It's Murder, On a Galapagos Cruise

Miss Riddell #9

by P.C. James

A trip of a lifetime turns deadly when a sleuth uncovers a body. Can she follow the clues to their bloody end before she meets a watery grave?

1988, Ecuador. Seasoned puzzle-solver Pauline Riddell believes in justice. Even on a cruise to the Galapagos Islands with her grieving sister, her keen eye for what’s right and wrong keeps her vigilant. So when a stroll along the deck leads to the discovery of a dead crew member, the middle-aged woman stands her ground and claims foul play.

With the ship’s brand new company desperate to avoid scandal, she agrees to work with a brash young detective to quietly crack the case. But with rumors of a vicious guerrilla group on board and Miss Riddell suspicious of the victim’s real identity, solving this riddle might be the last thing she does.

Can this whip-smart amateur investigator catch a killer without falling to her own untimely end?

It's Murder on a Galapagos Cruise is the thrilling ninth tale in the Miss Riddell Cozy Mysteries series. If you like brilliant heroines, curious crimes, and maritime mayhem, then you’ll love P.C. James’s thought-provoking story.

Genres: Fiction, Cozy Mystery

214 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 13, 2021

Reviews

[Jodi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pauline is at it again, detecting/investigating. She is not a pleasant person as proclaimed in the narrative itself as always aloof and distant. Now add in the middle-aged ‘man’ syndrome and she is hard to root for. She is not only insensitive to her recently widowed sister (who is a good sport and forgives her) she also is a scold “What do you think they are?” Freda said. “If you’d been listening to the guide,” Pauline said, “you’d know there are coffee plantations farther up the hillside.” Later, after an exchange with her Freda, she pinches her. A middle-aged woman pinching her sister---that’s awful.

As with the first book, this reviewer felt the author was cheating by giving information to the investigators and revealing it and the fact said information was sought, later in the text and that the intended audience is difficult to gauge. The language and behaviors (Pauline tediously telling us she isn’t going to do anymore detecting and a sentence later is at it again and the wishy-washy behavior between was it an accident or a murder) seem juvenile yet the theme of the murder is quite adult. We discover the murder victim, via mostly from the information from the police department via the PR agent for the cruise line, is not a good person. Despite learning lessons in the first book not to jump to conclusions and accuse people, Pauline is right back at it. We know from her mentor that investigators fail often until they get it right, but she does not conjure any sympathy when she gets it wrong. She does later tell us that she has an inkling of who is guilty, “but I prefer to let them stay thoughts for now. Suspicion is a dangerous emotion once it’s loose.”

Amidst her vacillating between continuing her investigating work, there does emerge some wisdom. Early in the book she categorically states, “For me, the law must be adhered to.” Then decides she is not wiling to do it anymore and worried that she will not adhere to said laws. Pauline reflected that “Helping people to get justice had been her passion and her whole reason to be. And now it was gone. Murdered by her betrayal of her own principles. What right did she have to hold others to laws that she was prepared to flout when the occasion arose?” She wisely proclaims “Once you start down that path, it becomes simply vigilantism.” In the final pages of the book, she does overcome this crisis and claims that she will continue her work.

The best insight and funny comment of the book was in discussing the British belief that tea solves all problems: “Yes, history. It may sound a grand theory born out of a humble cuppa but our empire was created by coffee drinkers in the 1700s and ended with tea drinkers in the 1900s. Coffee makes people aggressive and energetic. Tea makes people calm and restful. You can’t build or keep an empire by being calm and restful.”

[Mara Blake-ward · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you love cozy mysteries......

I thoroughly enjoyed "Murder on a Galapagos cruise" the second in the Miss Riddell series. Miss Riddell is on a cruise with her sister but that isn't going to stop her from investigating what everyone wants to believe is an accident.

