Death Comes to the Nurseryby Catherine Lloyd
Rating: ★★★
isbn: 9781496723222
Series: Kurland St. Mary Mystery #7
Publication Date: February 3, 2020
Pages: 264
Genre: Fiction, Historical, Mystery
Publisher: Kensington
Meh. A generally solid cozyish historical series, this one fell flat for me. It wasn’t bad, but it felt too busy and a tad too contrived. Some characters veered into tropes, which is something previous books avoided. That a woman (a nursery maid) so beautiful could come on the scene and suddenly make historically staid and responsible male characters start following her around (3 of them, at least), forgoing their responsibilities and breaking out in fisticuffs over who gets to walk with her is just too far beyond reasonable for me.
Further adding to the mediocrity of the story, the man who turns out to be the murderer was obvious from the start, because the author’s red herrings were just too, too red.
I have the next one and still have hopes it will be enjoyable. Though this historical series is cozy in its atmosphere, the author doesn’t shy away from bringing real issues to her characters: women who struggle through miscarriages, women who don’t want children at all (a challenging thought in the 1700’s), a bit of PTSD for the main male character, making the characters more interesting, rather than more romantic.