Dark Nantucket Noon

Homer Kelly #2

by Jane Langton

Poet Katharine "Kitty" Clark came to Nantucket to watch the eclipse, and ended up kneeling on the beach at the base of the Maria Mitchell Observatory, next to the body of Helen Green. Kitty's knife was found buried in the sand nearby. Accused by a bystander of having killed Helen, Kitty replies "No. It was the moon, you see. The moon did it." Then Homer Kelly shows up at the jail where she is being held, and tells her he is her attorney. Homer's approach is unorthodox, but maybe that's for the best.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Audiobook, Adult Fiction

304 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Langton was born in Boston, Massachusetts. She studied astronomy at Wellesley College and the University of Michigan, receiving a bachelor's degree in 1944. She received an M.A. in art history from the University of Michigan in 1945, and another M.A. from Radcliffe College in 1948. She studied at the Boston Museum School from 1958 to 1959.

In 1961 Langton wrote and illustrated her first book for children, The Majesty of Grace, a story about a young girl during the Depression who is certain she will some day be Queen of England. Langton has since written a children's series, The Hall Family Chronicles, and the Homer Kelly murder mystery novels. She has also written several stand-alone novels and picture books.

Langton's novel The Fledgling is a Newbery Honor book. Her novel Emily Dickinson is Dead was nominated for an Edgar Award and received a Nero Award. The Face on the Wall was an editors' choice selection by The Drood Review of Mystery for 1998.

Langton lives in Lincoln, Massachusetts, near the town of Concord, the setting of many of her novels. Her husband, Bill, died in 1997. Langton has three adult sons: Chris, David and Andy.

Series:
* Hall Family
* Homer Kelly Mystery

Reviews

[Leslie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

During the few minutes of darkness during a total eclipse of the sun, a young woman is murdered on Nantucket Island. Discovered standing over her is the poet & college professor Kitty Clark, spurned lover of the dead woman's husband. Will Homer Kelly be able to convince a jury of Kitty's innocence?

Probably this mystery only deserves 3* but being from Massachusetts, I loved all the details and the line drawings about Nantucket in the book.

[Tomi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Terrible - the author couldn’t decide whether to write another Moby Dick or a mystery…and failed at both.

[alexander burrus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nero award winner

I was happy with the flotilla of potential culprits at the beginning but unhappy with Kitty's happy demeanor leading up to a trial facing life imprisonment and having a happy go lucky time as it lost realism points there. It was cool to see hand drawn pictures by the author it brought warmth to my reading adventure. The premise had to much drivel for me at the heat of the story but I am more than willing to read the author's other works as I feel the promise for a story that is right up my alley.

[Eugene · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m enjoying working my way back through the Homer Kelly mysteries. This second offering has a great setting on Nantucket, and even if the “damsel in distress” (Kitty Clark) is waay too much of an ethereal airhead for my liking and the romantic embellishments unsatisfactory, Ms. Langton overcomes all with a really strong story nicely wrapped up with a climactic finish, and a plethora of lovely pen & ink drawings throughout the pages.
We’ll be back for more.

[V. Briceland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Are there many mystery writers as good at word crafting as Jane Langton? The first two chapters of the second Homer Kelly mystery, Dark Nantucket Noon, are as dark and rapturous a portrait of romantic solipsism as anything from Shirley Jackson. When Langton rhapsodizes over her much-beloved New England landscapes and wildlife, whether Nantucket's shores and hidden forests, or wounded swans trying to fly, her prose elevates her material beyond genre.

I feel there's a wide-open plot hole in this particular volume, however, in which a poetess is accused of murder simply because she discovers a body bleeding from the chest, and because she happens to have a knife in her purse. Weapon forensics have been around for centuries, and I'm pretty sure even in the mid-nineteen-seventies the Nantucket Police Department would have had the capability of distinguishing a narrow slit made up close by a small and ladylike knife versus, say, the gaping chest wound made by a spear gun shot at high velocity from a distance. But nope. No one remarks on discrepancy. The poetess was in possession of something pointy, and I guess that's good enough for the Massachusetts Attorney General for the purposes of this story.

It's something that nagged at me throughout the entire story, but honestly, I don't much care. The story's still exciting, Homer Kelly is still charming and amusing, and Langton knows how to write.

