Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Two middle-age women, one a dour divorcée, the other a promiscuous New Age flake, are neighbors in the coastal English village of Fethering; they become, improbably, friends and, even more improbably, sometime sleuths. Such was the orginal premise for Brett's Fethering series. It sounds contrived, but with the talented Brett, the character clash and the amazingly high homicide rate for a tiny village come across as both brilliant and perfectly reasonable. The secret is in Brett's range. He moves effortlessly from sharp, pitiless physical description (e.g., a fiftyish woman who looks like Marilyn Monroe gone to seed) to flashes of compassionate insight (one of the sleuths, Carole Seddon, fears becoming a lone woman huddled in a shelter at the beach). Brett always spikes his plots with acerbic social commentary his depiction of a Christmas Eve drinks party is as comically merciless an examination of characters' pretensions as any Restoration comedy. In the latest Fethering, Seddon's much looser friend, identified only as Jude, drags Carole into celebrating Christmas, starting with searching for the perfect gift at a trendy village shop and attending Jude's Christmas party, which the shop owner and her music-producer husband also attend. A few days later the shop burns to the ground, and the body of this couple's stepdaughter is discovered within. Jude and Carole kick into investigative mode, and the plot kicks up, providing more secrets and greater danger for the intrepid pair. Intricate fun.--Fletcher, Connie Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
A murder provides series heroine Carole Seddon a welcome distraction from Christmas, a holiday she's tried to ignore for years, in Brett's delightful 11th cozy set in the English seaside village of Fethering (after 2009's The Poisoning in the Pub). A few days after Carole and best friend Jude do some shopping at Gallimaufry, "the kind of Aladdin's Cave where anything might be discovered," the store burns down. In the ruins firemen discover a woman's charred body. The police later learn that a single bullet, not fire, killed the victim, Polly Le Bonnier, the attractive stepdaughter of Gallimaufry's owner. Once again, Carole and Jude turn sleuths to find out whodunit, with assistance from a cast of credible supporting characters, including Carole's lovable dog, Gulliver. Brett keeps the reader guessing until the surprising conclusion. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In Brett's 11th Fethering mystery featuring amateur sleuth Carole Seddon (after The Poisoning in the Pub), Christmastime means nothing more than a big bah, humbug! for Carole until a corpse is found inside the shell of a burned-down local store. She's on the case, surrounded by suspicious characters. For series fans. [See Prepub Mystery, LJ 6/1/10.] (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.
