Review - A Box Full of Darkness by Simone St. James

A Box Full of Darkness

by Simone St. James

Release Date: January 20, 2026

2026 Berkley

Ebook ARC; 352 Pages

ISBN: 978-0593200414

ASIN: B0F5PKRY8L

Audiobook: B0F67PW6QM

Genre: Fiction / Horror / Mystery

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

2 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Strange things happen in Fell, New York: A mysterious drowning at the town’s roadside motel. The unexplained death of a young girl whose body is left by the railroad tracks. For Violet, Vail, and Dodie Esmie the final straw was their little brother's shocking disappearance, which started as a normal game of hide-and-seek.

As their parents grew increasingly distant, the sisters were each haunted by visions and frightening events, leading them to leave town and never look back. Violet still sees dead people—spirits who remind her of Sister, the menacing presence that terrorized her for years. Now after nearly two decades it’s time for a homecoming—because Ben is back, and he’s ready to lead them to the answers they’ve longed for and long feared.

 

My Thoughts

A Box Full of Darkness is one of those books I thought I would give a chance simply because I really enjoyed this author's earliest works and I always want to give the new ones a chance as the concept always sounds intriguing.  This one had an interesting concept, it returns to Fell, the setting of a previous book, there are ghosts involved, and includes my favorite, a decrepit house with a lot of secrets.  However, the mystery never really grabbed my attention and I wasn't invested in what happened with the siblings.  Basically, the whole thing felt forced and silly.

 

The three siblings were the main characters and their stories were told through their POVs. They hadn't really seen each other in twenty years and personally, I don't think the relationship between them was developed very well as it felt forced and contrived.  The dialogue was stilted and focused mainly on superficial things even though the author tried to force some sentimentality with childhood reminiscences that didn't quite hit the mark.  After twenty years of not being interested in the house, it did seem odd that the three would suddenly leave their jobs in order to investigate the house when 'something' happened, as if they can just drop their lives at the drop of a dime.  

 

I did enjoy the creepy vibe of this book and really liked the crumbling house with the forest behind it that no one went into. Boy, as kids they really didn't explore a lot as I would have been all over those woods.  So, imagine the shock when they discover things in those woods they didn't as kids. Imagine! And even though the book took place in the 80s, you couldn't tell because the author didn't really take advantage of the nostalgia of the time period.  Even the mention of the hotel, the setting of a previous book, didn't seem to fit the tone of the book and was jarring. 

 

The plot is kind of where this book missed the mark for me. Let me just say that I did enjoy the creepy vibe of the house and loved the ghost sightings, but those are things I live for in books.  The story itself didn't make sense though and a lot of questions were left unanswered or you just had to suspend belief and just move on.  Um, no.  Too many questions, no explanations, so the book fell flat.  And all of the questions were centered on Ben, his arrival, and his disappearance as well as Violet's sightings of another evil entity in the house.  The plot holes were so big you could drop this book right in them.

 

Verdict

A Box Full of Darkness is one of those book for which I had high hopes, that it would be the type of book I first read from this author, but it was not to be. While I did enjoy the supernatural element and loved the setting, it wasn't enough to get past a plot that left me frustrated and annoyed due to the many plot holes and unexplained elements as well as poorly developed characters.  This book just didn't make sense. 

 

Review: Make it Out Alive by Allison Brennan

Make it Out Alive (Quinn & Costa, #7)

by Allison Brennan

Release Date: January 27, 2026

2026 Hanover Square Press

Ebook ARC; 392 Pages

ISBN: 978-1335001412

ASIN:  ‎ B0F7XJN4YP

Audiobook: B0FN9DVLKX

Genre: Fiction / Mystery

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

3 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Three newlywed couples have disappeared from an exclusive resort in Florida, only to turn up dead soon after. With the location and the similarities between the female victims as their only leads, it’s up to the FBI Mobile Response Team to catch a serial killer before anyone else ends up dead. And they have the perfect bait—Detective Kara Quinn, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the targeted women.

Undercover as newlyweds pretending to enjoy their honeymoon, Kara and FBI Agent Matt Costa set a flawless trap. When their plan works and they arrest the predator, Matt sends the rest of the team home so he and Kara can have the weekend for some much-needed R&R. But on Monday morning, the couple doesn’t show up to work, and the MRT learns they never checked out of their hotel.

