Thursday 11 April 2024

A Body at the Dance Hall

 922. Amateur sleuth Mabel Canning is surrounded by the bright lights of London as she chaperones a young American woman to a dance. But when someone is murdered, a deadly tango begins…

Meet plucky woman-about-town Mabel Canning, leader of the London Ladies’ Murder Club and trusted assistant to gentlewomen. When she is tasked with accompanying Roxy, a fun-loving heiress, on a glamorous night out, Mabel can’t wait to sip champagne and practice the foxtrot. But just as Roxy sashays out of sight, a mysterious man warns Mabel that the feisty young redhead is in danger. And someone is dead before the music stops...

Roxy was the last person to see the victim alive, and she stumbles into Mabel’s arms with her daffodil-yellow dress splashed with blood. Determined to protect her ward, Mabel gathers her dashing beau 
Winstone and her pals from the murder club. Together they trace the weapon back to the ballroom, but when its twin goes missing, it is clear time is running out to prevent another murder on the dance floor…

The police conclude the killer is in Roxy’s family, but Mabel finds herself spinning between a motley troupe of suspects. Mr Bryars, the anxious ballroom manager, is constantly tripping over himself to hide his secrets. But would he kill to protect his reputation? And young Ned Kettle may have looked dashing while waltzing around with Roxy, but he was once a notorious thief. Is the sticky-fingered rogue also a dab hand at murder?

Just as Mabel and her murder club friends quickstep closer to the truth, Roxy is kidnapped, and Mabel comes cheek to cheek with the killer. Can she save poor Roxy and herself? Or has she 
danced her last dance?

A delightfully witty and utterly addictive whodunnit absolutely bursting with 1920s sparkle, from USA Today bestselling author Marty Wingate. Perfect for fans of Agatha Christie, Richard Osman, Verity Bright and T.E. Kinsey.

My Review

I do enjoy historical murder mysteries and so I was looking forward to A Body at the Dance Hall. I hadn't, sadly, read the first two books in the series yet, but that doesn't really matter. Mabel Canning is an independent woman. She has a small flat in London and works for the Useful Ladies agency, she turns her hand to any task that a Useful Lady is needed for. Sometimes, that turns out to be detecting a murderer.
I enjoyed this mystery. I did manage to spot most of the 'twists' before they occurred, including having solved who was behind it quite early on. That didn't matter though, it still made for a very enjoyable read and let me pretend that I was incredibly intelligent, having been able to solve it all!
I'd be quite keen to read more in this series. Mabel and her friends are really interesting. With this having been the first book in the series that I'd read, I got a bit confused about who Park and Winstone were. For a good portion of time, I thought that they were two different people, the way that the names were used interchangeably. I'm not sure why this was done, seeing as they are one and the same man. Minor irritation though.
This was a great and entertaining read and I'd be very keen to read more from this series.



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