Another police story starts as Rhys Bowen introduces a new character for her series. The first part is loaded with police procedurals and detective work that is no doubt quite interesting. Mysteries in the book open at a much later stage that reminds us about On Her Majesty’s Frightfully Secret Service and On Her Majesty’s Frightfully Secret Service thus we have to wait with patience before the story finally concludes.
Luckily its Roger Clark’s voice that we hear in the narration of this longish novel and no doubt it is soothing. Roger never allows the audience to get bored at any stage; he lets you enjoy the progress of the story and the strength of the well knit plot. Evan the young constable at the beginning of the novel makes a picture of the local characters in our mind by describing his neighbors who are against one another.
Then there are people like the postman who always reads the letter before delivering it. It seems that the town is loaded with monsters just like a big city. Evans thus had to keep an eye on different affairs but more than this he has a big case in his hands. Two tourists are slaughtered in a big way and no one knows who has done all this and why.
Investigations are held as everyone in this small village can be a suspect because of his or her link with the tourists. Even Mrs. Powell Jones is dragged into the case because of her award winning tomatoes that were destroyed earlier by the same men.
Complications are there in the novel but there is not much thrill because the killer is not killing one after the other so we enjoy the investigation but not the thrill that lacks.