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All Historical Mystery Coverage

Mycroft and Sherlock, the new novel by NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, with an assist from screenwriter Anna Waterhouse, sees the Holmes brothers in their first joint investigation, which involves a series of brutal murders, cryptic Chinese glyphs and the opium trade. But what’s even more entertaining is watching the Holmes brothers try to outdo each other with their deductive reasoning.

Mycroft, at age 26, already works in Her Majesty’s War Department, while Sherlock, just a month shy of his 19th birthday, is still engrossed in his studies. When Trinidad businessman Cyrus Douglas—Mycroft’s own Watson—seeks Mycroft’s assistance in investigating a shipwreck, Mycroft enlists Sherlock to tutor children at Douglas’ orphanage. Sherlock easily bonds with the orphans by regaling them with his incredible mental acuity, and he is shocked when one of the children, Charlie Fowler, dies from an apparent drug overdose. With the help of other orphans—in a sort of precursor to Sherlock’s later use of street urchins through the Baker Street Irregulars—he traces Charlie’s involvement to a Chinese opium operation.

At the same time, a series of brutal murders has rocked the Savage Gardens area of London, where seven victims—six Chinese men and one white man—have been found. Both Holmes brothers are drawn to the murders and begin to piece together clues that will ultimately intersect.

As engrossing as the plot is by itself, Abdul-Jabbar ups the emotional quotient when Dr. Joseph Bell—Arthur Conan Doyle’s real-life inspiration for Sherlock Holmes—informs Mycroft that he has a fatal heart condition.

The novel is the second in Abdul-Jabbar’s Holmes series, but it’s the first time that Sherlock plays an integral role in the story. The author clearly has fun with the tit-for-tat deductive prowess displayed by each brother, while developing a sibling rivalry that will linger throughout Sherlock’s adult career.

Readers will find plenty of reasons to celebrate this latest Sherlockian adventure.

Mycroft and Sherlock, the new novel by NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, with an assist from screenwriter Anna Waterhouse, sees the Holmes brothers in their first joint investigation, which involves a series of brutal murders, cryptic Chinese glyphs and the opium trade. But what’s even more entertaining is watching the Holmes brothers try to outdo each other with their deductive reasoning.

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The prewar world of New York City in 1910 comes to life through the colorful social settings and real historical events that abound in Mariah Fredericks’ mystery, A Death of No Importance. The Edgar Award-nominated YA novelist has lavished her debut adult novel with period details and strong characterizations.

Family rivalries, often tainted by the dark legacies of wealth and power, have made their mark in America in the early 20th century. The Industrial Revolution has heightened class differences and fueled the rise of anarchist politics, inciting a sense of unease in the upper classes. Who among them really has money—and who is willing to share that upper echelon at the risk of having to cling to a more precarious perch?

Handsome Norrie Newsome is the scion in a family where the wealth may not be quite as secure as it used to be, and where a wise choice of wife could ensure his continued presence among the well-heeled. He finds a candidate in Charlotte Benchley, whose family belongs to New York’s “new wealthy.”

Enter Charlotte’s astute ladies’ maid, Jane Prescott, who turns sleuth when Norrie is found brutally murdered during a glittering Christmas Eve party given to announce the couple’s engagement. Jane’s gift for listening, as well as her natural curiosity, places her near the scene when the murder is committed. Could the murderer be the would-be fiancée, who discovers that Norrie is quite the ladies’ man? A spurned lover? Or is it the family’s pick: an anarchist taking revenge for a past crime committed by Norrie’s family? They owned a coal mine that collapsed, killing miners and children. When Jane meets a young newspaperman with an equal interest in the crime, they team up to discover the roots of a past tragedy that still haunts families across the social spectrum.

Occasionally, Jane seems a little too ahead of her time; she is a cool, modern presence in an era of Gibson Girl waistlines and strict codes of social and sexual behavior. She appears to see through the established pecking order and invites confidences despite the barriers of a stringent, limiting class hierarchy. But no matter. The author leads readers on a merry chase from the glittering ballrooms and cozy boudoirs of the privileged to the tawdry streets of the Lower East Side, and to a shabby mining town that bears the scars of terrible tragedy.

The prewar world of New York City in 1910 comes to life through the colorful social settings and real historical events that abound in Mariah Fredericks’ mystery, A Death of No Importance. The Edgar Award-nominated YA novelist has lavished her debut adult novel with period details and strong characterizations.

