An Elizabethan Mystery

Assassin by Grace Cavendish
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I briefly started this when I first bought it but then set it aside. This time, I read on and enjoyed the whole thing. (Also, it comes in a beautiful hardcover volume that's a pleasure to handle.)

I'm not sure if this is meant to be MG or YA; it leans toward the former, IMO, but it may sorta fall in the crack between. Sometimes, it's a lot of fun to read such books, and that's how I felt about this novel. With a quick plot and quite a bit of action, it reads briskly and tells an entertaining story in 40,000 words or so, like a welcome visitor who drops by and then heads out again while you're still having a good time.

Grace, a maid of honor to Queen Elizabeth I, is getting pressed to get married, and in the course of meeting some suitors there is a murder in the castle. The way this young woman--with a few friends--goes about solving the murder while not having very much freedom of movement is quite realistic. The characters are round enough to suit the needs of the story and the genre, and the plot is reasonably complex while being straightforward enough for younger readers.

And entertaining enough for old ones, too.

Recommended for historical mystery readers who are open to MG or YA. (Fun people only, obviously.) :)



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