 

My Thoughts

Make it Out Alive is the seventh installment in the Quinn & Costa Thriller series, and while it had a decent premise, there was definitely something missing in this one, that something that usually keeps me glued to the pages and flipping quickly because of the high level of tension.  While I really enjoyed the locked-room scenario that played out and forced Quinn and Costa to examine their feelings for each other, the chapters with the killers just made me roll my eyes and I definitely didn't buy into the reasons for why they did what they did.   

 

By the time we hit the seventh book, the character development sort of stalls, and unfortunately, that was the case in this book.  The fact there is still tension between Kara and one of the other team members after all these books drives me wild, and that same profiler is constantly questioning herself because of what happened all those years ago.  I understand the trauma she went through, but she is supposed to be a professional so maybe behave like one?  

 

The plot was a bit disjointed in this one as you were thrown into the end of an investigation and really had no idea what was going on when the book began.  I'm not opposed to being thrown into an investigation this way, but the way it was done was a bit weird and threw me off a bit.  The team thinks it has its killer, sends everyone home, then suddenly Matt and Kara go missing so they realize the profile was off and have to do an emergency regroup to find out what happened to Matt and Kara.  Not implausible, but the way it happened made me realize I was reading a different type of book than the previous ones and had to just go along for the ride.  Unfortunately, you also knew who the culprit was right from the beginning and this didn't help the tension of the story.  And I really disliked the POV chapters of the killer. It really felt like the author was fishing really deep to come up with reasons for why the killer did what they did and I couldn't help but roll my eyes during their chapters.  I don't know what it is with the use of a locked-room type scenario lately, but while I enjoyed it, it just seemed so far=fetched for this series considering the deep investigations the author presented in previous books.  

 

Verdict

Make it Out Alive is definitely not my favourite book of this series due to the disjointedness of the story as well as poor reasons from the killer's viewpoint.  I don't have to like a killer or agree with what they did, but the reasons do need to be somewhat believable and for me, these were sitting on the edge of 'rolling my eyeballs into the back of head' type of reasons. I could even ignore the neediness of a professional profiler who whines whenever anyone questions her report, but I couldn't ignore the lack of tension or suspense nor the fact this required quite a suspension of belief to get through.  Will I continue to read the series? Yes, because I really enjoyed the earlier books in this series and hope the next one will have more relatable characters and more intriguing reasons for doing what they do. 

 

Review: Bloody Crowns: A New History of the Hundred Years War by Michael Livingston

Bloody Crowns: A New History of the Hundred Years War

by Michael Livingston

Release Date: October 21, 2025

2025 Basic Books

Ebook ARC; 592 Pages

ISBN: 978-1541607705

ASIN: B0DVSNML5L

Genre: Non-Fiction / History / Europe

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

5 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Henry V at Agincourt. Edward III at Crécy. The Black Prince at Poitiers. Joan of Arc at Orléans. The period we call “the Hundred Years War” was a cascade of violence bursting with some of the most famous figures and fascinating fights in history. The central combatants, England and France, bore witness to uncountable deaths, unbelievable tragedy, and uncompromising glory. But there was much more to this period than a struggle between two nations for dominance.  

Bloody Crowns tells a new story of how medieval Europe was consumed, not by a hundred years’ war, but by two full centuries of war from 1292 to 1492. During those years, blood was spilled far beyond the borders of England and France. The Low Countries became war zones. Italy was swept up. So, too, the Holy Roman Empire, the Iberian Peninsula, Scotland, and Wales. The conflict drove enormous leaps forward in military technology and organization, political systems and national identities, laying the groundwork for the modern world.

 

My Thoughts

Bloody Crowns did what I didn't think was really possible, bring a confusing mess of a series of skirmishes and battles into something fairly coherent that even someone without a background in history could somewhat understand. Everything else I have read about this time period has been fairly convoluted and while I have a history background and taught it my entire career, let's face it, the political, social, and religious situation of this time period was very different from out modern day sensibilities, so it's sometimes hard to understand why a certain person did this or why they chose to do that. Michael Livingston did a great job trying to show why certain decisions were made and why other options just weren't available for these people at the time. 