If there were a literary recipe for bestselling author Lauren Willig’s novel The English Wife, it would include blending equal parts historical fiction and British murder mystery, a dash of “Downton Abbey” and a pinch of Edith Wharton’s Gilded Age.

That’s not to say The English Wife is cliché or formulaic; on the contrary, readers will be alternately delighted and shocked by this page-turner that features a dual narrative tethered to the social caste systems that straddled the pond in the late 19th century.

One of the novel’s two heroines, Georgie, is a former English showgirl and the wife of the wealthy American Bayard Van Duyvil—a blueblood from a distinguished, albeit dysfunctional, New York family. This unlikely match is kindled in London, where Bayard rescues Georgie from a life of poverty and hardship and brings her to New York, much to the chagrin of his mother, the formidable matriarch Mrs. Van Duyvil.

The tale begins with what appears to be a double murder at a New York society gala, and then unfolds in flashbacks, moving from late 19th-century London’s mean streets, where Georgie works as an actress, to the storied banks of the Hudson, where the Van Duyvil’s gracious manse is a hub for the old Dutch Knickerbocker society, which includes the Astors and Vanderbilts.

When Bayard’s sister, Janie, encounters an ambitious New York journalist determined to crack the case of the so-called Knickerbocker society murders, their working relationship evolves into a wary friendship, with the heartbroken heiress and cynical reporter both determined to uncover the truth.

This elegantly written tale will keep readers guessing until the final chapter.

If there were a literary recipe for bestselling author Lauren Willig’s novel The English Wife, it would include blending equal parts historical fiction and British murder mystery, a dash of “Downton Abbey” and a pinch of Edith Wharton’s Gilded Age.

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The game’s afoot—this time with a feminist, gender-bending twist—in a Sherlock Holmes-inspired mystery that is sure to attract any fan of the Great Detective.

What if there was no Sherlock Holmes—at least, not the pipe-smoking, cocaine-addicted super sleuth whose exploits have beguiled generations of mystery fans. What if, instead, Sherlock was the superb creation of a brainy woman named Charlotte Holmes, who invented the detective to enable her to engage her own skills for crime solving in an era when such pursuits were strictly a man’s game.

Author Sherry Thomas has concocted such a fiction in her Lady Sherlock series, and her latest, A Conspiracy in Belgravia continues the story of Lady Charlotte’s creation—a super-logical detective named Sherlock, who evidently suffers from an illness that keeps him “behind the scenes” while his “sister,” Charlotte (who is assisted by her partner and landlady, Mrs. Watson) acts as his public face.

Her scheme gets complicated when Lady Ingram, the wife of Lord Ingram Ashburton, Charlotte’s close friend and benefactor, requests a confidential meeting with Sherlock Holmes. Charlotte must balance her loyalty to Ashburton against Lady Ingram’s private request for Holmes to locate a former lover named Myron Finch.

As Charlotte searches for the elusive Finch, she weighs a marriage proposal from Ash’s brother, Lord Bancroft. And always lurking in the background is the shadowy arch-villain Moriarty. What is Lady Ingram’s connection to the infamous criminal mastermind, and how will it affect Holmes’ detective work? These and other Sherlockian puzzles are sure to be embraced by contemporary fans of the Great Detective—in whatever guise Sherlock chooses to appear.

The game’s afoot—this time with a feminist, gender-bending twist—in a Sherlock Holmes-inspired mystery that is sure to attract any fan of the Great Detective.

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World War I raged from 1914 to 1918. It killed many thousands and left countless others with emotional and mental scars that were little understood at the time—a terrible legacy of shock and mental disability that affected many of those who fought,  sometimes for the rest of their lives.

Charles Todd’s war novels have explored those lasting scars in two series, his Ian Rutledge mysteries and, beginning in 2010, a newer series featuring Bess Crawford, a World War I nurse.

In this ninth installment in his Bess Crawford series, A Casualty of War, the mother-son writing team known collectively as Todd has provided an authentic look at the visceral horrors of trench warfare, as they set readers down in a makeshift medical facility, or “forward aid station,” near the front lines. Bess has been assigned there near the end of the war, after another nurse has attempted suicide due to the high stress level at the facility.

Bess soon makes the acquaintance of one Captain Travis—first as a soldier about to rejoin his regiment, and soon after as a gravely wounded soldier himself; one who insists, moreover, that his distant cousin has intentionally tried to murder him on the battlefield. Trouble is, that cousin was killed in battle weeks before Travis was himself wounded. For his insistence on what took place, the captain is transferred to a mental facility, where his condition soon deteriorates.

