Book Review: Murder Most Festive by Ada Moncrieff

-


 SUMMARY:
Christmas Eve, 1938. The Westbury family and assorted friends have gathered for another legendary celebration at their beautiful country house. The champagne flows, the silverware sparkles, and upstairs the rooms are ready for their occupants.

But one bed will lie empty that night. On Christmas morning, David Campbell-Scott is found dead in the snow. There's a pistol beside him and only one set of footprints.

Yet something doesn't seem right to amateur sleuth Hugh Gaveston. Campbell-Scott had just returned from overseas with untold wealth - why would he kill himself? Hugh sets out to investigate.

TEE'S THOUGHTS
Ever since I was in the 6th grade I have been a huge fan of Agatha Christie, and now, in general, any English mystery. The English just seems to know how to write a great mystery, and Ada Moncrieff has given me everything I would expect from a great mystery with Murder Most Festive.

There is a big country manor, I mean what English mystery is without one of those? Fancy parties or dinners, family members who secretly despise one another, eccentric side characters who are guests, and to make it even more enjoyable, she has thrown Christmas into the setting.

This was an enjoyable book, a quick read that really didn't take much to figure out, but that doesn't leave the story missing anything. It did, however, take me a few chapters to get invested in the characters and the story, which I felt had something to do with the writer's style of writing, but once I got into the groove of it, I had no problems with it at all. The ending wraps up much like a beloved Christie book with all the subjects in a room getting facts. It is a tidy wrap-up with nothing left hanging.

If you love Agatha Christie, or heck even a fan of playing the board game Clue, I think you would enjoy Murder Most Festive. It is what it sounds like...a good old-fashioned English murder mystery.

Thank you Poisoned Press for sending me a gifted copy of the book

Comments

  1. WendyW December 16, 2021 at 9:32 PM

    Nice review. A mystery set in a country manor sounds excellent!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Can't Wait Wednesdays: Summer Sons by Lee Mandelo

-
Image
Can't-Wait Wednesday is hosted by Tressa at  Wishful Endings  and gives us a chance to highlight books we are patiently waiting to fill up our TBRs with. I love spooky season, not all the pumpkin spice items they now have that stock the grocery shelves, but the creepy books I can snuggle up with wearing a comfy sweater. Who am I kidding...it is still too warm here to wear a sweater in October. Despite the sweltering 100 degrees weather here on the Oklahoma prairie, I am thinking about all the creepy and thrilling books I can stack my TBR list with, and Summer Sons is really close to the top of my list! SUMMER SONS BY LEE MANDELO Hardcover ,  384 pages Expected publication: September 28th, 2021 by Tordotcom Andrew and Eddie did everything together, best friends bonded more deeply than brothers until Eddie left Andrew behind to start his graduate program at Vanderbilt. Six months later, only days before Andrew was to join him in Nashville, Eddie dies of an apparent suicide. He leaves
Read more

Sunday Salon- More Hot Weather and More House Reno's

-
Image
 The Sunday Salon is hosted by  Readerbuzz  Another hot week here in Oklahoma. Once again we have had temps and heat indexes in the triple digits, and it looks like it will continue on into this week. We were lucky enough to receive some rain a few times, however, once the sun came out it WAS HOT. I don't want to be one of those people who start wishing for all things pumpkins, long walks in falling leaves, etc...but at this point, I am. Of course, everything is rather dead here due to the heat so, we might not have many leaves to change and fall LOL. Our garden seems to be loving the heat, we are overrun with tomatoes, and have been eating them with every meal and giving them away We are still working on the dining room. With a hundred-year-old house, and plaster walls and ceilings, and a decent-sized earthquake last year ( fracking causes our earthquakes ) we had a few repairs to make before the actual painting started. The entire ceiling had to be redone, along with several long
Read more

Sunday Salon: Diningroom is finished!

-
Image
 The Sunday Salon is hosted by  Readerbuzz  I was born into the military, both my parents were in, my entire life was spent on military bases around the world, I married into it, and I also raised a boy who grew up to be a military man, so first and foremost I would like to pay a small remembrance to the 13 servicemen and women who lost their lived this past week in Kabul and also the families left behind. It saddens me that these young men and women lost their lives at such a young age. --------------------------------------- We finally finished our dining room. It actually went so much easier than most of the rooms we have done! I know I said I was unsure about the blue, it seemed too bright, but once everything was put back in I loved it. When living in a 100-year-old house there is always the next project, so on to the Butlers pantry which is between the dining room and kitchen. We have ordered wallpaper for it and it will not arrive until September 9th so we have a bit of a breath
Read more