  

In this book though, the author goes beyond the actual timeline of the Hundred Years War and argues convincingly that it actually began years before the historical start of the war.  The political events before the events that are typically attributed to the Hundred Years War are vital to understanding how the events spiraled out of control and should be included in the timeline.  Even my own history professors agreed with this concept as events don't typically just start, except for a few exceptions, but are part of a timeline of events that led into the major skirmishes that have far-reaching consequences.  While I don't think the concept is 'radically original' as stated by the author as my own professors thought this way, it certainly does help to understand what led into the major events of the Hundred Years War, what led to Agincourt (for another great read, see Livingston's Agincourt: Battle of the Scarred King) and the importance of Jeanne d'Arc (I'm French so I just don't think of her name in English terms.) 

 

This is a very tumultuous time in history and it doesn't help when every third person is named Henry, Charles, or Louis and property boundaries of countries as well as allegiances changed between breakfast and dinnertime.   I thought the author did a great job sorting out who was who, what was what, trying to explain the allegiances in terms of the time period and what that meant, and the importance of what was happening, even the little things, and trying to explain to people who had a familiarity with France where some of these skirmishes would have taken place today.  And this is what I found the most interesting, the attention to the details of things non-battle that nevertheless played such a critical role in what happened during this time period. Something like the development of weapons that changed the course of a skirmish, the wedding between two nobles that may have changed an important allegiance, the death of a child, the birth of a child, the friendship between former foes, the madness of a king, the death of a king, etc... It wasn't always the big battles that had a profound effect on what was happening, but the smaller, but still very significant events that changed the course of history.  England's claim to the throne pushed France into strengthening its central monarchy (leading to the development of the God-kings we will see in the future), asserting control over independent duchies like Brittany, Burgundy, and Gascony to name a few, and developing a centralized army that would be funded by a taxation system (one that would have repercussions in the future we all know about, but that was still three hundred years away), all controlled by the crown.  And what happened to England? The War of the Roses.

 

Verdict 

Bloody Crowns walks the reader through centuries of battles, politics, and people concisely, but manages to do so in a way that is fascinating and interesting, without falling into that dry recitation that some of these books sometimes do.  Personally, I'm not sure how difficult this book would be for someone who has absolutely no knowledge of the subject as I have a really good background and have no difficulty understanding the players in this drama, but it did seem like the author did a great job explaining who was who and what was what.   I also know that not everything was covered in this book, as the author readily acknowledges, but that was not the point of this book, it was to show how the Hundred Years War started much earlier than historians typically think, a point he made very, very well.  For history buffs though, it does give you a lot to think about and I highly recommend.  

 

Review: It Should Have Been You by Andrea Mara

It Should Have Been You

by Andrea Mara

Release Date: January 13, 2026

2026 Pamela Dorman Books

Softcover ARC; 384 Pages

ISBN: 978-0593832097

ASIN:  ‎ B0F4QBTJLN

Audiobook: B0F6PVJPHN

Genre: Fiction / Thriller

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

2 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

You press send and your message disappears. Full of secrets about your neighbors, it’s meant for your sister. But it doesn’t reach her – it goes to the entire local community WhatsApp group instead.

As rumor spreads like wildfire through the picture-perfect neighborhood, you convince yourself that people will move on, that this will quickly be forgotten. But then you receive the first death threat.

The next day, a woman has been murdered. And what’s even more chilling is that she had the same address as you – 26 Oakpark – but in a different part of town. Did the killer get the wrong house? It won’t be long before you find out…

 

My Thoughts

It Should Have Been You actually had an interesting premise. You type a really snarky message on WhatsApp intended only for your sisters to see and realize afterwards that you accidentally sent it to the entire group. By the time you realize, too many people have seen it and the word has spread. Logically, this can and does happen to people. I've even seen it at work when someone hits the 'reply all' button but really should have just hit the reply button to privately message someone.  Luckily, at work, it's just been funny and nothing serious, and you get the nice instructions on how to reply to people properly in your socials, but this one was quite serious.  And for the first hundred pages, I actually enjoyed the mess, the panic, the discussions, and other whatevers happening around the message despite the lack of character development. And the sloppiness of the execution of the story sort of fit along with what was happening in the story.  Then, the tone changed and I found myself starting to roll my eyes and descended into the pit called 'unbelievable' and to mimic some of the references thrown around in the book, came to a 'That's all folks!' ending for me. 

