A Fete Worse Than Death: A Jack Haldean Murder Mystery

I bought this book simply because the title made me laugh out loud. The characters are straight out of a drawing room play. That being said the mystery itself is not very mysterious. It must be hard to write a good mystery. The writer has to create enough characters so that the murderer isn't obvious, but not so many that the reader loses track of who is who. I'm afraid this is one of those books where things are rather obvious because there just aren't that many characters for the murderer to be. I guessed the ending early on, but it was a pleasant ride anyway.

I thought this was a very well-written mystery. Set in the early 1920s in England, the story features Major Jack Haldean, a writer who dabbles in solving crime. While visiting family in the countryside, Jack becomes involved in solving several murders. The murders end up affecting his own family--but they also date back to WWI. The author ties it all nicely together and the ending surprised me (but then again, I can hardly ever figure out "whodunit"). This is a nice, cozy sort of mystery.