It’s no secret around here that I love a mystery – especially a British one. In addition to classics like Dorothy Sayers and Agatha Christie, I can appreciate a modern-day British detective with a sharp eye and a crackling wit. Bonus points for nosy amateur sleuths with enjoyable supporting characters (because I love a good ensemble cast).
Lately, I’ve found all of the above in Samantha Clair, whose adventures in twenty-first-century London are more Dorothy Parker than Miss Marple, but nonetheless highly enjoyable.
Sam is the sarcastic, red-pen-wielding protagonist and narrator of a newish mystery series by Judith Flanders. An editor at a London publishing house, Sam is both keen-eyed and curious by nature. She gets caught up in her first case when one of her authors, who’s also a friend, goes missing. Sam can’t help poking her nose into the investigation, and almost by accident, she ends up in a relationship with Jake Field, the no-nonsense detective inspector. (Their romance has always struck me as a bit odd, if only because neither of them seems particularly keen on the other for quite a while. Maybe they’re just understated? But four books in, I’m convinced they like each other now.)
As she pursues the various cases that come her way, Sam doesn’t quit her day job – which is a good thing, since Jake would probably tell her not to. But that also means we, the readers, get an inside glimpse into life at Sam’s office. There’s a lot of juggling paperwork, a little bit of reading new manuscripts, a lot of sweet-talking difficult authors and a lot – a LOT – of office politics. There’s also, sadly but truly, a hefty dose of office sexism, which Sam fights on the sly with help from a few female colleagues and her whip-smart assistant, Miranda.
Outside the office, there are Sam’s neighbors, Kay and Anthony, who live upstairs with their adorable young son, Bim. Mr. Rudiger, the elderly hermit who lives on the top floor, never goes out but knows everything that goes on in the building, and I’ve enjoyed watching his friendship with Sam develop. And Sam’s impeccably polished solicitor mother, Helena, who knows everyone worth knowing and irritates Sam to no end by frequently being right about everything, is a great foil for her daughter.
Sam’s wry first-person narrative makes the series; it’s like going out with a sharp-tongued friend and hearing about her adventures over a drink (or several). These stories are not quite literature on the level of Sayers or Christie, but they’re a lot of fun.
If you’re an Anglophile, a publishing geek and/or a mystery lover, you might enjoy Sam’s adventures: smart and well plotted with a hefty dose of snark.
cakes, tea and dreams 