Bess appears to be the only person who believes the captain may be telling the truth, and following the armistice she sets out to make sense of his claim and hopefully prove him sane. It won’t take readers long to discover that where there are two branches of a family, there’s often a will in dispute. Bess and her friend Simon set out to begin a search within the fold of the Travis family—a dangerous undertaking that involves a whole community as well as a number of family skeletons.

The authors deftly explore the early ways in which the medical community as well as families and loved ones try to understand what we now know of as post-traumatic stress disorder. A Casualty of War brings into sharp focus an era that thrust the world squarely into the 20th century.

In this ninth installment in his Bess Crawford series, A Casualty of War, the mother-son writing team known collectively as Todd has provided an authentic look at the visceral horrors of trench warfare, as they set readers down in a makeshift medical facility, or “forward aid station,” near the front lines. Bess has been assigned there near the end of the war, after another nurse has attempted suicide due to the high stress level at the facility.

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It’s best to leave your revolutionary fervor behind and just give in to the beautiful and opulent settings that blanket Tasha Alexander’s new mystery, Death in St. Petersburg. Set in that storied city in the early 1900s, before the cataclysm of 1917, Alexander’s novel captures St. Petersburg at the peak of its glitz and aristocratic splendor. The enchanted winter setting benefits from lines here and there from poet and Russian literary genius Alexander Pushkin, as this one that captures the atmosphere: “I love thy winters bleak and harsh; / Thy stirless air fast bound by frosts; / The flight of sledge o'er Neva wide, / That glows the cheeks of maidens gay. / I love the noise and chat of balls; / A banquet free from wife’s control, / Where goblets foam, and bright blue flame / Darts round the brimming punch-bowl’s edge.”

Sleuth Lady Emily, here in her 12th outing in Alexander’s popular series, is in Russia with her debonair and attractive husband, Colin. They investigate the tragic murder of prima ballerina Nemetseva, found outside the Mariinsky Theatre after her premiere performance as Odette/Odile in “Swan Lake.”

The book takes readers behind the scenes with a crash course in ballet, describing the beauty and cruelty of the unforgiving, competitive life of a top-level ballet dancer in Russia’s storied and revered Imperial Ballet.

The book cleverly balances flashbacks with Lady Emily’s current day, presenting the fascinating backstory of young Irusya (Nemetseva) and Katenka, young dancers in the corps de ballet, whose lives become intertwined over the years, right up to the fatal event, as the flashbacks catch up to the present day. Irusya’s brother, Lev, and his revolutionary circle of friends contrast with the aristocrats living sheltered lives in precarious comfort at their soirees and balls, while princes bestow expensive favors on their favored ballerinas, who remain a lower class . . . all setting the stage for events to come.

But it’s St. Petersburg that stars in this show, as we accompany Lady Emily and her husband through a brilliant Russian winter, where horse-drawn sledges draw their muffed and ermine-swathed occupants over the sparkling snows to the hush of a theater at opening; where glittering Fabergé jewels are trinkets for the rich; and where a ghostly ballerina appears in the city, bearing marks of her murder, and then disappears into the snowy landscape.

It’s best to leave your revolutionary fervor behind and just give in to the beautiful and opulent settings that blanket Tasha Alexander’s new mystery, Death in St. Petersburg. Set in that storied city in the early 1900s, before the cataclysm of 1917, Alexander’s novel captures St. Petersburg at the peak of its glitz and aristocratic splendor.

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The line between right and wrong quickly blurs in Thomas Mullen’s new novel, Lightning Men. The follow-up to his intensely powerful story of Atlanta’s first black cops, Darktown, his latest picks up two years later, in 1950, but is well-crafted enough to stand on its own.

This time, black police officers Lucius Boggs and Tommy Smith stumble upon a shipment of moonshine and marijuana destined for their traditionally black neighborhood. When they attempt to apprehend the white suspects—despite black officers not being allowed to arrest whites—a deadly shootout ensues, leaving one man dead and dozens of questions unanswered.