[Jazz · Rating 4 out of 5]

This mystery was a must-read before the Total Eclipse occurs across the U.S. on August 21. I finished just in time. A murder occurs during the eclipse's totality on a beach outside a lighthouse on Nantucket Island, where a number of people have gathered to best view the eclipse. When the moon reveals the sun once again, poet Kitty Clark is discovered with a bloody knife and standing over the dead body of a woman who had married her ex-lover. Kitty is arrested, but former policeman turned professor, Homer Kelly, does not believe she's guilty. What did happen when the earth went dark and who killed environmentalist Helen Green? Much of the book is taken up with descriptions of the fauna and flora of Nantucket, so unless you like nature writing as I do, you may be put off somewhat by the writing. The background on whaling and Kelly's research on Herman Melville adds flavor to the novel also. But the mystery is intriguing enough to wade through it, even if the descriptive writing slows the narrative a bit. It's never boring and the solution to the mystery is well worth reading. As always Jane Langton's drawings add charm and a sense of place to the book.

[Alonzo Church · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heroine is a poet with a broken heart and a skewed vision of reality. She wants to see the solar eclipse on Nantucket but is afraid she will bump into the soulmate who married someone else. She’s a sweet person but she carries a knife in her purse. Naturally, a bizarre collision of events wreck her life and leave her accused of murdering her soulmate’s wife on the beach in front of a lighthouse in the midst of a a Dark Nantucket Noon. Fortunately, a somewhat daft detective teams up with a cast of Nantucket characters who love our heroine. Is a Hallmark style happy ending inevitable?

This is a good cozy. It presents a unique, slightly dizzy universe populated with slightly off center people. Cozies often lack menace (which I think a mystery must have), but this one has an awareness of dark places. Heck, the land scheme at the center of this would have worked in a John D. McDonald opus. The sparkly twinkle of some of the characters feels real. The cute animals are not crime solvers (though a swan is heavily involved in the plot).

Since the first one in the series was a DNF for me, I was pleasantly surprised by this.

[Tom Godfrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd never heard of the author but the short precis seemed interesting so I read the book. What we have here is an ex-police inspector named Homer Kelly now working privately on occasion, plus he is developing a book on Herman Melville! Kitty Clark, a recognized poet, has come to Nantucket to observe an eclipse of the moon, though she is somewhat distracted because her ex-boyfriend, now married, lives on the island. She is drawn to a local lighthouse, where the ex, the wife, and two other people are at the top. Just as Kitty reaches the site in total darkness due to the eclipse, she hears a noise. The noise turns out to be the wife hitting the ground, bleeding. Kitty tries to help, thereby getting blood all over herself. Oddly, Kitty has a knife, and she is the only suspect. Of course, in the end it all comes out right, the former lovers are reunited, and the real murderer is discovered. What really drives the book is the nature of the relationship between Homer and Kitty, literary as it is, and the description on life on Nantucket. This really is old-school New England, where families have lived in the same place for hundreds of years, whose history formed the backbone of what became America, and where the nascent country's place in literary history was born. Truly, I have never read any mystery like this, and it probably isn't for everyone, but hardly a sentence goes by with it making you stop and consider what you just read.

[Ronald Wilcox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kitty, a poet, comes to Nantucket Island to witness a rare total eclipse. She goes to a part of the island where a lighthouse stands and finds a group of people who have gone to the top of the lighthouse to see the eclipse. A woman comes down to greet her and the eclipse occurs. When she can see again, the woman is at her feet and she has blood on her and she insists it is the moon that murdered her. The dead woman? The wife of a previous love of Kitty! Homer Kelly is asked via a note to help defend her when she is arrested for murder. The plot centers around the environment of the island so it adds to the suspense although the solution to the mystery is a little far fetched. Still a very enjoyable read.

[Paul Pferdner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked this book. The interesting background of Nantucket Island and the fight for and against conservation, plus the total solar eclipse that is the beginning and ending of so much. All the characters are full of vivid life, they are themselves and not people you have ever met before. This author has a unique and effective voice, one that makes reading this book a pleasure.

I will be looking for her other books, the others in this series as well as any others she has written. Highly recommended.

[Sandy Wallace · Rating 3 out of 5]

Darkness at Noon

This cozy mystery set in one of my favorite places has an intriguing plot which deftly captures the feelings of the Nantucket residents for their island and their lives on it. Unfortunately, the author’s rapturously poetic descriptions of the island’s landscapes sometimes get in the way of moving the plot forward. The characters are interesting, but often seem to take second place to the author’s determination to describe every feature in every location traveled on the island. Good story if you can get past the purple prose.

[Terri London Mabel · Rating 4 out of 5]

52 Books, 2023 Edition: a book about secrets

More similar to the rest of the series than #1 was. Same blustery, lumbering, lovable Homer; same wonderful drawings; same charming sense of place. Just lacked some Mary.

Original setting for a murder (eclipse) and I liked the resolution and who did it etc.

Audio: Not sure why they got a British narrator, but his American accent is very good.

