Publishers Weekly
10/28/2019
The discovery of the body of a French tourist, washed up on one of the Isles of Scilly off the Cornish coast, kicks off MWA Grand Master Grimes’s entertaining, if sometimes befuddling, 25th mystery featuring Scotland Yard Supt. Richard Jury (after 2018’s The Knowledge). Soon afterward, a man is killed on an East Midlands estate—possibly by his wife, who admits only to shooting him in the leg—and a woman is gunned down inside Exeter Cathedral. Jury and his eccentric pal, Melrose Plant, plus handfuls of detectives from the far-flung crime scenes, attempt to discern what, if anything, connects these murders. Jury and company travel around England by boat, plane, helicopter, and car in search of answers, with occasional breaks for a drink in places such as the Old Success Pub in Land’s End. Never mind the difficulty of keeping track of the large cast and the complicated plot, witty dialogue keeps the action moving to the satisfying conclusion. Series fans and newcomers alike will have fun. Agent: Steve Sheppard, Cowan, Debaets, Abrahams & Sheppard. (Nov.)
From the Publisher
Praise for The Knowledge:
"Martha Grimes delivers an outstanding police procedural...Readers will find it hard to put the book down; all will be drawn in from the first sentence. This may be Martha Grimes’ finest Richard Jury mystery to date." —Bookreporter
“Jury’s investigation centers on gem smuggling, tax dodging, and greed. The real mystery is how to find a cab drivers’ pub, the Knowledge, so secret that even Scotland Yard can’t force its patrons to reveal its location . . . Readers will appreciate the elements that have made this a long-running bestselling series, notably a complicated case and distinctive characters.”—Publishers Weekly
“Grimes’ twenty-fourth mystery starring Richard Jury gets off to a breakneck start . . . Jury’s devoted readership will find much to enjoy.”—Booklist
Praise for Martha Grimes and the Richard Jury mystery series:
“Delightful, surprising, even magical. They begin as police procedurals—someone is murdered, Jury investigates—but Grimes’s love of the offbeat, the whimsical and the absurd makes them utterly unlike anyone else’s detective novels . . . Although Grimes is American she has a wicked eye for English eccentricity . . . Original, civilized and witty novels that . . . truly are novel and, once come upon, they can become necessary.”—Washington Post, on Dust
“Delicious . . . A prime example of Grimes’ skill at balancing the serious with the lighthearted . . . Jury and his posse are terrific companions . . . Delightful.”—Seattle Times, on Vertigo 42
“Intricate and entertaining . . . A delicious puzzle.”—Boston Globe, on The Horse You Came In On
“Wondrously eccentric characters . . . The details are divine.”—New York Times Book Review, on The Stargazey
“Swift and satisfying . . . grafts the old-fashioned ‘Golden Age’ amateur-detective story to the contemporary police procedural . . . real charm.”—Wall Street Journal, on The Lamorna Wink
“The literary equivalent of a box of Godiva truffles . . . Wonderful.”—Los Angeles Times, on The Stargazey
“Witty, atmospheric mysteries . . . Simply heaven.”—Denver Post, on The Stargazey
“Read any one [of her novels] and you’ll want to read them all.”—Chicago Tribune
“Grimes is not the next Dorothy Sayers, not the next Agatha Christie. She is better than both.”—Atlanta Journal-Constitution
“Grimes is superlative at describing the physical world . . . And, when Grimes takes us into interiors, whether it’s a posh country home or a down-at-the-heels flat, she is like Dickens in linking human character to habitat . . . A stellar series.”—Kirkus Reviews, on Vertigo 42
Library Journal
03/01/2019
Three mysteries plague Scotland Yard detective Richard Jury, here joined by Brian Macalvie of the Devon-Cornwall police: a French tourist is found dead on an inlet's wet sands, a man lies murdered at his Devon estate, and another lies in Exeter Cathedral. The 25th Richard Jury book, with the title again taken from a pub featured herein.
