Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories, Vol 1: The Captain of the “Pole-star”

The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories: Volume One
by Tara Moore (Editor)
Rating: ★★½
isbn: 9781943910564
Publication Date: January 1, 2016
Pages: 291
Genre: Fantasy, Fiction, Historical
Publisher: Valancourt Books

The first-ever collection of Victorian Christmas ghost stories, culled from rare 19th-century periodicals

During the Victorian era, it became traditional for publishers of newspapers and magazines to print ghost stories during the Christmas season for chilling winter reading by the fireside or candlelight. Now for the first time thirteen of these tales are collected here, including a wide range of stories from a diverse group of authors, some well-known, others anonymous or forgotten. Readers whose only previous experience with Victorian Christmas ghost stories has been Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol” will be surprised and delighted at the astonishing variety of ghostly tales in this volume.

I love me some Conan Doyle, but not this one. I’m not a fan of Arctic settings, nor of stories that take place at sea, so this was a double whammy against me liking it. Add to that, it isn’t really a spooky ghost story, so much as a second hand account of ghost sightings and their results.

In my opinion, Conan Doyle’s The Haunted Grange of Grosthorpe is a far superior ghost story.

The Night of Fear

The Night of Fear
by Moray Dalton
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781912574896
Publication Date: March 1, 2019
Pages: 195
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Dean Street Press

Together they looked down at the inert sprawling figure of a man fantastically dressed in red-and-white-striped pyjama trousers, with a red sash belt and a white silk shirt open at the neck.

A Christmas gathering of young and old in a great country house in England—a masquerade—and the lights are turned off for a game of hide and seek. Silence—then a man’s cry for “Lights!” The lights come on, revealing Hugh Darrow, blind since the War, standing in the main hall, fresh blood dripping from his hands and covering his white Pierrot costume. He tells the story of having discovered a dead man, stabbed through the heart, lying in a curtained window embrasure next to the one in which he was hiding. The murdered man proves to be Stallard, one of the visitors, and a writer of mystery tales. There follows a thrilling tale in which the life of an innocent man hangs in the balance. A grand and baffling tale for the mystery lover.

After a rocky start, with a choppy narrative that was very difficult to fall into, the book evened out about 1/3 of the way in and once PI Glide showed up, I found it very difficult to put the book down until I’d finished it. I can’t say it’s because I liked Glide – I really didn’t care for him one way or the other, but the I got caught up in the events and the fast pace, of the story, and I warmed to Mrs. Clare. I generally don’t like courtroom dramas, but this one kept a nice edge of tension going; even though I felt confident about the murderer, I had no idea how Glide was going to pull off the proof of it.

I got 2 out of 3 of the murders correct, but I totally missed the Diane prediction I made – or more accurately, I was right, but with entirely the wrong person. I’m laughing to myself because that critical scene towards the end over tea – I knew how that was going to turn out because I’d seen the same thing done way back in the 80’s on, of all things, the soap opera General Hospital. But the scene at the zoo? I didn’t see that coming, and it was a delightful little twist to the story. My biggest complaint about the story is the fate of Sergeant Lane – I dislike being made to like someone only to have them ripped away.

I won’t say no to more Dalton, but I’m not sure I’d make a concentrated effort to get me hands on more of them.

Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas

Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas
by Stephanie Barron
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781616954239
Series: Jane Austen Mystery #12
Publication Date: October 1, 2014
Pages: 329
Genre: Fiction, Historical, Mystery
Publisher: Soho Press

Christmas Eve, 1814: Jane Austen has been invited to spend the holiday with family and friends at The Vyne, the gorgeous ancestral home of the wealthy and politically prominent Chute family. As the year fades and friends begin to gather beneath the mistletoe for the twelve days of Christmas festivities, Jane and her circle are in a celebratory mood: Mansfield Park is selling nicely; Napoleon has been banished to Elba; British forces have seized Washington, DC; and on Christmas Eve, John Quincy Adams signs the Treaty of Ghent, which will end a war nobody in England really wanted.

