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MANSIONS OF THE DEAD
by Sarah Stewart Taylor
St Martin's Minotaur, July 2004
352 pages
$23.95
ISBN: 0312307667


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

A highly publicized investigation is about to get started and the Boston police department is doing its best to contain the information for what promises to be an exhaustive case. The son of an influential Massachusetts family has been found murdered by his college roommates and the detectives are going to need all the help they can get in order to solve the case quietly and quickly. Their only clue left at the scene was some unusual jewelry found with the victim.

Sweeney St George is a college professor and an expert on many aspects of how people and different cultures honor their dead. She recognizes the jewelry as those worn by widowed colonial women to remember their deceased mates. The police think the killer left them behind, but Sweeney does not believe that to be the case. These are priceless family heirlooms and she wants to know more about these pieces. This will take a bigger dynamic when she learns that the murdered student was one of her own, making it very personal for her. The key is with the jewels and she will do her own personal investigation through that angle.

MANSIONS OF THE DEAD is another amateur sleuth novel where a character, who has nothing to do with law enforcement, manages to do what the police cannot, solve a case. What differentiates this book from the plethora of others is that this novel is unique and very good. The participation of Sweeney in the case is not gratuitous and it makes sense regarding the storyline. Ms Taylor manages to separate her character's investigation from that of the police and instead of bringing an antagonistic atmosphere, they manage to compromise to work together strengthening the plot and making it entertaining.

One thing that makes Professor St George likable is that her interests reflect those of the author's. Teachers often say that when writing you should write about things you know. This author does that and it teaches as well specifically how people unintentionally might desecrate a tomb and not realize it.

The book might have benefited with the use of some pictures, but that is beside the point. MANSIONS OF THE DEAD is a good book worthy of notice. If all books could be as good as this we would be set. Her characters are worth the read plus a second visit.

Reviewed by Angel L. Soto, January 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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