Burns proves that a girl and her mastiff can’t be defeated.
Murder disrupts a young baker’s life.
Madison Montgomery is well on her way to fulfilling the conditions laid out in her great-aunt Octavia’s will for her to claim her inheritance. In spite of a devastating fire, Maddy is operating Octavia’s bakery, Baby Cakes, and learning to make tasty confections from her aunt’s old friend Hannah Portman and head baker Leroy Danielson. Maddy has also taken excellent care of Baby, Octavia’s bull mastiff, under the guidance of Michael Portman, Hannah’s veterinarian grandson, who’s also Maddy’s main squeeze. So what could go wrong? For one thing, Baby’s been off his feed ever since meeting Daisy, a female mastiff whose owner inquired about Baby’s stud service but then decided not to follow through. Second, Maddy’s best friend, Sheriff April Johnson, is being stalked by Clayton “CJ” Davenport, a high roller she wed when she was a teen beauty-pageant queen and never quite divorced. Clayton thinks he’ll get back at April by opening a fancy patisserie and putting Baby Cakes out of business. Instead, he’s put out of business himself with a fatal knife wound. Since Sheriff April isn’t considered a suitable investigator of her own husband’s murder, the Michigan State Police send Trooper Bob Roberts to solve the crime, and the short-tempered cop has just about everyone Maddy loves best in his sights. Sleuthing isn’t exactly on the top of Maddy’s to-do list, but if she doesn’t crack the case soon, there won’t be anybody left but Baby to stock the shelves of her newly opened store.
Burns proves that a girl and her mastiff can’t be defeated.Pub Date: June 27, 2023
ISBN: 9781496738233
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Sharply drawn characters, a “locked-room” location, and a tension-filled WWII setting illuminate this wartime thriller.
During World War II, a female police officer investigates a spate of murders on a tiny island off the coast of Massachusetts.
Oren’s novel opens arrestingly with a local police captain discovering a fisherman’s unexpected catch of a human body. Then, an initial assessment of death by drowning goes distinctly south when it turns out that the man was strangled. Things only get trickier from there since it’s wartime, 1944, and the corpse is that of a prisoner of war: The island, along with its docks, trawlers, and cranberry bogs, includes a prison camp of Italian POWs and a U.S. military emplacement headed by a lieutenant who’d prefer to be on the front lines (his wealthy family ensures that he’s not). To complicate matters further—especially when another murder victim emerges—the police captain is Mary Beth Swann, who took over her husband’s law enforcement role when he shipped out to the South Pacific. Being a female police officer was already challenging enough; Mary Beth, originally from Boston, also has to tolerate the disrespect of the island’s inhabitants. What elevates this intriguing story—comparisons with television’s always engaging Foyle’s War are inevitable—are the wonderfully delineated specifics of the location and characters. This island may be fictional, but it’s drawn directly from the author’s experiences on Nantucket, and each of the characters sparkles with their own vitality, including the town’s brothel madam, the Acadian short-order cook missing two fingers, a visiting gangster, and the nearly 90 Italians waiting out the war in a remote corner of a foreign land.
Sharply drawn characters, a “locked-room” location, and a tension-filled WWII setting illuminate this wartime thriller.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-950539-60-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dzanc
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2022
A lush and leisurely period mystery with a proto-feminist heroine.
What’s the connection between the murder of a film censor and the simultaneous disappearance of a glamorous actress?
Perveen Mistry, “the sole female solicitor” in Bombay, is excited to meet her new prospective clients, the high-powered Calcutta couple Subhas Ghoshal, a director for Champa Films, and Rochana, his wife and leading lady. Perveen’s fifth case, set in 1922, again tucks a whodunit into a detailed portrait of colonial India and a relevant period topic, here the beginning of the Bollywood film industry. Perveen and Jamshedji Mistry, her father and boss, visit the Ghoshals’ lush digs to discuss a contract dispute. After the meeting, Perveen invites her friend Alice Hobson-Jones, a Rochana superfan who’s the entitled daughter of Lady Gwendolyn Hobson-Jones, to an advance screening of Rochana’s new film. The evening is memorable, and not in a good way. Blithe Alice brings along Diana, an adorable dog who runs amok and disrupts the luxe event. In the confusion, government film censor Joseph Morgan turns up dead and Rochana goes missing. Throughout Perveen's ensuing investigation, Alice doubles as insightful sidekick and comic relief. Massey, who’s generous in her historical color, devotes equal attention to Perveen’s singular life and the tangled whodunit. Perveen’s world includes meticulous chief maid Gita, tennis-playing debutante Kitty Daboo, and a secret paramour, British civil servant Colin Sandringham, who’s mentioned on page 1 but doesn’t appear until after the novel’s midpoint, as Massey’s tale moves with stately elegance to its complex solution.
A lush and leisurely period mystery with a proto-feminist heroine.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781641295093
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Soho Crime
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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