Jane, however, discovers holiday cheer is fleeting. One of the Yuletide dies in a tragic accident whose circumstances Jane immediately views with suspicion. If the accident was in fact murder, the killer is one of Jane’s fellow snow-bound guests. With clues scattered amidst cleverly-crafted charades, dark secrets coming to light during parlor games, and old friendships returning to haunt the Christmas parties, whom can Jane trust to help her discover the truth and stop the killer from striking again?

My first Christmas read of 2021, and a library loan that was the most reluctant of my choices that day. I’m wary of books that use real historical figures as the main characters of their novels – they rarely turn out well – and a mystery series involving Jane Austen solving murders felt almost blasphemous, as well as an attempt to cash in on Austen’s popularity.

It was actually pretty good! I know next to nothing about Austen’s life beyond the basics, so I can’t say her voice was accurate, but it’s definitely an accurate representation of many of her characters’ voices, which could be argued to be, in part, small pieces of herself as well as her observations of others. There were lines in this book that felt like re-constructions of dialogue straight from Austen’s novels – not quotes or rip-offs, but the author definitely nailed the style, probably from deconstructing dialog from the books.

What I found really intriguing were footnotes in the text – probably not more than 1 or 2 per chapter – from the editor, clarifying historic events, or offering small amounts of historical background, for places, characters and events used in the plot. I’ve never seen this meld of fiction and non-fiction before and I really appreciated the extra information, and that it was offered judiciously.

The mystery itself was average; the setup was good and the flow of clues and information worked well, it’s just that the murderer, in spite of being very well hidden beneath all the family secrets and political intrigues, was obvious to me from the start, as was at least one familial intrigue.

So, even though the mystery itself was a bit predictable, I ended up thoroughly enjoying the read. This isn’t the first book in the series – it looks like there are quite a few before this one – but I had no trouble at all following along. Two allusions were made about previous exploits, and these were footnoted with the titles they came from – the only two footnotes not about historical references.

I’m not sure if my library has any of the others, but I’m definitely interested in reading more of them.

Death in Brittany (Brittany Mystery, #1)

Death in Brittany
by Jean-Luc Bannalec
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781250088437
Series: Brittany Mystery #1
Publication Date: May 31, 2016
Pages: 318
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Minotaur Books

Commissaire Georges Dupin, a cantankerous, Parisian-born caffeine junkie recently relocated from the glamour of Paris to the remote (if picturesque) Breton coast, is dragged from his morning croissant and coffee to the scene of a curious murder. The local village of Pont-Aven—a sleepy community by the sea where everyone knows one other and nothing much seems to happen—is in shock. The legendary ninety-one-year-old hotelier Pierre-Louis Pennec, owner of the Central Hotel, has been found dead.

A picture-perfect seaside village that played host to Gaugin in the nineteenth century, Pont-Aven is at the height of its tourist season and is immediately thrown into uproar. As Dupin delves into the lives of the victim and the suspects, he uncovers a web of secrecy and silence that belies the village's quaint image.

I’m pretty sure I have one of the books in this series floating around a TBR pile somewhere, but I couldn’t remember which one, and I was pretty sure it wasn’t the first one, so I checked it out from the library. If I do have one of the series (and I didn’t give it away) it’s one that I’ve picked up and put right back down again for ages, but the titles always appeal to me, so I made myself read this one.

It was pretty good! Not great, but entertaining, and a pretty solid mystery. The writing style (3rd person) reminds me a little of the Provence mystery series written by M.L. Longworth, although I suspect that’s more just the power of suggestion (one series set in Provence, the other in Brittany) than any actual resemblance. But I’d class these as traditional mysteries, not cozy; they’re all about the mystery plots and very little about the characters, although the descriptions of the countryside were a little eye glazing.

