Staff Reviews

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Devilish grand fun to read!

Susan Ryland has edited all of Alan Conway’s bestselling Atticus Pund mystery series from the first book, years ago; she is intimately acquainted with the fictional detective. The series made Alan a wealthy man and truth be told it goes quite a ways to keeping the publishing firm she works for afloat.  While Susan doesn’t like Alan, she does enjoy his Atticus Pund mysteries, as Magpie Murders opens Alan has just turned in the latest manuscript. She settles down to spend a pleasant weekend with Atticus Pund.

Susan and the reader are drawn into a clever mystery as Atticus and his assistant James are called to a picturesque English Village where the housekeeper of Pye Hall, home of Sir Magnus and Lady Pye, dies in what appears to be a tragic accident.  Written with the style and atmosphere of Dame Agatha Christie, the mystery soon has the reader engrossed, eager to unravel what is happening in this lovely little village. 

However, all is not smooth sailing, Susan is soon convinced that something different is going on with this story, and there are clues within the mystery.  Soon the reader is involved in two mysteries full of all those juicy stalwarts of the genre: greed, jealousy, and dark secrets along with a few murders to spice up the stories and a wicked twist. 

This is great fun to read!  It literally turns the mystery genre on its head in a literary whodunit with some very inventive surprises. 

— Deon Stonehouse