Friend or Faux

Lady Margaret Priam Mystery #5

by Joyce Christmas

Since Manhattan's summer season is ever so dull, what else can Lady Margaret do but heed her brother's desperate fax and return to the family castle--especially since one of his guests has been murdered? With her own instinctive powers of reason called into play, Lady Margaret even outsmarts Scotland Yard. Original.

197 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published September 23, 1991

About the author

Joyce Christmas is the author of 11 mysteries published by Fawcett Gold Medal, eight featuring expatriate Brit in Manhattan, Lady Margaret Priam. A ninth Lady Margaret book, Going Out in Style, is scheduled for summer 1998. Her second series stars retired office manager, Betty Trenka, a senior sleuth who's facing the problems of aging, and finding a new life for herself. The most recent, Downsized to Death, was published in November, 1997, for a total of three in the series so far.

Reviews

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lady Margaret Priam fears her relationship with New York detective Sam De Vere has ended, so she takes the opportunity to visit her brother the Earl in England, where he's having some problems with a film crew renting his estate, a visiting former Maharajah and his entourage, and a young woman who thinks she'd make a wonderful countess. By the time Margaret arrives, one of the guests is dead, and by the time De Vere arrives, looking for her, there's a second body. Margaret works out a solution to the crime that's clearly correct--except the murderer is not the person she thought. But fate takes a turn--or is it the Priam ghosts?

[Eugene · Rating 3 out of 5]

The series continues good enough. Here Lady Priam returns to her ancestral home in Britian, where he brother has begged her to come help him manage the estate and the perilous affairs thereof - but no sooner does Margaret arrive than the perils include murder!
Priam’s Priory is host to old family friend the Maharajah of Tharpur, visiting from India, who has brought his enormous retinue and both his wives - the official and the un-official versions. Naturally some tensions are seen, and Margaret’s brother David has invited a Hollywood film crew to use the grounds of the estate for a movie, so things seem like quickly come to a head. When Margaret arrives so too has Scotland Yard, as the body of the official wife has been discovered stabbed to death. We are off!
Like much of the series, the “mystery” and explication thereof resides largely in Lady Priam’s mind as she analyses the events she sees and makes her private deductions. This is fine, as these books are a welcome change of pace from the usual fare, and Margaret and her milieu are just rare enough to keep us intrigued by their doings.

[Ashlyn]

Did not finish (uninterested)