The main character of the book is an obvious tip of the hat to Poe, as his name is Dupin. To my everlasting relief, however, he is as unlike his classic namesake as can be. There’s no expounding, or soapbox monologues; the mystery plot spans 4 days and every one of them is non-stop showing and almost no telling. A Gaugin masterpiece is at the centre of the murder plot, and mysteries about art are catnip for me, so when it felt slow going, the art kept me reading. I say slow going, but that’s not really accurate; the book isn’t divided into chapters, but the 4 days of the investigation, and if you’re a stop-at-the-end-of-a-chapter reader like I am, discovering the first ‘chapter’ is 97 pages long makes it feel like it’s taking forever. Once I figured that out, I adjusted my habits and the book and I got along much better.

I’m definitely interested in the rest of the series. I need to figure out if I do, indeed, have a book and which one it is, and whether or not my library has the entire series or is going to torture me with random entries. No matter though, I definitely have a new series to look forward to.

Recipes for Love and Murder (Tannie Maria Mystery, #1)

Recipes for Love and Murder
by Sally Andrew
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781925240092
Series: Tannie Maria Mystery #1
Publication Date: September 23, 2015
Pages: 378
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Text Publishing

Tannie Maria used to write a recipe column for the Klein Karoo Gazette. Then Head Office decided they wanted an advice column instead, so now she gives advice. In the form of recipes. Because, as she says, she may not know much about love, but food—that’s her life.

Everything has been going well. A tongue-tied mechanic wins his girl with text messages and Welsh rarebit. A frightened teenager gets some much-needed sex ed with her chocolate-coated bananas.

But then there is a letter from Martine, whose husband beats her, and Tannie Maria feels a pang of recognition and dread. This may be a problem that cooking can’t solve…

I found this at my local library and the synopsis had me excited to read it. About 25% of the way in, I wasn’t sure I was going to get through it; at the end, I’m eager to get to the library and check out the second book, and likely buy them for my personal library.

The biggest hurdle for me with this book is my almost total ignorance about South Africa. I know it’s in Africa; I know it’s in the south; I know it was colonised by the Dutch, and I know about apartheid and Nelson Mandela. Oh, and they (and the rest of Africa) are tied with Australia for coolest animals. Beyond that, I got nuthin’. That made a lot of the cultural references a mystery to me and there was a time or two where I struggled to understand. The list of things I need to research to cure just a tiny fraction of my ignorance is long. I was helped a bit by a familiarity with Dutch, which allowed me to decipher some of the Afrikaans vocabulary that is liberally sprinkled throughout the text.

The other hurdle I initially had with the book was understanding the MC, Tannie Maria. I just couldn’t get a handle on what kind of character she was meant to be; a time or two she came across as slow of mind, but she’s not. She’s got a tragic background she survived, but she has this kind of passive strength and spirit that frankly leaves me confused. This could be fallout from my cultural ignorance in the same way that my BFF’s husband sometimes leaves me confused (he’s Dutch) and a few Aussies too. Different environments influence different personalities. I liked her; I just didn’t understand her.

I really waffled between 4 and 4.5 stars, but ultimately settled on 4 because of the above and because there was a bit too much sentiment about the power of love towards the end. It’s beautifully written, but not the kind of thing that resonates with me. The mystery itself was pretty good, though I’d argue it’s not strictly a fair-play plot. The style is what I’d call a ‘gritty cozy’ if forced to describe it. There’s a dark side to the crimes and spousal abuse is a strong theme, but the characters and mood are uplifting, with food playing a major role in the story. There’s a side story that almost stole the show for me at the end, and there’s a low-key romance brewing between the mc and the detective that I have a hard time getting excited about because, frankly, he has a handlebar moustache and those things creep me out.

But what really makes the book is the atmosphere; the author brings the veldt to life on the pages in a way that kept me glued to the story when the language and cultural references left me floundering. When I wasn’t sure I cared about the characters, the Klein Karoo kept me coming back for more. By the end, it was the characters, the writing and the Karoo that makes me want to pick up the next book in the series, The Satanic Mechanic.

