Katharine Schellman, Murder at Midnight

A murder mystery set at an English house-party. I found this a little patchy, to be honest. It was the fourth in a series, which may have added some confusion, as some of the characters obviously had background that I didn't know about - but some authors can handle this sort of problem neatly so that the reader doesn't feel at sea, and this wasn't really the case here.

Then there was a continual switching of point of view, mostly between the main character, Lily, but also with a younger woman, Amelia. This wasn't signalled in the audiobook, so I don't know if the print copy headed chapters, for instance, with whose experience we were following, but I had to go back and check. Also Amelia alternated between being pathetic and gutsier, rather at random and, I felt, more at the author's convenience than actual consistency of character. A couple of Americanisms crept in too. And finally, I felt the denouement was a bit rushed - up till then, the writing could have used a bit of editorial pruning, but suddenly we were whizzed pell-mell to a conclusion! I was still picking up my metaphorical skirts, and it was all over.

All of that being said, it was a pleasant listen - the narrator, Henrietta Meire, did a nice enough job, if a little lacking in distinguishable voices, and the plot had enough red herrings to keep the listener guessing. I might go back to some of the earlier ones to follow Lily's adventures.

Thank you to both NetGalley and Dreamscape for a review copy of the audiobook.