The Girl in the Yellow Dress

June 6, 2022
Adams’s moody eighth Henry Johnstone mystery (after 2021’s Bright Young Things) opens in 1930 as career criminal Brady Brewer is hanged for the murder of Sarah Downham. Brewer’s guilt seems beyond question, yet he dies loudly protesting his innocence. Barely a month later, a second young woman is murdered a mile from where Sarah was found. A copycat killing? Or was Brewer actually innocent of the first crime? Det. Chief Insp. Henry Johnstone and Sgt. Mickey Hitchens head to Leicestershire to assist Insp. James Walker, who arrested Brewer for Sarah’s murder and now leads the investigation into the latest death. After reviewing the evidence, the detectives find that as wicked as Brewer was, he may have been hanged for a murder he didn’t commit. The mystery is properly twisty and the English countryside beautifully atmospheric, but the story’s greatest strength is the relationships between the detectives. Johnstone is spiky and irritable, his longtime partner, Hitchens, is his caring conscience. Walker is miffed by Scotland Yard’s interference, yet worried that his antipathy for Brewer caused a rush to judgement. Lovers of tweedy English murder mysteries will find much to like.

June 15, 2022
In 1930, DCI Henry Johnstone is flummoxed by a murder whose chief suspect is already dead. Few tears fell when Brady Brewer was hanged for the murder of Sarah Downham. Although he swore that he truly loved her, his brutal record of crimes against women told otherwise, not least in the opinion of Johnstone, who had seen him in action during the war. But when the body of a second young woman, Penelope Soper, is found dumped on a country road not far from the place where the first body was discovered, the local police must face the possibility that Sarah's killer is still at large. So as little as he likes getting sent to the border between Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, and sad as he is that this case from the back of beyond will likely be his last with Mickey Hitchens, the faithful sergeant who's long overdue for promotion, Johnstone decides that the only way to solve Penelope's murder is to reinvestigate Sarah's. He faces stiff opposition from Inspector Walker, the copper who built the case against Brady; from Elizabeth, Brady's long-suffering sister; and from Sarah's wealthy and powerful family. But the oddest of clues--a handmade yellow dress, which witnesses saw Sarah wearing the night she disappeared and is now missing from the evidence box--persuades him that there's more to Sarah's murder than a whirlwind romance gone bad. A fitting swan song for Adams' dynamic duo.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

August 1, 2022
1930, Leicestershire, England. DCI Henry Johnstone and his sergeant, Mickey Hitchens, are summoned from Scotland Yard to the tiny village of King's Toll to help solve the rape and murder of teenager Penny Soper. Months earlier, another young woman, Sarah Downham, was also raped and murdered in the village, and a violent criminal, Brady Brewer, was hanged for the crime. Is the latest death a copycat killing, or was Brewer not guilty of the first murder? It's up to Henry and Mickey to find out. The local copper, Inspector Walker, naturally resents the interference of the Yard, and the locals are extremely reluctant to see Sarah's case reinvestigated, since it will reopen old wounds. Henry and Mickey discover a web of lies, jealousy, and resentment, leading to a tragic finale. A dense and atmospheric plot with plenty of surprises, authentic historical details, and intriguing characters with all too human foibles make this one a good pick for devotees of fans of British historical mysteries.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.