Synchronized Sorcery (Witchcraft Mystery, #11)

Synchronized Sorcery
by Juliet Blackwell
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9780593097953
Series: Witchcraft Mystery #11
Publication Date: July 6, 2021
Pages: 335
Genre: Mystery
Publisher: Berkley

Strange things are happening in Lily Ivory’s San Francisco. First, she finds a vintage mermaid costume which dates from the 1939 San Francisco’s Treasure Island World’s Fair – and which gives off distinctly peculiar vibrations. Next, she stumbles upon a dead man in the office of her predecessor, and as the community’s new leader, she feels compelled to track down the culprit. Just when Lily thinks things can’t get any stranger, a man appears claiming to be her half-brother, spouting ideas about the mystical prophecy involving San Francisco and their family…

When the dead man is linked to the mysterious mermaid costume, and then yet another victim is found on Treasure Island, Lily uncovers ties between the long-ago World’s fair and the current murders, and begins to wonder whether the killer might be hiding in plain sight. But unless Lily can figure everything out in time, there may be yet another body floating in San Francisco Bay.

I don’t know if this just wasn’t one of her best ones, or I just wasn’t feeling it. Things at work have been pretty damn dismal the last couple of weeks, so it’s entirely possible it was just my sour mood colouring my enjoyment of a normally favorite series. But there was a little something; some slowness, or lack of focus, to the plot, that kept me from really losing myself in it. And her familiar was acting like a spoiled brat throughout the book, something that at the best of times I have no patience with.

But still, probably more me than the book.

The Cats Came Back (Magical Cats Mystery, #10)

The Cats Came Back
by Sofie Kelly
Rating: ★★★
isbn: 9780399584596
Series: Magical Cats Mystery #10
Publication Date: January 1, 2018
Pages: 294
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Berkley

This is an adorably fun series about two magical cats and a likeable group of humans, but this entry was very average for me, mainly because I anticipated every plot development and who the murderer was well before it’s reasonable to have guessed.

That’s pretty much all I’ve got to say – it’s not a bad read, it just wasn’t as cleverly plotted as others in the series.

Death by Committee (Abby McCree Mystery, #1)

Death by Committee
by Alexis Morgan
Rating: ★★★
isbn: 9781496719539
Series: Abby McCree Mystery #1
Publication Date: January 29, 2019
Pages: 282
Genre: Mystery
Publisher: Kensington

Meh.

Several decades ago, when I started reading cozies, they were actually good; well written and well plotted puzzles that didn’t involve the grimy underbelly of society or graphic violence (the gory kind).

They’re still puzzles that don’t involve the grimy underbelly of society or graphic violence (the gory kind), but somewhere along the way – about a decade ago – publishers turned them into a commodity to be standardised; they created a formula for maximum efficiency and higher returns via quantity. And they seemed to have completely done away with quality.

This is starting to piss me off, because as much as I enjoy a good vintage cozy/traditional mystery, sometimes I want a good cozy/traditional set in my own time, and I’m dammed if I can find one anymore (and by this, I mean new series, not the good ones that have lasted).

I thought Death by Committee had potential at the beginning, but by the halfway mark it became clear that the author (or her editor) was falling into the standard equation, and not only following formula in plotting, because sometimes there’s no escaping those tropes that work, but following a worn out formula for her characters too. The current fad seems to be a middle aged woman riding heard on a band of hyperactive seniors. Sophie Kelly makes this work with her series, but Morgan does not. The seniors were flat and took advantage of the MC. The MC’s righteous indignation failed to feel righteous, and the MC’s romantic interest failed to seem like anyone other than someone with a mood disorder.

The highlight of the book was the MC’s mastiff-mix, Zeke.

Editing was subpar, with several dropped time-lines (a memorable one is where the MC and her romantic interest make plans to meet for dinner that night and it never happens – the entire scene just disappeared).

