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Daniel Kind, Oxford scholar, historian, television personality and author, has moved to Brackdale village in the Lake District. His lover Miranda still works for a London magazine which means she has to travel down to London periodically. She's there now, which is why Daniel has been working in the overgrown garden of Tarn Cottage. Daniel's father, Ben, had been a policeman who moved to the Lake District after the divorce and never contacted his children again. Daniel has forgiven him and has become friendly with Ben's former sergeant, DCI Hannah Scarlett who is now in charge of the local Cold Case Review team. Her lover is the owner of a bookshop from whom Daniel buys books on local history. Years earlier, Warren Howe, a landscape gardener, was hacked to death while working in a garden in Old Sawrey, a nearby village. An anonymous note comes in to the station stating that Tina Howe, Warren's widow, was responsible for the murder. Hannah and her sergeant, Nick Lowther, who had been in on the original investigation, are assigned to the case. THE CIPHER GARDEN works on many levels. We have the unsolved murder from an earlier date; the relationships among the characters, Daniel with Miranda, his sister, Hannah and Marc, Hannah's significant other, and even Ben Kind, long deceased. Warren's grown children are also introduced, as are his widow, his partner, and even some of his conquests, of whom there were many. The revelation of the meaning of the cipher garden at Tarn Cottage is a shocker, There are no extraneous scenes or characters in this well-written old-fashioned village-type cozy, but the lives of everyone are changed by the end of the novel. Poisoned Pen Press will soon open operations in England. I wonder if they will be able to find many more books of this quality.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, September 2005
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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