While the central case is engrossing in itself, Mullen doesn’t stop there. The author begins another sweeping arc as black families begin moving into previously all-white neighborhoods. Danny Rakestraw, one of the few white officers to sympathize with and support the department’s fledgling black police force, is further conflicted when his brother-in-law, Dale, rallies the Ku Klux Klan to “save” their neighborhood from further encroachment by black families. Citing the potential for falling property values and increased crime, events quickly spiral out of control as black homes are vandalized and the homeowners are savagely beaten. Rake, in turn, is left to choose between loyalty to his family and his duty to uphold the law. Both of these storylines eventually coalesce toward a shocking, suspense-filled finale.                                              

Brash and unflinching, Lightning Men transcends typical genre stories by highlighting the real-life racial divide of 1950s Atlanta that is rarely discussed, but should never be forgotten. As in Darktown, Mullen examines the issues without losing sense of the personalities involved, creating a deeply affecting portrait of pre-civil rights America while echoing the ongoing racial injustices that persist today.

The line between right and wrong quickly blurs in Thomas Mullen’s new novel, Lightning Men. The follow-up to his intensely powerful story of Atlanta’s first black cops, Darktown, his latest picks up two years later, in 1950, but is well-crafted enough to stand on its own.

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A murdered British officer with ties to the World War II Secret Service, found with the ace of hearts, known as the blood card, on his chest. An open coffin containing the body of a gypsy fortune-teller, her hand clutching a similar playing card. How are they connected?

Enter two members of the former Magic Men, a special MI5 unit that served in the war effort, concocting trickeries to aid in the fight against the Nazis. Readers may already be familiar with Max and Edgar, who feature in author Elly Griffiths’ earlier books in this fantastical, intriguing series (The Zig Zag Girl, Smoke and Mirrors). In the latest, the exceptional The Blood Card, the pair once again delve into the world of illusion to discover what these deaths have in common.

It’s the 1950s, and former Magic Men member Max Mephisto is still hanging onto his career doing stage magic, even as the burgeoning era of television threatens to eclipse the popularity of live variety shows. Detective Inspector Edgar Stephens, also part of the core World War II group, is now on the Brighton police force, and the two old partners in espionage have nosed out a crime or two since that epic time.

Here they follow the aces to unravel the reason that Peter Cartwright, their former MI5 recruiter, has been murdered. Edgar takes his very first plane trip, visiting the United States to track down an American mesmerist who appears to be connected to Cartwright. When the American magician dies after a hit-and-run, and Edgar himself barely escapes the same fate, Max and Edgar realize they’ve stumbled onto something more than just a trick of fate.

Griffiths has a matter-of-fact, conversational way of setting her scenes, and effectively uses plain declarative sentences, making a mundane event often seem wildly off-beat. Her understated humor and sly comments just slide into the dialogue, augmenting the storyline while never overtaking it.

The upcoming coronation of a young Queen Elizabeth figures large in this story, and the author cleverly mixes magical deceptions with real-life espionage. The straightforward crime detection sometimes seems a bit downsized, surrounded by a gypsy funeral; backstage ghosts; subliminal messages; the eerie smell of lavender; and a classic case of misdirection involving a disappearing general. As Edgar so cogently asks, “But what was the trick and why had it been performed?”

The further adventures of Max and Edgar continue to enthrall, this time in service of queen and country.

A murdered British officer with ties to the World War II Secret Service, found with the ace of hearts, known as the blood card, on his chest. An open coffin containing the body of a gypsy fortune-teller, her hand clutching a similar playing card. How are they connected?

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes canon found a home and a ravenous readership in the pages of The Strand Magazine in the late 1800s. Now, more than a century later, author Lyndsay Faye has continued that tradition with her own Holmes adventures in the modern-day incarnation of The Strand. Fortunately for Holmes aficionados, if you haven’t been able to keep up with the publication, 15 of her tales (including two new stories) are now available in a new, collected volume, The Whole Art of Detection: Lost Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes.

Faye divides the collection into neat time periods in Holmes’ and John Watson’s lives, with adventures occurring pre-Baker Street, during the early Baker Street years and post-Reichenbach Falls. There are even a few tales set in Holmes’ later years. While not as memorable as Doyle’s best stories, Faye does an admirable job of filling the gaps between some of those tales with interesting asides. The stories are at times emotional—such as the case of “An Empty House,” in which Watson contemplates leaving London and the painful loss of his wife and Holmes behind, only to discover Holmes is very much alive. Other stories, like “The Adventure of the Memento Mori,” are shocking, as our intrepid pair discover a devious criminal slowly poisoning the patients in a women’s home.

