Book Review: Mrs. Jeffries Weeds the Plot

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

Mrs. Jeffries Weeds the Plot     Amazon US PB Amazon Canada PB
Emily Brightwell
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Cozy   Amateur Sleuth   Woman Main Character   Historical
Series: Mrs. Jeffries & Inspector Witherspoon # 15
Berkley, Nov 2000, $5.99, 214 pp.

The house on Upper Edmonton Garden belongs to Scotland Yard’s Inspector Weatherspoon, a police officer with a homicide resolution rate of 100 %. Except for the participants, no one, including the inspector, realizes that his success is due to his household staff “guiding” him through the quagmire of an investigation.

The latest case comes from a previous murder inquiry. Martha Dowling asks the Weatherspoon household for help. Her employee Annabeth Gentry inherited a fortune, a home, and several murder attempts ever since her dog dug up the body of a pick pocket near her new residence. The caretaker of a school near Dowling’s estate is also killed. Weatherspoon and his unofficial team begin to make inquiries.

This is the sixteenth installment in the delightfully eccentric Victorian mystery series yet the story line retains a fresh thought provoking feel as if MRS. JEFFRIES WEEDS THE PLOT is the first novel. Still, the return of the cast feels like old friends are visiting. The mystery is well drawn even though a hint at the identity of the killer at the midpoint seems a bit early, but it does not take away from Emily Brightwell’s wonderful historical amateur sleuth tale.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner