Jane Wunderly is an American widow last seen in Egypt when she resolved the Murder at the Mena House in Cairo. She was travelling as the assistant to her wealthy aunt. Now the two ladies are taking their ease in England. MURDER AT WEDGEFIELD MANOR is about to follow.
Echoes of the Great War are still heard in the spring of 1926. The Essex-based Wedgefield Manor suits Aunt Millie perfectly, as she visits Lord Hughes and his daughter Lilian, who is a keen golfer. Jane occupies herself by taking flying lessons from Group Captain Chris Hammond in a neat little Gypsy Moth biplane. Several returned veterans are working on the estate. Jane’s American egalitarian ideals are not shared by all the house guests. One guest takes exception to mechanic Simon Marshall spending time with the family, and Simon leaves in a temper. He doesn’t get far in the car before crashing, and the police discover his death was caused by the brake cables being damaged. Was Simon the target, or one of the family? There isn’t an obvious motive.
Mr. Redvers, who featured in the earlier story, reappears, and the presence of a handsome young man doing something for the intelligence services reminds me greatly of the Darcy O’Mara character in Rhys Bowen’s mystery series about Her Royal Spyness, Lady Georgiana Rannoch. I was quite cross that after Jane gets a wetting in a stream, she is put to bed for the rest of the day to recover when a young man would have been given a hot cup of tea and a change of clothes.
The trouble with 1920s country house murders is that they all resemble an Agatha Christie story, with stock characters and a short list of motives. MURDER AT WEDGEFIELD MANOR, however, distinguishes itself with the returned soldiers on the premises, including a Jamaican. This serves to make the story memorable and create new characters with backgrounds. I think the author Erica Ruth Neubauer is providing a complete contrast to the first adventure in Cairo, and I’ve read another installment in the lively Jane Wunderly series set on a sparse Scottish island. Life was interesting during the 1920s, provided one had the money to travel.
In the wake of World War I, Jane Wunderly—a thoroughly modern young American widow—is traveling abroad, enjoying the hospitality of an English lord and a perfectly proper manor house, until murder makes an unwelcome appearance . . . England, 1926: Wedgefield Manor, deep in the tranquil Essex countryside, provides a welcome rest stop for Jane and her matchmaking Aunt Millie before their return to America. While Millie spends time with her long-lost daughter, Lillian, and their host, Lord Hughes, Jane fills the hours devouring mystery novels and taking flying lessons—much to Millie’s disapproval. But any danger in the air is eclipsed by tragedy on the ground when one of the estate’s mechanics, Air Force veteran Simon Marshall, is killed in a motorcar collision. The sliced brake cables prove this was no accident, yet was the intended victim someone other than Simon? The house is full of suspects—visiting relations, secretive servants, strangers prowling the grounds at night—and also full of targets. The enigmatic Mr. Redvers, who helped Jane solve a murder in Egypt, arrives on the scene to once more offer his assistance. It seems that everyone at Wedgefield wants Jane to help protect the Hughes family. But while she searches for answers, is she overlooking a killer hiding in plain sight?
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