Carolyn B. (BookwormCMB) - , reviewed on 8/9/2010 + 3 more book reviews

I usually like Dorothy Cannell's Ellie Haskell books, but this book fell flat. It was very hard to get through. The murder didn't happen until about two-thirds of the way through the book, and because the main character doesn't have the same quirky interactions with others, like Ben, her cousin Freddy, or Mrs. Malloy, who doesn't show up until much later in the story, the comic aspect of the story was missing as well. Instead, there are multiple characters thrown in and many bear only a superficial connection to the loose plot. In fact, it was hard to keep them all straight.
One character--a nemesis from Ellie's schoolgirl days--doesn't seem at all realistic and instead of being a threat is just a caricature and an annoyance.

For much of the novel, I felt that it was never really clear just WHAT the real mystery was. The premise is that a friend of Ellie's, now working at her former boarding school, asks her to return to help find out who took a missing trophy and return it before a planned awards ceremony. But the trophy -- albeit a valuable antique with sentimental and intrinsic value -- is in the grand scheme of things not that big a deal to most of the characters.

The ending was unsatisfying as well. It seemed to just "happen" and many of the loose ends, including what could have been an interesting subplot, were just tied up with a quick paragraph or two. I will continue to read Cannell's books, but I'm only lukewarm on this one.

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