Kirkus Reviews QR Code
DEVIL'S KNELL by Mignon Warner

DEVIL'S KNELL

By

Pub Date: Sept. 2nd, 1983
Publisher: Doubleday

Another murder puzzle solved, this time singlehandedly, by unflappable clairvoyant Edwina Charles (Death in Time, etc.) in her home town of Little Gidding. The murder victim: cold, officious local postmistress Mae Holliday--who is found in a neighbor-village's Cathedral with a wooden spike through her chest. . . just a day after appealing to Mrs. Charles for help in finding her past. (On the verge of marriage to much-older Jocelyn Smith, head of a church-sponsored senior citizens' complex, Mae claimed to have no memory of her life before Little Gidding.) The strangest clue: a roll of eerie' film found in the dead woman's pocket. The top suspect: village drunk Big John Little--till he kills himself, after which rumors of witches' covens take over as the murder explanation. Mrs. Charles, however, is busily looking into Mae Holliday's early life. . . and she'll spring a neat little trap to pin down the killer. One of Warner's better efforts--with some lively character studies fleshing out an imaginative but rather fragile plot.