Using sharp intelligence and experienced sleuthing, the intrepid Lady Georgiana Rannoch sets out to save her friend, accused of murder, in The Last Mrs. Summers, an excellent, stand-alone entry in the Royal Spyness series by Rhys Bowen (Four Funerals and Maybe a Wedding).
What begins as a road trip with girlfriend Belinda to inspect an inherited, dilapidated cottage on the wild Cornish coast soon takes a darker turn. With no hotel available nearby, Georgiana and Belinda accept an offer of housing with a childhood friend. There has been a series of unfortunate deaths at the estate and, before long, the two young women are swept up in yet another death: their host is found murdered and Belinda is arrested for the violent crime. Now Georgiana must unravel a tangled knot of seemingly unrelated clues and blind ends as she attempts to uncover the real killer. At first there are too few potential suspects and then, too many. How will Georgiana narrow the list of suspects and discover the actual perpetrator? Even more difficult and challenging, how will she convince the police she has found the real killer and it's not Belinda?
There's so much to enjoy about this well-written novel--the easy camaraderie between Georgiana and Belinda, the 1930s setting in England's colorful Cornwall, the complicated mystery and the heroine's shrewd solving of the crime. To all that, add the melding of the protagonists' pitch-perfect British insouciance with the brooding atmosphere of a gothic mansion, and the result is an absolute delight. Readers will find themselves staying up late. --Lois Faye Dyer, writer and reviewer