Tag: historical fiction

When murder hits close to home, Iris must fight to clear her name…

Spring, 1924. Reporter Iris Woodmore plans to move to London to avoid a shocking hometown scandal. Longtime enemy Archie Powell has been threatening to reveal her darkest secret – and she’s
desperate to flee before he does.
But when he’s found murdered after a violent argument with her, there’s no escape. Iris must stay and clear her name even though the truth could ruin her reputation.

With the police closing in, Iris has to find the real killer if she’s to keep her secret. Can she prove her innocence without revealing the identity of the one man who can provide her with an alibi?

A gripping new mystery for fans of Verity Bright, Clara McKenna, and Helena Dixon.

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Thanks for taking the time to stop by my author page. You’ll see all my books are classic murder mysteries – because golden age whodunnits are the stories I enjoy reading most.
I love to create memorable characters and devise intriguing plots with a focus on mystery rather than violence.
I live in Hampshire, England, and it’s the setting for many of my books. My standalone novel, Murder at Merewood Hospital, features Sister Helen Hopgood, the last nurse left in a military hospital in
Hampshire at the end of the First World War.
I also have family connections to Devon, and the fourth Iris Woodmore Mystery, A Killing at Smugglers Cove, is set on the south coast of Devon in 1923. Iris is back in her native Hampshire for A Corpse in Christmas Close, set in Winchester over Christmas 1923, and Murder at Mill Ponds House, which begins on 1st May 1924.
You can read all of my books as standalone novels, even the Iris Woodmore Mysteries, as each is a separate story, although the characters develop as the series progresses.
I hope you enjoy reading or listening to my books.

Facebook: @MichelleSalterWriter
Instagram: @michellesalter_writer. Newsletter Bookbub

My thoughts: Poor Iris, creepy stalker Archie Powell has moved to her home town and hardly anyone seems to understand what a nasty piece of work he is. He keeps up his reign of terror, threatening Iris with a gun and saying he’ll expose her for having an affair with a married man (even though she isn’t).

Then someone shoots him, and Iris is the prime suspect. There are some others too, but Iris needs to clear her name before the police arrest her. Who else hated Archie so much they they’d shoot a man in the back, or is there something else going on?

Luckily Iris has fantastic friends and they all rally round to help her find out who the killer is. By interviewing the residents of the respite home Archie was managing, and the people who worked there perhaps they’ll find something.

As Iris works to solve the case, it becomes apparent that not everyone is telling the truth, and plenty of people’s secrets are going to have to be brought out into the light before the case is solved.

Another excellent case for Iris, though perhaps not one she’ll be recounting in her job as journalist, at least not the parts about her being a suspect or Archie’s threats.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

Jemima Flowerday combines her skills as a dressmaker and sleuth to solve crime in the crumbling stately homes of 1920s Britain.

December 1922, and society dressmaker Jemima Flowerday receives a letter from Lady Hamlash of Merry Beggars Hall, requesting three new gowns for the Christmas season. Lady Hamlash does not travel, so Jemima will need to visit the Hall in deepest Suffolk to work in situ.

The commission appeals to Jemima for more than one reason. It will bring her some much-needed income. More interestingly, the remote manor house was the scene of a grisly murder earlier that year, when Lady Hamlash, inspecting her plants in the walled garden, found a man’s severed head beneath a terracotta asparagus cloche. The murder was never solved.

Jemima, addicted to mystery novels and with a proud history of solving crimes in her own world, is sure she can crack the case. That ambition becomes a little more complicated when, within hours of her arrival at Merry Beggars Hall, the household cook dies in front of her…

Kay Blythe, who also writes as Natalie Meg Evans, is an award-winning historical author on both sides of the Atlantic, having reached the New York Times top 100 list with her debut novel, The Dress Thief. Writing crime as Kay Blythe fulfils a long-held ambition.

My thoughts: Jemima has a sharp mind and is keen to dig into the strange discovery of the butler’s brother’s head under the asparagus cloche. For starters, where’s the rest of him and how did his head come to be in Suffolk when he lived and worked in London?

There’s definitely something a bit strange going on at Lady Hamlash’s house, and even more so when the temperamental French chef drops dead in front of Jemima. Was she murdered or is there more to it than just someone hating the woman? And who could hate her enough to kill?

Digging into the events, and utilising her ability to move between the classes as a guest but also a dressmaker, someone who isn’t entirely a servant but also due to her connections (her in-laws are titled) welcome among the family, she is perfectly situated to ask questions and look into things.

She is however at risk herself after drawing the attention of the killer, but working in tandem with the police, who she hands the evidence she’s found over to, and another interested party, can Jemima solve the case and stay one step ahead of a desperate murderer and solve both the body-less head and the chef’s death?

Clever, enjoyable, and with a fiendish explanation to the events that’s far more complex than it might first seem, this is a cracking piece of historical crime fiction.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

Agatha Christie is about to embark on a new, gripping murder case. But this time, she’s not the author – she’s a suspect…

1926 – Christie is a darling of the literary circuit and the most desired guest in London’s glittering social scene. She can often be found at meetings of the Detection Club – where mystery writers
come together to share ideas, swap secrets and drink copiously. But then a fellow author’s initiation ceremony takes a gruesome turn, and one of the group ends up dead. Now, Agatha is no longer just
the creator of great mystery plots – she’s a player in one.

And when Agatha disappears the day after the murder, she’s widely assumed to be guilty. Only Eliza Baker, assistant to the Club’s enigmatic secretary, Dorothy Sayers, is interested in investigating the case. But in a world where murder is the ultimate plot device, can Eliza piece together the evidence and find the killer before it’s too late?

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Kelly Oliver is the award-winning, bestselling author of three mysteries series: The Jessica James Mysteries, The Pet Detective Mysteries, and the historical cozies The Fiona Figg Mysteries, set in
WW1. She is also the Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University and lives in Nashville, Tennessee. She is bringing new titles in the Fiona Figg series to Boldwood, the first of
which, Chaos in Carnegie Hall, will be published in November 2022.

Facebook: @KellyOliverAuthor
Twitter: @KellyOliverBook
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My thoughts: Blending fact and fiction, this is a fun historical crime caper. Agatha Christie was indeed a member of the Detection Club, a group of the top crime writers of the era, and she did disappear for a while in 1926, turning up in Harrogate with apparent temporary amnesia. This is usually attributed to the fact that her husband had asked for a divorce so he could marry his secretary. Agatha never revealed anything about this episode and after some time refused to discuss it at all.

But here an alternative theory is proposed, following the murder of a fellow crime writer, one of which she is accused of doing, she flees in fear. Although shooting someone in the dark isn’t very Christie – a former pharmacist she knew her poisons very well and many of her books feature death by deadly dose.

Luckily for her, Dorothy Sayers, the club’s secretary is on the case (Sayers and Arthur Conan Doyle did really look for her when she went missing) and so is her assistant Eliza Baker (sadly, fictional), who has some experience in these matters after working at Scotland Yard during the war.

I really liked Eliza, she was smart, resourceful and a lot more intuitive than the police, solving both the murder and Mrs Christie’s disappearance with apparent ease and playing a lot of chess along the way. I hope this is the start of a cracking series featuring the Detection Club and Eliza, who is a better detective than the creators of some of the most famous. She also has a faithful canine companion, and as you probably know by now, an animal detective is always a bonus in my book.

And don’t worry about Agatha, as well as being one of the most successful writers of all time, she also found love again with archaeologist Max Mallowen, and even went on digs with him, which inspired some of her more far flung books like Death on the Nile. Yes, I am a huge fan and a total nerd, why thank you.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.