Review by Booklist Review
Perry's methodical "agent of inquiry" William Monk is back in another historical puzzler set in Victorian England. More comfortable now with his status as an independent investigator and mellowed somewhat by his recent marriage to nurse Hester Latterly, Monk takes on the troubling challenge of finding Miriam Gardiner, who disappeared from a garden party at the home of her wealthy, much younger fiance, Lucius Stourbridge. Lucius wants her back, even after the coachman who drove her away turns up dead and Miriam is accused of the crime. In the meantime, Monk's beloved Hester, who has some investigative credentials of her own, is quietly searching for the thief who is raiding hospital medicine stores, adjusting to her new marriage, and crusading for hospital reforms. The tangents dovetail neatly, with Perry delivering her usual leisurely paced story suffused with period details, many of which focus on the conventions of gender and class that so marked the times. What's best, however, is the denouement, when the guilty party and the meaning of the title are dramatically unveiled in a packed London courtroom. --Stephanie Zvirin
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this 10th entry in the popular series featuring prickly English investigator William Monk and his equally prickly bride, nurse Hester Latterly (A Breach of Promise, etc.), Perry mulls over the moral justification of criminal acts. Just back from his honeymoon in the summer of 1860, Monk tries to locate Mrs. Miriam Gardiner, a comely widow who inexplicably fled in a coach from her wealthy young fianc's home. Monk's search takes him to Hampstead Heath, where the coachman's body is foundÄmurdered, he deduces, by a single blow to the head. Could Miriam have struck that deadly blow as she fled, and if so, why? Cornered at last, Miriam refuses to explain her behavior or implicate the coachman's murderer, even though Monk suspects she's the victim of some atrocity. Meanwhile, Hester gears up to defend Cleo Anderson, a saintly nurse who admits to filching hospital supplies to treat impoverished war veterans. Plot mechanics grind away as Perry strains to connect the two crimes, resolving matters with an ending that reads like Henry Fielding without the laughs. Fans of earlier Monk and Latterly mysteries may enjoy Perry's sometimes overwrought depiction of the two-career couple negotiating who cooks supper, but the many other anachronisms just don't wash (says Hester's colleague: "you want to have nurses visit the poor in their homes? You are fifty years before your time"). Despite the characters' tendency to sermonize self-righteously, Perry's theme is the hazy nature of guiltÄa topic sure to intrigue those who've followed her career. For thrills, however, readers should turn to other books in the series. Mystery Guild selection; Random House audio. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Series entry No. 10 featuring Victorian England investigator William Monk follows two twisted mysteries until they merge. Lucius Stourbridge hires Monk to find his runaway fiance, Miriam Gardiner, and missing coachman, James Treadwell, who is found bludgeoned to death. William's new wife, Hester, hospital volunteer and war nurse, becomes embroiled in a mystery surrounding drugs missing from the hospital pharmacy. Although lifelike, the characters drone on about the nature of guilt, medical standards, veterans' rights, and the status of women. Terrence Hardiman's dramatic reading doesn't quite save it. Purchase only for Monk fans.-Sandy Glover, West Linn P.L., OR (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Now that he's savoring the joys of marriage to unlicensed nurse Hester Latterly, enquiry agent William Monk (A Breach of Promise, 1998, etc.) is all the quicker to feel the distress of Lucius Stourbridge, whose fiance, bewitching widow Miriam Gardiner, vanished from the middle of a croquet match at the Stourbridge home in Cleveland Square. And when James Treadwell, the Stourbridge coachman who carried the lady off at her request, is found murdered near Hampstead Heath, Miriam's peril is only deepened: she's arrested for his murder. Nor does Hester's own subplot offer any relief, since her investigation into the disappearance of anaesthetic medicines from North London Hospital leads her straight to the woman the police will call Miriam's conspirator. Even after a second shocking murder whose motives remain stubbornly obscure, the facts of the case seem simple and damning, and Monk's friend (and Hester's former suitor) Sir Oliver Rathbone, stonewalled by his silent clients, accepts the defense brief without a clue how to proceed. But Perry'though her main mission, as usual, is to criticize the 19th century by showing how much more enlightened the 20th is about medical standards, veterans' rights, and the endless duel over the status of women'manages a climactic thunderbolt that will leave even her most loyal fans gasping. What fearful secret could lead Miriam to prefer trial and execution to telling her story? No writer since Agatha Christie has been so good at teasing her audience with such obvious questions until choosing to ring down the curtain. (Mystery Guild selection)
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