It’s morning here as I write this, and I’m not a morning person, so let me just say this: it wasn’t a bad book. It just wan’t a good one, either.

Murder at the Royal Botanic Garden’s (Wrexford & Sloane Mystery #5)

Murder at the Royal Botanic Gardens
by Andrea Penrose
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781496732507
Series: Wrexford & Sloane #5
Publication Date: September 28, 2021
Pages: 368
Genre: Fiction, Historical, Mystery
Publisher: Kensington

One advantage of being caught up in a whirl of dress fittings and decisions about flower arrangements and breakfast menus is that Charlotte Sloane has little time for any pre-wedding qualms. Her love for Wrexford isn’t in question. But will being a wife—and a Countess—make it difficult for her to maintain her independence—not to mention, her secret identity as famed satirical artist A.J. Quill?

Despite those concerns, there are soon even more urgent matters to attend to during Charlotte and Wrexford’s first public outing as an engaged couple. At a symposium at the Royal Botanic Gardens, a visiting botanist suffers a fatal collapse. The traces of white powder near his mouth reveal the dark truth—he was murdered. Drawn into the investigation, Charlotte and the Earl learn of the victim’s involvement in a momentous medical discovery. With fame and immense fortune at stake, there’s no shortage of suspects, including some whose ruthlessness is already known. But neither Charlotte nor her husband-to-be can realize how close the danger is about to get—or to what lengths this villain is prepared to go . . .

I still like this series, but what started out as a string of compelling mysteries is starting to lose its edge. Blame it on the editor, reader feedback, or change of perspective on the part of the author, but the whole narrative has become entirely too idealistic to be reasonably realistic. There was an excess of repetitive statements about the family you choose, the power of love, and an awful lot of lamenting over the death of an objectively heinous individual. All of these ideals are wonderful and worth striving for, but considering the early 1800’s setting, I doubt very much they were worked quite so thoroughly into the mindset of anybody living at the time. The result was a book that felt entirely too much like a religious genre novel. Only with murder and (light) swearing.

What I did enjoy was the botanical setting of Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, and the impetus behind the plot being the race for a game-changing medicinal plant that enhances the effect of cinchona, or quinine, against malaria (plant being entirely fictional). I really enjoyed the name drops of real historical figures, including Alexander von Humboldt – and was tickled to see the author recommend Andrea Wulf’s The Invention of Nature in the story notes.

The plot was going rather well until I neared the end, when the author suddenly felt the need to work in a slave-trade angle that felt like a bolt from nowhere. Looking at the story as a whole, it felt like the author needed to wrap up some loose ends from the previous book, needing to kill someone off while keeping the current book’s plot going. I don’t know, but it just felt super clumsy.

I’ll read a 6th, should it appear, because I really do enjoy the cast of characters, but if this idealistic stuff continues to the point of incredulity, I’ll add this series to the “done for me” list.

No Escape Claws (Second Chance Cat Mystery, #6)

No Escape Claws
by Sofie Ryan
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781101991244
Series: Second Chance Cat Mystery #6
Publication Date: January 29, 2019
Pages: 287
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Berkley

It’s fall in North Harbor, Maine, where Sarah owns a charming secondhand shop and sells lovingly refurbished items of all kinds. The shop is always bustling–and not just because a quirky team of senior-citizen detectives works out of it and manages to get in even more trouble than Sarah’s rough-and-tumble rescue cat, Elvis.

A cold case heats up when young Mallory Pearson appears at the shop. Mallory’s father is in prison for negligence after her stepmother’s mysterious death, but Mallory believes he is innocent and asks the in-house detectives to take on the case. With Sarah and Elvis lending a paw, the detectives decide to try to give Mallory’s father a second chance of his own.

A so-so entry. Good character, great cat, small-town setting. Sophie Ryan (who also writes as Sophie Kelly) is a decent writer, too, but the plotting was weak in No Escape Claws.

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Overall, this is an enjoyable cozy series, as current cozies go. This one just wasn’t one of the strongest.