Fiona Buckley

This is the twenty-third book in the Ursula Stannard series of Elizabethan mysteries. Such a long series inevitably ebbs and flows but, after a couple of very strong entries, I thought this was rather weak. Seemingly random individuals living on the Cornish coast in and around Penzance and the Lizard peninsula are being kidnapped and Ursula impersonates a distant relative of one of them and inhabits his house in order to try to find out what happens. On the positive side, there are as usual some colourful and interesting characters and I nearly always like a novel set in Cornwall. But I found the scale and motivation of the whole kidnapping plot when this was revealed to be utterly implausible, as was the fake royal progress and the Queen Elizabeth doubles. I thought Ursula's reaction to Juniper Penberthy was out of character and, for the first time, I found myself hoping this would be the final end to the series. We will see - Ursula is 60 years old, which is probably the equivalent of about 80 now after all.… (mere)

The author is better known for her historical novels usually set in Medieval or Tudor England, but this was I think her first novel, published in 1984, about an interracial marriage between a white English woman and an Indian man. I am assuming this is based on the author's own experiences. Melanie Purvis is from rural Somerset, Avtar Singh is from Chandigarh. This is generally novel is not so much about racist prejudice per se, but much more about the duality of the cultures competing within Melanie and pulling her in two directions. I thought this internal conflict was very well described and quite nuanced. At varying times I thought she would settle definitively for one or the other. She visits England against Avtar's opposition as she yearns for a break from the ordered tradition of the Punjabi community. The final moment of decision came when her English relative Frances makes a casual remark about Melanie's future child being half caste, "they’re neither one thing nor the other, are they? People won’t accept them here". Melanie counters that the child will be “Indian as well as English. Inheritor of two lands, two tongues, two literatures. Someone with a chance of growing up richer, more knowledgeable and less prejudiced than anyone limited to only one of each. Is that supposed to make people into something less than human?" Melanie is reconciled with Avtar and returns to India to have her baby, while intending to return periodically to England for work and personal reasons. I really enjoyed this thoughtful novel.… (mere)

Readable but, as the kids say, "mid." I did like that the main character, Ursula, is a bit reckless and cavalier about what she does without suffering too much of a case of the stupids. But while this is marketed as a mystery, there's not really much of a mystery here—if I had to come up with a category for it, I'd say Queen's Ransom belongs to something like "cosy thriller." It was fine, but the constant undercurrent of "rational English Protestants who understand that God is love" versus "the swarthy French Catholic zealots who want to burn all heretics at the stake" got old quick.… (mere)

This is the twenty-second book in the Ursula Stannard series of Elizabethan mysteries. As I was reading this, I got the feeling that the author might be about to finish this series. Partly this was because of her age (she is 86 this year), but also the feel of the narrative itself - a very dramatic plot, a deeply personal revenge attack on Ursula's extended family and household, conveying a real feeling of dread and terror ("I feel as though there is a net of steel all round us, all round me, and it is closing in on me." This plot was wrapped up with still 50 pages to go, and after the trial and execution of the revengers, there was a further feel of finality with a nicely romantic end where Ursula's son Harry gets married and she bequeaths Hawkswood to him, retiring to her recently inherited estate of Faldene, which is now hers following the deaths of the uncle and aunt who brought her up. Yet at the end, waking up in her new house, she is still privately prepared in case she is once again called upon to do her duty.… (mere)