[R. Ware · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoy the personality of Homer Kelly, former
Middlesex County policeman, now literature graduate student.
Also the portrayal of the culture of the island, and the
attitude toward mainlanders. The book is extra
fun if you've lived in New England.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked this second book in series much better than first. Like Homer and Mary together as a couple, and the setting and major suspected character are interesting. Will probably will not pursue the series.

[Maureen Doyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Langton at her best

How do you find the murderer of a woman stabbed during a full eclipse? Langton mixes a wonderful island, scallop fishers, a bit of MOBY DICK, and a maiden in distress and find a good read.

[Phillip Mclaughlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

the Homer Kelly series is just perfect

As a second book I could not stop reading. These people were my neighbors in Maine and Massachusetts.
Murder at an eclipse on Nantucket and the deep roots that connect the small group of people.
Highly recommend

[Dogsandbooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not bad after a slow start (and too much poetry). A twisty but believable solution, a detective worth further investigation. DPL e book via Freading.

[Pythia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Insolito giallo d'annata, tutto sommato divertente anche se i palati più fini potrebbero non gradirlo. Peccato per la pessima traduzione.

[Leslie Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

The mystery was fine, of course. But it was the language that lifted it up.

[BookSweetie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sometimes humorous mystery (published in 1981) set in Nantucket # 2 in author Jane Langton’s Homer Kelly series.

[Sally Trabulsi · Rating 5 out of 5]

An oldie but goodie. Great story, even though writing was a little tedious at times.

[Rae · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wounded swan named Jupiter. Conservation. Herman Melville. Solar eclipse. Intriguing murder.

[Linda Taddeo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful language and descriptions. Those are absolutely first-rate. Character behavior and dialogue is not as good, unfortunately.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I almost didn't keep going after the first chapter, but I was very glad I persevered. Homer Kelly alone is worth the read.

[Regine]

Poetically atmospheric.

[Kesla]

Dnf

[Gaye · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the second in the series (because I couldn’t find the first). Perhaps, if I had read the first one first, it wouldn’t be so confusing.

[martha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ha, what to say. Really mean 3.5. Fun characters and loved the author’s illustrations. Random.

[Jack Heath]

Synopsis: poet Kitty Clark came to Nantucket to watch the eclipse, but finds herself kneeling on the beach next to the body of Helen Green.

[Wendy Kendall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dark Nantucket Noon
By Jane Langton

Katherine, or Kitty as everyone calls her, returns to the island of Nantucket especially to view a spectacular, noon eclipse of the sun. She flies from her Boston home, time away from teaching, to experience nature’s show in the only place where the entire total eclipse will be visible. She’s certain she won’t run into her passionate love, Joe Green, or his wife while she’s there.

Kitty runs far out along the beach, and ends up viewing the dramatic event by a lighthouse on a seemingly deserted spit on Nantucket Sound. When the daylight returns, the most beautiful woman on the island, Joe’s wife, lies dead in a pool of blood at Kitty’s feet. Joe and others who were viewing the eclipse from inside the lighthouse run out onto the murder scene.

Homer Kelly, salt of the earth homicide detective turned Harvard professor, and occasional amateur sleuth, turns up at the jail believing in Kitty’s innocence. This mystery novel is one of a series featuring Homer Kelly. During his murder investigation, and defense of this capricious, creative, poet and teacher, Kelly learns a lot about the people living on the island. He discovers a passion to preserve the precious environment, and also a competing hunger to draw more people and development.

This author treats us to a very detailed picture of this special place on earth. Jane Langton is now 93 years old living in Lincoln, Massachusetts. She was born and raised in Boston. Her passion for Nantucket shines through in her writing, and also in her wonderful line drawings that are scattered throughout the book. Langton said she also used her drawing skills to help with the writing itself. “Drawing comes in handy in moments of desperation when a plot refuses to get itself organized,” she said. So early on, she started using a writing technique she calls Plotting with Charts: “I make tiny drawings on Post-it notes and stick them on a long piece of shelf paper. Then, because the glue on the back is forgiving, I can move the episodes around, trying them in different combinations.”

Besides her mystery series, she’s written about a dozen delightful children’s books. Then, in 1970 she witnessed a solar eclipse in Nantucket, and decided to combine the event with her astronomy studies at Wellesley College in this Homer Kelly novel which came out in 1975. No wonder her description of the eclipse and its impacts are so fascinating. If you like discovering beautiful natural environments and animals, if you like meeting interesting characters and suspects, and certainly if you like solving an intriguing cozy mystery that masterfully unfolds, then you’ll want to read a Dark Nantucket Noon.