Book Review: "Death At A Highland Wedding" by Kelley Armstrong

 

After slipping 150 years into the past, modern-day homicide detective Mallory Atkinson has embraced her new life in Victorian Scotland as housemaid Catriona Mitchel. Although it isn’t what she expected, she's developed real, meaningful relationships with the people around her and has come to love her role as assistant to undertaker Dr. Duncan Gray and Detective Hugh McCreadie.

Mallory, Gray, and McCreadie are on their way to the Scottish Highlands for McCreadie's younger sister's wedding. The McCreadies and the groom’s family, the Cranstons, have a complicated history which has made the weekend quite uncomfortable. But the Cranston estate is beautiful so Gray and Mallory decide to escape the stifling company and set off to explore the castle and surrounding wilderness. They discover that the groom, Archie Cranston, a slightly pompous and prickly man, has set up deadly traps in the woods for the endangered Scottish wildcats, and they soon come across a cat who's been caught and severely injured. Oddly, Mallory notices the cat's injuries don't match up with the intricacies of the trap. These strange irregularities, combined with the secretive and erratic behavior of the groom, put Mallory and Duncan on edge. And then when one of the guests is murdered, they must work fast to uncover the murderer before another life is lost. - from Netgalley.com

This eARC was provided by Netgalley.com and I giving an unbiased review.

This is the fourth installment in the Rip in Time series by Armstrong. We are back to modern day detective Mallory, who has slipped through time to a Victorian Era Scotland, and into the body of a housemaid. The original book was interesting to read, though I am not one for historical fiction as much as urban fantasy. Over the course of the MC's story through the books, it seems there will be no need of her returning to her future time line, as she ahs started a relationship, and seems to enjoy detective-type work in this earlier time period. Though restricted by conventions of social placement of women, she is still able to teach more current detective skills to some.

Though the series has been somewhat enjoyable due to the author's writing style, the storyline just is slowly losing my attention. As I stated, I am not into historical fiction, and I feel that these books are somewhat repetitive with the basic story idea: dead body, investigate, lovey lovey, society treatment of women, solve murder, catch bad guy. I do want to point out that this author does do other novels of fiction that I do find more enjoyable.

Book Review: "Schemes & Scandals" by Kelley Armstrong

 

It’s Mallory Atkinson’s first Christmas in Scotland. Victorian Scotland, that is. Also, as the twenty-first-century detective learns, Christmas really isn’t a thing in Victorian Scotland. It’s all about Hogmanay. But her boss, Dr. Duncan Gray, treats her to an early gift of tickets to the event of the season: a Charles Dickens reading. There, they bump into Lady Inglis—the lovely widow who has sent Gray sexy letters trying to entice him back to her bed.

Lady Inglis introduces Mallory to Dickens—the meeting of a lifetime—but in return she wants their help. She’s being blackmailed. Someone stole letters she wrote to another lover and is threatening to publish them.

Mallory isn’t sure what to make of Lady Inglis, but no woman deserves that, so she insists on taking the case with or without Gray’s help. Growing tension between them soon tells Mallory that Gray is hiding a secret of his own. She has until Hogmanay to uncover the blackmailer…and, hopefully, to put things right with Gray so they can enjoy the holiday together.  - from Netgalley.com 

This eARC was provided by Netgalley.com and I am giving an unbiased review.

So, historical fiction stories are not my favorite reads, but the first book in this series had intrigued me with the plot synopsis, and so I started in on it. Of course, this being a smaller novella between possible longer tales, it was a much shorter read, and I did finish it rather quickly once started. Our MC is still stuck back Victorian Era Scotland, with still no idea, or much hope, at returning to modern day. However, her relationship with Gray is developed more, and still, due to the period, not able to be openly displayed, or even talked about amongst their own privacy. Here there is a nice touch that the MC gets to meet Charles Dickens, who just happens to be one of her favorite authors (coincidental...hmmm).

Overall for the shortness of this story, it flowed well. Sticking to the characters, and events from previous installments, I detected no deviance from what has happened before. How accurate the part of Dickens being in Scotland that possible Yuletide... who is to say. There probably is some record of him making a circuit during the era, but I am not that interested to verify. It sounded well and true to me.

Enjoyed the short work, and because I've got some vested reading into the series, I would definitely recommend and read additional stories if the author presents more.