Tag: mystery

3.5 star, Uncategorized

Review: A Game of Fear by Charles Todd

Fives @ Down The Rabbit Hole

Inspector Ian Rutledge #24

In this newest installment of the acclaimed New York Times bestselling series, Scotland Yard’s Ian Rutledge is faced with his most perplexing case yet: a murder with no body, and a killer who can only be a ghost.

Spring, 1921. Scotland Yard sends Inspector Ian Rutledge to the sea-battered village of Walmer on the coast of Essex, where amongst the salt flats and a military airfield lies Benton Abbey, a grand manor with a storied past. The lady of the house may prove his most bewildering witness yet. She claims she saw a violent murder—but there is no body, no blood. She also insists she recognized the killer: Captain Nelson. Only it could not have been Nelson because he died during the war.

Everyone in the village believes that Lady Benton’s losses have turned her mind—she is, after all, a grieving widow and mother—but the woman Rutledge interviews is rational and self-possessed. And then there is Captain Nelson: what really happened to him in the war? The more Rutledge delves into this baffling case, the more suspicious tragedies he uncovers. The Abbey and the airfield hold their secrets tightly. Until Rutledge arrives, and a new trail of death follows… 

This was my first time (randomly) picking a book from this series to read. I actually didn’t realize it was part of a series, but like many other long series, they can be read as standalones too (I think). I think I said I would pick less books up randomly, but luckily this one did not come back to bite me.

A Game of Fear revolves around our protagonist Inspector, Ian Rutledge, who investigates an interesting murder… a murder with no body. Or really any evidence at all, for that matter. Set in 1921 in the small village of Walmer, we get a historical into the look of what happened to the town during and after war, and how that all may be culminating into the current mystery. Is there really a ghost in Walmer?

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4.5 star

Review: The Red Palace by June Hur

Fives @ Down The Rabbit Hole

Joseon (Korea), 1758. There are few options available to illegitimate daughters in the capital city, but through hard work and study, eighteen-year-old Hyeon has earned a position as a palace nurse. All she wants is to keep her head down, do a good job, and perhaps finally win her estranged father’s approval.

But Hyeon is suddenly thrust into the dark and dangerous world of court politics when someone murders four women in a single night, and the prime suspect is Hyeon’s closest friend and mentor. Determined to prove her beloved teacher’s innocence, Hyeon launches her own secret investigation.

In her hunt for the truth, she encounters Eojin, a young police inspector also searching for the killer. When evidence begins to point to the Crown Prince himself as the murderer, Hyeon and Eojin must work together to search the darkest corners of the palace to uncover the deadly secrets behind the bloodshed.

June Hur, critically acclaimed author of The Silence of Bones and The Forest of Stolen Girls, returns with The Red Palace—a third evocative, atmospheric historical mystery perfect for fans of Courtney Summers and Kerri Maniscalco.

This was one of my anticipated reads back in January and I finally got around to it. And boy am I glad I did! I was expecting a general historical fiction story, not realizing it was doubling up as a mystery novel. Needless to say, that is an instant win in my book, and I certainly enjoyed this one.

The Red Palace takes place in eighteenth-century Korea. Our protagonist, Hyeon, a lowly bastard daughter of a noble, who has worked her way to enter the palace as a nurse. When one day she is forcibly put into the middle of court drama and becomes entangled in an investigation, how will she leverage her position of (non-)power? Or will she be silenced for her crimes should the King find out?

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4 star

Review: The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley

Fives @ Down The Rabbit Hole

Everyone’s invited…everyone’s a suspect…

For fans of Ruth Ware and Tana French, a shivery, atmospheric, page-turning novel of psychological suspense in the tradition of Agatha Christie, in which a group of old college friends are snowed in at a hunting lodge . . . and murder and mayhem ensue.

All of them are friends. One of them is a killer.

During the languid days of the Christmas break, a group of thirtysomething friends from Oxford meet to welcome in the New Year together, a tradition they began as students ten years ago. For this vacation, they’ve chosen an idyllic and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands—the perfect place to get away and unwind by themselves.

They arrive on December 30th, just before a historic blizzard seals the lodge off from the outside world.

Two days later, on New Year’s Day, one of them is dead.

The trip began innocently enough: admiring the stunning if foreboding scenery, champagne in front of a crackling fire, and reminiscences about the past. But after a decade, the weight of secret resentments has grown too heavy for the group’s tenuous nostalgia to bear. Amid the boisterous revelry of New Year’s Eve, the cord holding them together snaps.

Now one of them is dead . . . and another of them did it.

Keep your friends close, the old adage goes. But just how close is too close?

I loved the last Lucy Foley so much, I simply had to see what this other one was about. Unfortunately it really fell short of my expectations. It was still pretty good, and I did enjoy it overall, but I feel like it didn’t quite have the same impact on me as The Guest List did. But it’s also one of those weird situations where I’m not sure if I objectively feel like its worse, or if it’s just in comparison.

The Hunting Party is a story of old friends who went to Oxford together, gathering for their yearly New Years trip. This time they have chosen a idyllic estate in the Scottish Highlands, which is all but great until they get (predictably) snowed in by a large blizzard. In total isolation, tensions mount and old grudges surface. We find out a body has also been found and it doesn’t look like an accident. With only so many suspects, just who was it who was responsible?

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