|
[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
NO CLUE AT THE INN brings back the characters from the popular Pennyfoot Inn series and reunites them for their 13th adventure. It's coming up for Christmas in 1912 when London-based Cecily Sinclair, now married to Hugh Baxter, receives a letter from her cousin Edward. Edward has taken over the running of the coastal Pennyfoot Inn and has turned it into a country club. Unfortunately he has to leave the country on business and the Pennyfoot is rudderless, as a fatal accident has befallen the manager. Edward's request is for Cecily and Baxter to manage the club over Christmas. Baxter is reluctant at first but Cecily wins him over, though she has to promise to keep him informed of any investigational activities, which she is prone to plunging into. Cecily invites all the old staff from the Pennyfoot to come to stay for Christmas and also enjoys catching up with her local friends. She soon discovers that the deceased manager was not well liked and his wife wrings a promise from Cecily for her to look into his death. As well as Cecily's guests, the club is occupied by four important barristers and their wives. Cecily continues to poke around whilst the Christmas activities are planned and she finds a link between the barristers' party and the late manager, but then there's a shocking murder and the police become involved. I don't think it's giving too much away to say that the police are incompetent and that Cecily saves the day; however doing the right thing doesn't come cheap. I really enjoy Kate Kingsbury's Manor House books. However, this is my first Pennyfoot mystery and I felt lost with the many characters, both from the past and the present, which I couldn't keep straight. I couldn't understand the relationship between all the old staff members and the characters of the barristers and their wives were mostly very sketchy. A cast list would have been useful. It is quite slow-moving with the mystery part mostly in the last third of the book. There's a lot of Cecily catching up with friends. I think this book will appeal to faithful readers of the series who know and like the characters and want to find out what happened to them after the series ended in 1999. Finally, I have to comment that there are some geographical errors and that contrary to one of the character's belief, there are no skunks in England.
Reviewed by Karen Meek, December 2003
This book has more than one review. Click here to show all.
[ Top ]
QUICK SEARCH:
Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]
| 
