their relationships to one another, and their well being, but she can be absolutely exasperating. Her keys need a 24-hour armed guard because Eleanor never knows where they are. The constant fumbling about for keys got old after the first dozen times they went missing-- as did her continued reluctance to tell the Detective Inspector important information in a timely manner. No wonder the man wanted to strangle her!

Also, her charitable work in third world countries was only obliquely referred to. If there had been more backstory, or a flashback or two that had fleshed out this period of Eleanor's life, I think it would have gone a long way to dampen my exasperation with her character.

Although Manna From Hades does have a problem or two, it does show promise as the start of a new series. I hope the second book is a stronger entry.

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The Sea Garden by Sam Llewellyn

Title: The Sea Garden
Author: Sam Llewellyn
ISBN: 0-7472-7373-1, Headline Book Publishing, 1999
Genre: Romantic Suspense, Amateur Sleuth
Rating: B+

First Line: Revel the weeder was digging where the terrace wall had collapsed by the Sea Garden at Trelise.

Victoria, a young American, and Guy, a young Englishman, meet, fall in love and get married. Shortly thereafter Guy inherits the family estate on condition that he and Victoria change their surname to Blakeney-Jones. They move to Trelise, a fictitious one of the Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall in England.

Trelise was bought by Joshua Jones in the 1840s, and the herbalist spent the rest of his life turning the island into a garden. Now the gardens are overgrown, and Guy has the idea of filming their restoration and making a television series. When bones are discovered in the section currently under renovation, they're dismissed as having belonged to a centuries-dead monk. Victoria doesn't believe this and begins to research the history of Trelise, going through diaries, letters, invoices and other documents stored in the mansion. As she pieces together the generations, Victoria finds deceit and death handed down over the decades-- enough of it to put her own life in danger.

I really enjoyed this book. Llewellyn is a native of the Isles of Scilly, and he brings them to life on the page. The convoluted history of the owners of Trelise from past to present was compelling, and it was interesting to see how Victoria's own strengths and weaknesses played a part in her deductions and conclusions.

If you're a fan of exotic settings and family histories with more twists and turns than a basket of cobras, you should enjoy The Sea Garden. I will definitely be taking a look at the other books Llewellyn has written.

[Source: Paperback Swap.]