[Angela · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 Stars

It's Murder, On a Galapagos Cruise is the ninth book in the Miss Riddell’s Cozy Mystery Adventures series by P.C. James.
Miss Riddell’s Cozy Mystery Adventures is a ten-book boxset that follows amateur sleuth, Pauline Riddell on many adventures. The series spans about 35 years, and several countries, making for an interesting read.
With plenty of (historical) cozy mysteries, crime & investigation, intrigue, interesting characters, and dramatic developments- Miss Riddell is kept very busy, and takes us along for the ride.
The Series Contains:
-In the Beginning, There Was a Murder (Book #1)
-Then There Were… Two Murders? (Book #2)
-The Past Never Dies (Book #3)
-A Murder For Christmas (Book #4)
-Miss Riddell and the Heiress (Book #5)
-Miss Riddell and the Pet Thefts (Book #5.5)
-Miss Riddell’s Paranormal Mystery (Book #6)
-The Girl in the Gazebo (Book #7)
-The Dead of Winter (Book #8)
-It’s Murder, On a Galapagos Cruise (Book #9)

Happy Reading…

Thank you, P.C. James!

[Belinda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I gave this book three stars because I did not like Pauline-the main character. I can't imagine going on a "trip of a lifetime" to the Galapagos Islands and not being impressed. I would also like to have read more about the sights on the islands but when the main character isn't impressed, you aren't going to read much about it either. That was my complaint with the book. The mystery was good enough but a little forced. I have already purchased another book in this series so I'm hoping I like that one a lot better. The reason for the rating - which I usually do not give three stars - is because I was so disappointed in the lack of description and information about the Galapagos Islands. Your experience with this book may be different.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was my first reading of P.C. James from the series featuring Miss Riddell. The lady detective and her sister were heading for Galapagos Islands for a needed vacation and landed with a travel group that were not entirely friendly as one of them was murdered early on. Since the one lady sister was known for her detective work, the captain asked for her help in solving the murder of a man on the cruise.
It was pretty old fashioned in social interactions and dialogue and did not appeal to me overall. I stuck with it to the end, however. Murder solved.

KINDLE UNLIMITED

[S.L. Harpel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing Read! These just get better and better!

I love Miss Riddell! Agatha Christie books were always a fav of mine and Miss Marple was top of the list! These are very similar and brings back all those memories and feel goods!

It’s a perfect cozy mystery with just enough intrigue to keep me guessing! Nothing better than a murder mystery at sea!

This is a must read! I can’t wait to grab the next one!

[Miriam Verbeek · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely cosy read!

I enjoyed this book. It was a comfortable read, somewhat in the style of The First Lady detective books weaving in landscapes and personalities with the pull of a mystery. I did laugh at miss riddle’s glazed eyes for nature - a sharp contrast to her eye for details of the crime.

[Maria do Socorro Baptista · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mais uma narrativa de detetives, esta me fez lembrar Agatha Christie e o livro O Assassinato no Expresso do Oriente, a diferença é que, em vez de trem, o evento se passa em um navio, durante um cruzeiro. Claro que há outras enormes diferenças, mas não pude deixar de me lembrar. Gostei bastante, e acho que a protagonista tomou a decisão certa no final.

[A. Cheney · Rating 5 out of 5]

One heck of a female detective

It's so nice to see Ms. Riddell back with so much more spice in her experience and attitude toward her investigation career.

[Jonathan Colan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a well-written book. I would have stopped reading it if not for the fact that I’d just come back from an almost identical cruise.

[Nicki Elson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I keep going back and forth between 2 and 3 stars. I don't read a lot of cozy mysteries, so maybe this book is okay for that, but the mystery portion just seemed like a lot of question-asking and then jumping to theories/conclusions based on very little.

But I came to this book for the Galapagos, not the mystery. Descriptions of a few excursions were nice, and I liked seeing even the grumpy Miss Riddle get won over—somewhat—by some of its charms near the end, but the book really only delivers crumbs of the Galapagos itself. And I was distracted by inaccuracies. For example, Puerto Ayora is NOT and never has been the capital of the Galapagos. Puerto Baquerizo Moreno has been the capital since the Galapagos officially became a province of Ecuador in 1973. Also, she sees "seals" on a bench in Puerto Ayora, when they are, in fact, sea lions (the only "seals" in the Galapagos are fur seals in a few very remote areas, and even these are not actual seals but in the sea lion family. Either way, she wouldn't see a seal in town). In addition, descriptions of the ship are much more in line with regular cruises, not Galapagos cruises, which are an entirely different animal.

This was an easy read and I never considered not finishing, so maybe 3 stars? Yet, I can't say I'll be recommending it to anyone or will ever consider reading it again, so...2 stars?? But the cover's cute, and I don't mind having it my Kindle library, so...3, I guess???