 

The story followed Susan and her family, but it was told mainly from Susan's POV. It didn't really matter whose POV as I didn't really connect with any of them as there was little in the way of character development. And I don't know if switching the POV helped the story or hindered it as the transitions between characters weren't smooth at all. It just made it difficult to emphasize with any of them.  And even if Susan was the MC, she was definitely whiny and annoying as she made mistake after mistake, not thinking anything through, and while I sympathize with the fact she had a baby four months ago, it got old blaming baby brain on every...single...thing...she...did...wrong. And what really rubbed me the wrong way, especially as a retired teacher, where were the consequences from her job? She was a teacher and saying what she did about a student, hell no.  The focus was on the family dynamics and how it exposed the sisters' lives, but it certainly goes much deeper than that.

 

So, this leads us into the execution of the story.  At first, it was interesting and somewhat compelling as I could imagine a scenario like that happening.  And while thrillers do tend to push the improbable, they still have to be believable, and unfortunately, there were too many things that you had to accept as the story went along.  When you start getting into hard-to-believe scenarios, the tension disappears and all you want to do at that point is finish the book, which is exactly what happened to me.  I mean, when you try to throw in too many things in a pot of stew, but don't actually know how to cook the stew, you get a mess. This analogy sums up the plot exactly in this book; too many things thrown in to mix up the plot and you've got a bit of a mess. 

 

Verdict

It Should Have Been You definitely had relevance to today's social media world and the SNAFU that can happen when you do something you shouldn't, but what really bugged me were the lack of consequences for everyone involved, including the 'friendship' that happened in the end. What? While I enjoyed the mess and the confusion and the panic that occurred when the message first went out, the lack of development in both the plot and the characters turned me right off the rest of the book.  I'm glad to see other people enjoyed this book, but I was not one of them.  

 

Review: Grace by A.M. Shine

Grace

by A.M. Shine

Release Date: February 10, 2026

2026 Head of Zeus - an Aries Book

Ebook ARC; 304 Pages

ISBN: 978-1804547984

ASIN: B0FB37BFS5

Audiobook: B0FD43DR87

Genre: Fiction / Horror

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

3 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Off the west coast of Ireland lies a lonely island, isolated and wilfully forgotten. Some say there hasn't been a child born on the island for thirty years. Others speak of strange deaths there, decades ago. But no one really knows what happened. Locals believe that the dark times are behind them.

They are mistaken.

Grace, adopted at four years old, has never known where she came from. A mysterious phone call leads her back to the island where she was born – and where a terrible evil has been disturbed.

As the evil starts to spread, Grace finds herself dragged back into a living nightmare that threatens to engulf anyone who steps into its path.

 

My Thoughts

Grace had a fantastic setting and the atmosphere was downright eerie, an island off the coast of Ireland called Croaghnakeela Island.  I have since learned that this island is an existing island and the author incorporated the island as well as Irish folklore into the story. I am currently reading a history of the British Isles and understand there are thousands of islands in the area so while the name of the island exists, I am assuming (hoping) the author took liberties with the story and the people who actually live there. 

 

Let me start with the setting as that was the best part of this book.  We have this island where no children exist, houses are falling into disrepair, the only delivery man refuses to step foot on the island, fog shrouds it perpetually, and legends abound as to what is going on on the island.  A priest was transferred there six years ago and the islanders have successfully kept him in the dark as to its secrets and what happened thirty years go, but he senses the malevolence of the island and the spirits focused on the people.  I loved the blend of folklore with what was happening as that was truly interesting and kept me engaged.  I love it when things are eerie, ghostly, and there are big, dark secrets.

 

Unfortunately, the setting wasn't enough to elevate the story as I found it meandering and the characters weren't fully developed.  Yes, the author tried to give a few of the characters a voice by telling their stories as to what happened all those years before, but by doing so, lost the overall tension and fear that was so prominent in the first third of the book. Even though there were some very interesting things that were revealed through these POV, I did wonder if there was a better way for the story to be told. I really enjoyed Father O'Malley's POV and would have preferred the story stay there as he was ignorant of what was happening and as he discovered what was going on, the tension and the fear would have increased substantially as he learned more and more.  As I've previously mentioned, some really interesting things were revealed, but they were lost in the meandering story line, and other things that I found fascinating were glossed over as if they weren't important, things I think the priest would have questioned. As a result, the overall story felt unfinished or incomplete. 

