MURDER IN THE PIAZZA

When the shady employer of an American woman living in Rome is murdered, she decides to launch an investigation in this debut novel.

Maggie White has been in Rome for months now—she moved from the United States after her husband, Burt, was relocated there for work. She lands a job managing Masterpiece Tours, a company that offers “exclusive painting holidays” to affluent Americans. But not yet a week into the new position, she’s already considering quitting. So consumed by contempt for her insufferable boss, Lord Philip Walpole, she dreams of his demise, a disdain cheekily captured by Moore: “Just a painless, but fatal, heart attack that would strike her boss down in the middle of the night. When that failed to materialize, she imagined him taking a wrong step in front of a speeding bus. Today she moved on to poison.” Maggie’s dream becomes a grim reality when she finds him dead in his study, clearly murdered. The possible suspects are many—Lord Walpole was an unscrupulous man rumored to be an illicit entrepreneur involved in drugs and money laundering, and maybe fraud and blackmail as well. Much to Maggie’s surprise and dismay, the case is quickly closed by Inspector Orsini—he’s “lazy at best and incompetent at worst.” The haste with which he abandons the probe suggests corruption of some kind. Maggie decides to conduct an investigation of her own—she’s impressively sharp and resourceful—an undertaking that ultimately pegs her as a suspect.

Moore’s tale moves along well-established literary grooves, formulaically familiar to anyone who has ever read a murder mystery in which the protagonist becomes an amateur sleuth. In addition, the writing is no more inventive than the plot, brimming with clichés. On the same page readers will find “Be prepared to have your socks knocked off” and “Michelangelo would roll over in his grave.” But originality seems beside the point—the author is clearly not interested in either poetical prose or provocation, but rather easily consumed, breezily companionable entertainment. And this is precisely what Moore delivers, and with a kind of artistically unobtrusive skill. The plot is suspenseful without ever becoming too anxiety inducing, and the skullduggery surrounding Lord Walpole’s life is dark without ever turning disturbingly macabre. At the heart of it all is the charmingly innocuous protagonist, who seems bored by the banality of her own quotidian existence. Now that’s she enlivened by a greater purpose, she’s not eager to return to her former life: “Mrs. Burt White, bridge player, lifelong student, and lady who lunches.” Her character flirts with complexity—an achingly ordinary person who pines for excitement and, if given the opportunity, is so clearly capable of achieving more in life. The details of the murder are complicated enough but not torturously so—it is at least possible that readers will also crack the case, and the prospect of doing so may very well be the book’s most alluring element. For those in search of an enjoyably dramatic tale served without asking the audience for much in return—essentially fiction just a notch above passive fare—this fits the bill.

A derivative, unchallenging mystery that delights without taxing readers.