Medium – Audiobook
About the Book – Lady Hardcastle and her maid and best friend, Flo Armstrong, decide to move to the country in order to get some peace and quiet. They move to a beautiful, friendly village near one of Lady Hardcastle’s friends and enjoy about a week of calm. The calm is broken, however, by the discovery of a corpse – the body of a young man in the cricket team found hanging in a tree. Lady Hardcastle and Flo decide to try and solve the murder, but are interrupted by another, unrelated one – the bludgeoning to death of a trumpet player at an engagement party. Lady Hardcastle and Flo must work together to try and catch the murderers, whilst trying to ensure their own safety.
My Rating – 5/5
My Thoughts – One of my favourite genres is ‘cosy crime’, or at least murder mysteries set in a different time. I like something with comedy, female heroes and a murderer who is not easily guessable. So this book ticked all the boxes for me. I loved the characters of Lady Hardcastle (Emily) and Flo – two women who despite class differences are best friends and spend (pretty much) every waking moment together. Emily is kind, funny and has no compunction about including her friend in any social gathering, Flo is wise-cracking, socially aware and an expert martial artist. The book contains enough hints to both of their past lives to make reading the series seem a no-brainer – how did Emily’s husband get murdered? How did Emily and Flo escape from China?
The plot for the book was great, and the actual murder mystery part of the book wasn’t easy to guess. The two murders were different enough that it didn’t seem like the murderer was pushing someone towards one viewpoint or another (serial killer vs. single murder). The author had also managed to capture English country life really well, with all of its intricacies, little niggles about the neighbours and social niceties. I would definitely recommend this book (the audiobook narrator was excellent as well) and will be looking out for the sequels!
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