 

Verdict

Grace definitely had a lot of potential and the setting just screamed atmosphere with the fog and the unsettling stories, but the overall story line fell a little short, in my opinion.  Although I loved the folklore and the legends, I would have liked more information on what was happening.  I really enjoyed the first third of the book, but the ending felt a bit rushed and honestly, predictable.  Overall, I do recommend that you read this novel if you love horror just for the atmospheric elements in the book as they were great, but I will acknowledge the execution fell a bit flat for me.  And the twists? Honestly, when you read a lot of horror you don't get surprised by them anymore as you sort of expect them so not being surprised by them didn't affect my overall rating.   

Review: Ghosted: A History of Ghost Hunting and Why we Keep Looking by Alice Vernon

Ghosted: A History of Ghost Hunting and Why We Keep Looking

by Alice Vernon

Release Date: September 2, 2025

2025 Bloomsbury Sigma

Ebook ARC; 304 Pages

ISBN: 978-1399418706

ASIN: B0F4FX2HTG

Audiobook: B0F9FXJ7P8

Genre: Non-Fiction / Paranormal

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

3.5 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Ghosted follows the journey of paranormal investigations from the Victorian era to the modern day, examining how our fascination with ghost hunting has changed alongside technology and culture. Where we once gathered around tables, observing and recording every movement of the medium, we now take electronic equipment and app-laden phones around haunted locations to catch ghosts digitally. Where theatres and concert halls held sold-out performances by conjurers recreating the tricks of fraudulent mediums, we now delight in picking apart and exposing the evidence presented on reality television programmes.

In this book, Alice Vernon embarks on a journey to encounter a ghost, travelling to some of the UK's most haunted locations and encouraging readers to interrogate their own scepticism and belief. Ghosted examines what we are looking for, why we are looking for it, and why have we never given up the ghost.

 

My Thoughts

Ghosted was an interesting book that delved into the history of ghost hunting and we we have been so fascinated with the paranormal throughout the centuries. While the history of ghost hunting goes back thousands of years, with the development of science and technology, the rise of interest in the subject has grown exponentially and this thought does exist that perhaps we are on the cusp of discovering why ghosts exist and capturing scientific evidence, a concept that drives even more and more people to 'ghost hunt' and to be interested in the paranormal.  The author mentions that our interest in the subject goes far deeper than simple curiosity, that we are looking for comfort, for something that helps us when we are suffering, something that I did find interesting.  However, while I did find the material to be fascinating, there wasn't anything really new in this book and I didn't feel like the scientific exploration went deep enough.

 

The book traces our journey from earlier times to Victorian times when it was quite popular to attend seances, gathering around tables, using spirit cabinets, and other paraphernalia to attract spirits, to modern times where it is popular to go to haunted locations with expensive technology and videotape the experiences.  Like today, there were societies set up to investigate the claims put forth by these mediums and even magicians, like Houdini, were able to show how some of the fraudulent schemes worked in their acts.  Again, while I enjoyed the discourse around the events that happened, I would have liked to have seen a more rigorous discussion around the events, especially the use of the so-called 'spirit cabinets'.  I am not necessarily an unbeliever, but I am a skeptic, and as a scientist with a history background, the lack of discussion of the sources did bother me quite a bit.  I understand the author wanted to let the reader make up their own mind about what was happening, but the surface-level thinking was too shallow for some of the sources that were used. The book was quite easy to read however, and it moved along chronologically. I especially enjoyed the chapters during the Victorian era as that is when the rise of spiritualism occurred, and I did find it interesting how even the aliens were brought into the discussions in order to make sense of what was happening. Quite an interesting time period! The author interjected a lot of humour into the book and I chuckled over the Scooby Doo references.  

