The Gladstone Bag: A Sarah Kelling Mystery

It's hard to believe this book is supposed to be contemporaneous to 1989. The heroine, a wealthy widow, still dresses for dinner and expects her guests at a private island vacation home in Maine to do so, too. Long-time family retainers drift in and out of scenes, always knowing their places. I went to a private Catholic girls' HS in the 1960s and never ran into characters so refined. Nevertheless, just as I'll never meet Miss Marple and her antiquated neighbors in St. Marys Mead (but love them just the same), or find their modern equivalent, I find this sort of tale an occasional pleasure - so many of the crime fiction published today, 2005, seem to be in a contest to be more violent and graphic than the next. Neither extreme is really an honest representation, so why does so much of the genre tilt towards brute force, rather than cleverness? The slender plot of The Gladstone Bag isn't very important; if you haven't read MacLeod's cozy series about the Kelling clan, you won't be lost but some familiarity does help. The uber-heroine Sarah's Aunt Emma is babysitting a posh summer "cottage" that has six guest cabins. Meals are fully catered in the main house by a professional chef and a full staff attends to guests' other needs. As she traveled to the island, said to be haunted by the ghost of a pirate guarding his missing treaure, Aunt Emma is mugged and the Gilbert & Sullivan Club's trove of costume jewelry, which she planned to repair, is stolen. Then most of the guests stage a mutiny and announce that they intend to dig up the entire island in search of the pirate's treasure, if necessary. The jewelry is recovered but dead bodies are, too; tales get taqngled but eventually Aunt Emma solves it all, with long-distance help from Sarah and her professional-detective husband. Author Charlotte MacLeod is, as usual, an expert in this form, never hitting a false note and as dependable as ever for the reader seeking a classic cozy: not too sweet, but just right.

Sarah Kelling's Aunt Emma is a woman who throws herself into good works, such as leaping from a burning building into a net to raise money for a fireman's widow. Now old friend Adelaide Sabine needs a hostess for her isolated summer place on Pocapuk Island, and Emma leaps again. She'll enjoy a quiet summer of rest, relaxation, and repairing the stage jewelry belonging to her pet Gilbert and Sullivan troupe while she keeps a benevolent eye on the artists and writers who'll be occupying Adelaide's six guest cottages. She packs up the baubles in her old Gladstone bag and heads for the coast of Maine. On the ferry, Emma is drugged and her bag temporarily stolen - could someone have mistaken the paste jewels for real diamonds? On the island, she's barely settled in when her Gladstone bag is heisted again, a trespassing scuba diver is found dead, and a mysterious stranger is off on a rampage of attempted murders. Emma won't stand for such a shocking breach of island etiquette. She enlists niece Sarah and nephew-in-law Max Bittersohn for a spot of long-distance detecting - and sets about digging a trap for a ruthless villain. A fine and witty read.

If you like Charlotte Macleod's books at all - don't miss this one, if you can get hold of a copy. It's lively and fun all the way, without the dry stretches that can strike any prolific author.