Murder in the Bookshop by Anita Davison

Murder in the Bookshop
by Anita Davison

ISBN-13: 9781785133060
ebook: 273 pages
Publisher: Boldwood Books
Released: August 22, 2023

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
1915, London : Working in the old bookshop that her Aunt Violet mysteriously inherited, Hannah Merrill discovers her best friend Lily-Anne in the bookshop with a paperknife through her heart. With the discovery of a coded German message, and Hannah’s instinct that Lily-Anne’s husband is keeping secrets, and she determines to get to the bottom of it. Hannah is helped by her outrageous, opinionated Aunt Violet. They think they’re making progress until one of their chief suspects is found dead.


My Review:
Murder in the Bookshop is a mystery set in 1915 in London. The actual detective is smart and does his job well (yay!), but Hannah considered him the enemy because he asked her questions. She found the body, it was her knife, and she has a key for the bookshop, so it's reasonable for him to ask her questions, but she held a grudge because of it. He's a nice guy, and her aunt likes him, but Hannah criticized his every move.

Hannah had a temper, so she often got mad at people. She often thought how she'd like to slap a man for being mildly condescending. She had a talent for stumbling across clues, but not for putting them together. By the end, the detective had clearly strongly suspected a certain person for a while and managed to get a full confession out of that person. Hannah was completely surprised by it.

There were no sex scenes. There was a very minor amount of bad language. The historical details about London at the beginning of WWI were interesting. If the story was the detective and Violet solving things, I'd read the next book, but I didn't care for Hannah (who dominated the story) and prefer smart amateur detectives.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.