 

Verdict

Ghosted was interesting as a non-fiction history book, but it was definitely lacking when it came to the scientific exploration as that was done on a quite superficial level.  And if you think, well, this is the paranormal, how can you analyze that? You can definitely analyze documents, especially someone who has training in the field.  The interrelated/independent data can be analyzed and discussed as there were plenty of people who wrote about what they saw and experienced. However, I did enjoy this book, the author had a good sense of humour, and I especially loved it when the author bought a haunted doll off EBay and her colleagues would not go near it. Now, I am a skeptic, but I have to admit, the porcelain dolls my mom gave me are secured in their respective closets. I did watch the first Chucky film when I was about 14 and am not taking any chances.  

 

Review: Never: The Autobiography by Rick Astley

Never: The Autobiography

by Rick Astley

Release Date: January 13, 2026 (First published October 10, 2024)

2026 Pan

Ebook ARC; 304 Pages

ISBN: 978-1035049417

ASIN: B0FG3K6X7J

Audiobook: B0D5MP3Y78

Genre: Non-Fiction / Autobiography / Music

Source: Review copy from publisher 

 

4 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

'Fame didn’t actually make me happy. I was an insecure twenty-year-old and being famous made things worse. It was an era all about the way you looked and I still don’t know how I squeezed through. I did enjoy myself for a lot of it, but, at some point, you’re looking in the mirror and 'Is this it, then?' Clichéd as this sounds, success is never going to mend something that is broken. You just have to work that out for yourself. And something was a bit broken in me – I think it is with almost everybody who gets on the stage.'

 

Balancing nostalgia, fresh perspectives and introspection, Never begins with family and unconventional upbringings; journeys through the tumultuous and glamorous world of pop; and takes pause for self-reflection. Rick goes beyond the blinding lights of the stage – giving an intimate look at the man behind the hits – and is a portrait of truth, artistic evolution and the astounding power of contentment.

 

My Thoughts

Never: The Autobiography was heartwarming, and I definitely enjoyed reading about his early childhood and his early years in the business.  I was a huge Astley fan as I really loved his voice, and because he was popular before the days of the Internet, I remember trolling through magazines to get more information about him. It was such a different time period in terms of how music reached the world.  Because of this, I never really gave it a thought when I didn't hear about any more of his songs being released or if he was working on a new album.  Again, so different from today when you could just look up to see if he had a podcast, website, etc... to get information.  

 

The memoir was quite well-written and he was quite candid about the difficulty of growing up with both a father and a mother who both suffered from some type of mental illness and the impact that had on his life and affected his overall relationship with both of them.  He talked about the years of therapy it took to work through the effects it had on his life, his decisions, and how he avoided confrontation or how he avoided standing up for himself, especially in terms of his music career.  At the same time, he developed close relationships with his siblings and with Lene, the woman who would eventually become his partner in life, stable relationships that gave him a support system to grow and develop into a more confident and secure individual.  But in order to grow and develop, he had to give up his music career for a while, and this is the part I found the most fascinating.

 

Rick Astley shared the difficulties he had in the music business, how he doesn't really have any regrets with the decisions he made, but at the same time, there is also this lingering sense about what would have been if he had had more control over his own musical career.  There are so many stories out there about careers being destroyed because record companies wouldn't allow an artist to grow and develop and make the music they really wanted to make, not really understanding the talent they had within their hands, and this is probably the case with Rick Astley as well.  He was able to understand that he needed to break free before he lost himself completely, and took a fifteen year break from music, but how many musicians burn out and get lost in that web of exhaustion that Astley explained in this book? How many of these musicians succumbed to alcohol and drugs because of the pressure to go, go, go, all the time? Reading about how he came back was a treat and definitely sent me down a few rabbit holes, listening to music I haven't listened to in quite a while.  The book did drop quite a few names, but it was not pretentious and I loved his reaction when he met Paul McCartney the first time. 

 

Verdict

Never: The Autobiography was fun to read and I definitely added some new Rick Astley songs to my playlist as I was not aware he had put out three new albums the past few years, and they are albums I really, really like. The book was a personal journey through his life and accepting the things you can change, but also the things you can't. It was also about taking hold of what's important in your life and realizing there are times you have to put yourself first, and that's not necessarily a selfish thing to do. It did enable him to return to something he loves and to something he continues to pursue passionately.  Honestly, if you are a fan of 80s music, I would definitely recommend this book.  

