Dying in the Wool

December 19, 2011
Amateur sleuth Kate Shackleton, whose usual avocation is searching for servicemen who went missing during the Great War, faces a tight deadline in Brody’s stately second English historical (after 2010’s A Medal for Murder). In 1922, at the behest of Tabitha Braithwaite, an acquaintance of Kate’s from the days they were both with the Voluntary Aid Detachment, Kate must find Bridgestead mill owner Joshua Braithwaite, Tabitha’s father, who disappeared in 1916, before her wedding in five weeks to Hector Gawthorpe. Rumors abounded in the local wool mills at the time that guilt-ridden Joshua, a suspected womanizer, tried to drown himself after his soldier son was killed on the Somme. A further complication was his objection to Tabitha’s marrying the unemployed Hector, who may hold a clue to Joshua’s fate. Brody takes her time drawing together the missing threads of this mostly gentle cozy. Agent: Judith Murdoch, Judith Murdoch Literary Agency.

December 15, 2011
A World War I widow takes up sleuthing. Although Kate Shackleton's husband is listed as MIA, she hasn't given up hope. Meanwhile, she's assisted others in locating their family members. But she's reluctant to help her fellow VAD friend Tabitha Braithwaite find her missing father, mill owner Joshua Braithwaite. Tabitha, who's soon to marry a much-younger man, would love to have her father walk her down the aisle, but Joshua went missing soon after he was hospitalized following a supposed suicide attempt. Even though his son had just been killed in action, he vehemently denied trying to kill himself. And why would he have tried? His mill was minting money from war contracts, and he still enjoyed quite a reputation as a ladies' man. Kate's father, a high-ranking policeman, suggests that since time is short and Tabitha is paying her, she should hire former police officer Jim Sykes to help with the legwork. Kate's investigations turn up many secrets past and present that people would prefer to remain hidden. When several people die in staged accidents, it's clear that Kate must find the killer before he strikes again. The first in a planned series introduces a refreshingly complex heroine and adds a fine feeling for the postwar period.

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