A lifelong devotee of Doyle’s works, Faye broke onto the book scene with the Holmes novel Dust and Shadow, earning critical appraise from the Conan Doyle estate itself. Her short stories may be even better. Faye easily captures the essence of Holmes and Watson, both in voice and style. Readers will feel as if they are in the cozy confines of 221B Baker Street right alongside this often feuding and sometimes teasing pair of old friends or, better yet, sitting beside them in a bouncing carriage as they race to rescue a would-be victim from an otherwise heinous end.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes canon found a home and a ravenous readership in the pages of The Strand Magazine in the late 1800s. Now, more than a century later, author Lyndsay Faye has continued that tradition with her own Holmes adventures in the modern-day incarnation of The Strand. Fortunately for Holmes aficionados, if you haven’t been able to keep up with the publication, 15 of her tales (including two new stories) are now available in a new, collected volume, The Whole Art of Detection: Lost Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes.

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The Inheritance, book five in Charles Finch’s well-written Victorian crime series, follows the activities of the detective agency run by gentleman sleuth Charles Lenox, along with his two partners, in a time when these newly formed partnerships are just beginning to gain credibility in the public mind. Sometimes it seems like a drawing room soap opera, all genteel furnishings and horse-drawn carriages; other times like a detailed and engrossing murder plot. As luck—and the author’s skill—would have it, it’s both.

For the inheritance in question, the “who” and “why” are standout questions. Who is the mysterious benefactor who has given not one, but two generous bequests to Lenox’s childhood friend Gerald Leigh? The first anonymous bequest enabled Leigh to attend the prestigious Harrow School as a boy; the second and most recent provides opportunities for Leigh to significantly advance his scientific career. Perhaps of greater significance, why were these legacies so mysteriously given? Leigh contacts his old friend Lenox after an absence of nearly 30 years to ask for help in finding answers.

As schoolboys, Lenox and Leigh pursued an exhaustive but ultimately unsuccessful quest to discover the identity of the legator. This time around there’s an urgency to unmask the friend—or enemy—who has offered the generous sum. A couple of members of London’s East End gangs have a deep interest in seeing that Leigh disappears for good, and Leigh’s solicitor is found dead before he can shed light on the charitable legacy.

While illustrating a warm picture of the men’s friendship as it grows and mellows through the years, Finch also provides a skillfully drawn social portrait of the late 1800s, without being ponderous or intruding on the course of the story. He adds tidbits of interest about the industry, progress and politics of the time, including breakthrough discoveries in the burgeoning field of microbiology. Leigh’s backstory draws a lively, sympathetic and often dryly humorous portrait of this uncommon scientist as he cuts a new path in an era where manners and protocol hold sway.

As this mystery unfolds, Finch conjures the palpable excitement of the day over such groundbreaking developments as the telegraph and electricity, as England—and the rest of the world—stand on the brink of great change, as the paths of the genteel and the common are poised to intersect and change the social contract forever.

The Inheritance, book five in Charles Finch’s well-written Victorian crime series, follows the activities of the detective agency run by gentleman sleuth Charles Lenox, along with his two partners, in a time when these newly formed partnerships are just beginning to gain credibility in the public mind. Sometimes it seems like a drawing room soap opera, all genteel furnishings and horse-drawn carriages; other times like a detailed and engrossing murder plot. As luck—and the author’s skill—would have it, it’s both.

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Smoke and Mirrors is the second book in a wonderful crime series by author Elly Griffiths, who also writes the equally entrancing Ruth Galloway mysteries. Smoke follows the series debut, The Zig Zag Girl, published in 2015.

In the early 1950s, Detective Inspector Edgar Stephens, now on the Brighton police force, and stage magician Max Mephisto are part of a core of men who formerly served in a special unit in World War II, working with Britain’s MI5 intelligence service to deceive the enemy through various trickeries and illusions. Readers meet several members of the small team of “Magic Men” in this and the earlier book, as Griffiths creates an imaginative, tightly constructed storyline with all sorts of intriguing possibilities for future adventures.

In Smoke and Mirrors, children’s fairy tales take a gruesome turn when two missing children are found dead in the woods in a parody of the Hansel and Gretel story, their bodies marked by a trail of candy. The victims appear to be part of a group of youngsters who are turning classic fairy tales upside down and creating their own spin on the plots, then enacting them at a homegrown children’s theater. One of the victims, 11-year-old Annie Francis, appears to be the creative mind behind the stories, inspired perhaps by her grammar school teacher, Miss Young, whose imagination may be outpacing her good judgment.

The bizarre murder takes place against the backdrop of a professional theater performance of Aladdin, a Christmas pantomime featuring Max Mephisto himself, but it brings up a creepy coincidence: Thirty-nine years earlier, a young girl was murdered not far away, in a theater production of the children’s tale Babes in the Wood, and at least one of the current actors in Aladdin—another member of the Magic Men—was in that 1916 production, when the children’s tale likewise turned dark and tragic.