 

Review: The Murder at Redmire Hall by J.R. Ellis

The Murder at Redmire Hall (Yorkshire Murder Mysteries, #3)

by J.R. Ellis

Release Date: September 13, 2018

2018 Thomas & Mercer

Ebook Edition; 299 Pages

ISBN: 978-1503904941

ASIN: B07C23S4D4

Audiobook: B07G7FBN41

Genre: Fiction / Mystery

Source: Review copy from publisher

 

2 / 5 Stars

 

Summary

Lord Redmire’s gambling habit has placed him in serious debt. Determined to salvage his fortune by putting Redmire Hall on the map, the aristocrat performs an impossible locked-door illusion on live TV. But as the cameras roll, his spectacular trick goes fatally wrong… Special guest DCI Jim Oldroyd has a front-row seat, but in all his years with the West Riding Police he’s never witnessed anything like this. He sees Redmire disappear―and then reappear, dead, with a knife in his back. As Oldroyd and DS Stephanie Johnson soon discover, nearly everyone at the event had a reason to resent the eccentric lord. But how did the murderer get into the locked room―or out, for that matter? When the only other person who knew the secret behind the illusion is brutally silenced, the case begins to look unsolvable. Because as Oldroyd and Johnson know, it’s not just a question of who did it and why ―but how ?

 

My Thoughts

The Murder at Redmire Hall is the third book in the Yorkshire Murder Mystery series, and while I love a locked-room mystery, this one fell a bit flat for me.  The author obviously loves Agatha Christie, and I am not opposed to a more modern-day tribute to her mysteries, but I also don't think her style always works very well in the modern world.  

 

First of all, I do enjoy Oldroyd as a main character and I have no gripes with his character development. I was happy to see a bit more of Steph in this book and to learn a bit more about her, but realistically speaking, I don't read these books for the character development of the police detectives as I am interested in the murders and the motives behind them. This is where I think an author needs to really push the development. In this case, this book fell flat on its face.  I personally thought the list of suspects was so stereotypical that I was rolling my eyes a lot of the time. Let's take a look shall we? We've got the victim, a lord who is a gambler and about to lose everything. Then there is the covetous brother who thinks everything should have gone to him and is extremely jealous and frankly, annoying. Next, we have the divorced wife who is perfect because she put up with ex-husband's doings over the years and naturally, raised one spoiled child and one perfect child who is set to inherit the estate. And of course, we have the ex-fling who is invited even though the ex-wife is there. What? And then there are the servants. And I am using that word because that's exactly how they were treated in this book.  So, did we time travel to 1920s or are we in the 21st century? I get that this was a bit of a spoof on the characters from Christie's books, and the author did try hard to bring that aspect to this book, but I don't think it worked. You can do an homage to Christie and still have interesting characters. 

 

So. why is this important? Well, in the modern world we have this thing called forensics and actual police procedural work.  You know, when you bring in SOCOs and other personnel to actually investigate and send things to a lab. They would have been tearing everything apart and found a lot of the things that were mentioned in passing, like a safe, for example. But no, we have interview after interview, with little being revealed. And even then, one of the biggest clues got missed.  So, this didn't sit right with me at all. But the plot moved along in its bumbling way and we got the big reveal at the end, ala Hercule Poirot style.  Yup, you got it. Let's bring everyone back to the table, let's reveal things that aren't really necessary because you have a beef against rich people, and when the person is finally revealed, they reveal all their motivations no problem, as if they aren't going to be roasted on a spit in prison for the next 25 years.  Oh, and despite no one figuring out the locked-room mystery for years, naturally Oldroyd figures it out. Of course.

 

Verdict

The Murder at Redmire Hall is a locked-room mystery and definitely an homage to Agatha Christie, but really, that's as far as it should have gone. I did like the concept of the locked-room and I am, and will always be, a fan of locked-room mysteries as I think they are fascinating, probably going back to my Agatha Christie reading days.  I would have liked to have seen some actual police investigation into the murder however, as there was so little it was almost laughable.  The characters were cliched and stereotypical and I almost bowed out when the author had Oldroyd do his big reveal the way he did, but I stuck it out. I will probably read the next book in this series (mostly because the publisher gave me the whole series to review), and while I did enjoy the first two books in this series, I was not a fan of this one.