Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes turn the Riviera upside down to crack their most captivating case yet in the New York Times bestselling series that Lee Child called "the most sustained feat of imagination in mystery fiction today." It's summertime on the Riviera, and the Jazz Age has come to France's once-sleepy beaches. From their music-filled terraces, American expatriates gaze along the coastline at the lights of Monte Carlo, where fortunes are won, lost, stolen, and sometimes hidden away. When Mary Russell and ...
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Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes turn the Riviera upside down to crack their most captivating case yet in the New York Times bestselling series that Lee Child called "the most sustained feat of imagination in mystery fiction today." It's summertime on the Riviera, and the Jazz Age has come to France's once-sleepy beaches. From their music-filled terraces, American expatriates gaze along the coastline at the lights of Monte Carlo, where fortunes are won, lost, stolen, and sometimes hidden away. When Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes arrive, they find their partnership pulled between youthful pleasures and old sins, hot sun and cool jazz, new affections and enduring loyalties. Russell falls into easy friendship with an enthralling American couple, Sara and Gerald Murphy, whose golden life on the Riviera has begun to attract famous writers and artists--and some of the scoundrels linked with Monte Carlo's underworld. The Murphy set will go on to inspire everyone from F. Scott Fitzgerald to Pablo Picasso , but in this summer of 1925, their importance for Russell lies in one of their circle's recent additions: the Holmeses' former housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson, who hasn't been seen since she fled England under a cloud of false murder accusations. When a beautiful young man is found dead in Mrs. Hudson's front room, she becomes the prime suspect in yet another murder. Russell is certain of Mrs. Hudson's innocence; Holmes is not. But the old woman's colorful past has been a source of tension between them before, and now the dangerous players who control Monte Carlo's gilded casinos may stop at nothing to keep the pair away from what Mrs. Hudson's youthful history could bring to light. The Riviera is a place where treasure can be false, where love can destroy, and where life, as Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes will discover, can be cheap--even when it is made of solid gold.
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Fine. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 368 p. Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
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New. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 368 p. Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
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From Venice to the Riviera, Living the Golden Life
This book starts out freewheeling and easygoing, as does the previous book, Island of The Mad, set in Venice, with many characters carried over, almost as a second volume. As Ms. King did with her duo The Language Of Bees/The God Of The Hive, giving us the story of Adrian Adler and his family.
But, Mrs. Hudson! And her correspondence initiates the contact, then adds her physical presence and renewed friendship with an old and valued friend of her youth. Wild and misspent youth, as it happens, which we sort of knew about. We get a few ...more...details, but mere hints. Tantalizing hints. A few interesting conversations between Mrs. Hudson and that friend.
Things start to darken, with the murder of an innocent, happy-go-lucky young man, with unexpected ties to all sorts of people. Well, perhaps not all that unexpected, actually, in as small a place as Monaco. And perhaps not all that innocent? And the sorts of people a smart woman should stay away from, or at least try to, strenuously. Smugglers, arms dealers, artists and sculptors, leading lights of the demi-monde, Bright Young Things, and lots and lots of White Russians, escaped from the shattered ancien regime of Tsarist Russia, bearing with them whatever scraps could be salvaged from the Bolshevik annihilation. Or maybe more than scraps? What did that banker to Nicholas II bring away?
But for me, the darkest, most interesting part is the relationship between Holmes and Mrs. Hudson. Or maybe, it's his attitude towards her. His seeming obsession with her, suspicion of her, his resentment, that she should shuck off the fetters he placed on her and resume her old, her real persona, with such ease, so quickly.
His need for control seems creepy and the dark side of Sherlock emerges, which we all knew of, but never saw so clearly. Not with Watson, whose personality is a simpler one than Hudson's.
In addition to the need for control, we seem to see a fear that she will make a fool of him, that Clarissa Hudson will prove to be another Irene Adler. Insupportable!
Mary also has suspicions, but as a woman and as a grateful supporter and adoptive stepdaughter of Clarissa Hudson's, she seems to be more willing than Holmes to keep an open mind, at least to a point. But to the point of murder?
The storytelling is, as always, a joy and a delight, sweeping us along willy-nilly. The evocation of Monaco so exact I had to immediately look it up on the Maps and in photos.
But, not all light and airy escapism. Some darkness, some depth, some things to think about.
And, a pretty cool description of how bronze is sculpted, poured and finished. Also, a rip-snorting finish, along with a sneaky feeling we haven't seen the last of Mrs. Hudson.
Thanks very much to Netgalley for the review copy, and apologies for the time it took. There were things in this book I had to think over and reread before I could find the words.