Griffiths’ exceptional and subtle sense of humor sometimes contrasts—or places heightened emphasis—on scenes that depict cruel and tawdry acts. In a way, there are few innocents in this tale. Everyone is interconnected, and even the victims’ motives may be cloudy. An inventive backstory and threads of connection elevate the story above the ordinary run of mystery novels.

Smoke and Mirrors is the second book in a wonderful crime series by author Elly Griffiths, who also writes the equally entrancing Ruth Galloway mysteries. Smoke follows the series debut, The Zig Zag Girl, published in 2015.

Thomas Mullen’s Darktown is a novel readers won’t soon forget—not just because of its thoroughly engrossing, suspense-filled plot, but because of the historical, moral complexity contained within its pages.

Darktown follows the story of Atlanta’s first black police officers in an era of heightened racial prejudice. In 1948, the eight-man police division cannot arrest whites, drive police cars or even set foot in police headquarters through the front door. Despite this, they are committed to forging an important path of integration and justice in the face of hatred from their white counterparts on the force.

The story focuses in particular on Officer Lucius Boggs and his partner, Tommy Smith, as they investigate the possible death of a black woman at the hands of a former white police officer, Brian Underhill. The officers came across the pair after a car accident in a primarily black portion of town. But because of Underhill’s connections within the department, he is turned free without even a citation.

His female passenger, Lily Ellsworth, turns up dead a short time later.

Mullen, an award-winning author and a resident of Atlanta, swiftly constructs a moral challenge for the black officers as they dare to question whether a white man may have committed her murder. With the rest of the predominantly white police department fighting them at every turn, the tension immediately ratchets up.

The story evokes parallels to racial injustices within the law enforcement community that persist to this day, making this an even more compelling and thought-provoking read. Mullen paints a vivid portrait of racial inequality and a dark period in American history that cannot soon be forgotten.

Darktown has been acquired by Sony Television for development as a television series, with Jaime Foxx to executive produce.

Thomas Mullen’s Darktown is a novel readers won’t soon forget—not just because of its thoroughly engrossing, suspense-filled plot, but because of the historical, moral complexity contained within its pages.

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Cheryl Honingford’s debut mystery opens in the autumn of 1938. America is in the midst of the Great Depression, Europe is on the brink of war, and radio is in its heyday. Ambitious young radio actress Vivian Witchell has landed a role in a popular mystery serial “The Darkness Knows” on Chicago’s WCHI radio. She plays the role of Lorna, sidekick to the series hero, and she’s determined to make a name for herself. At first Vivian plays up to her costar, the equally ambitious but enigmatic Graham, but soon finds herself up to her eyes in real mystery when she discovers a body in the employee lounge. It’s the station’s big-name actress, Marjorie Fox, whose public popularity unfortunately does not extend to her colleagues at work. A note found with the body also contains a veiled threat against “Lorna,” and the station owner soon assigns a private detective as Vivian’s protection.

Vivian finds herself attracted to PI Charlie Haverman, and an unlikely scenario unfolds as the two look into what—or who—lies behind the murderous events, which appear to involve letters from an unhinged fan who calls himself “Walter” and who seems to confuse the radio characters with real-life people.

Who might benefit from the aging actress’ death? The search uncovers a host of radioland suspects who seem willing to do almost anything to grab more on-air time and a chance at fame—including Graham, the handsome hero who has a way with women; a couple of wannabe starlets; a star-struck station engineer; and an enterprising midget who unexpectedly lands a choice promotion.

Familiar plot scenarios are not always a bad thing—we often read to relax and visit comfortable territory. Here, however, the author has offered a predictable, plot-driven narrative, missing a golden opportunity to provide the details of an exciting historical milieu in which real adventure could flourish. The author has chosen a great premise—a world in the shadow of war, prime time for a burgeoning form of public entertainment—but never seizes the seemingly endless possibilities for intrigue and story development.

This series has lots of room to grow, and hopefully later installments will leave the shallows and add a generous dose of atmosphere.

Cheryl Honingford’s debut mystery opens in the autumn of 1938. America is in the midst of the Great Depression, Europe is on the brink of war, and radio is in its heyday. Ambitious young radio actress Vivian Witchell has landed a role in a popular mystery serial “The Darkness Knows” on Chicago’s WCHI radio.

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