A Colourful Death

This writer excells at cozy mysteries that are not too cozy, if you know what I mean. In this outing, Evelyn Tyrnewell returns from picking up her neighbor Nick from the train station only to find his studio broken into and his art slashed. Thinking he knows the culpurate, Evelyn persuades him to allow her to go with him, to prevent him from doing something foolish, only to find the guy dead. It's up to Evelyn to convince the police that Nick's innocent.

This second installment of Dunn's Cornish mystery series is more dreadful than the first. Eleanor Trewynn's neighbor Jeff becomes the chief suspect when a woman who seems him standing over a dead body says she saw him commit the deed. Fortunately inconsistencies in witness testimony and Eleanor's alibi for Jeff convince police to hold off on arresting him. The biggest problem of this mystery is the author cannot decide whether it is a cozy mystery with Eleanor as sleuth or a police procedural with the official investigation in which Eleanor's niece DS Megan Pencarrow is a participant. Readers hear both voices and see both sides, making it an annoying mystery lacking direction. The mystery would be so much stronger as a DS Megan show more Pencarrow investigation without the annoying Eleanor Trewynn. I listened to the audiobook version. show less

From DuMaurier to Susan Cooper, with TV series such as POLDARK and DOC
MARTIN, and probably others I can't recall now, I've always enjoyed
works set in Cornwall. Maybe someday I'll get to go there. Meanwhile,
I can enjoy Carola Dunn's new series of Cornish Mysteries. A COLOURFUL
DEATH was a great break from tax preparation class, especially since I
was reading it in a large print edition -- it's so nice that large
print books now come out almost simultaneously with the "regular"
format. I can still read the print in an MMPB, but the large print
ones seem to go faster and I can stay up later reading them!

Eleanor Trewynn, who has spent most of her life working for an NGO,
returns to her native Cornwall after her husband's death and opens a
charity show more shop (similar to Oxfam) on the first floor of her cottage in a
small town. Her neighbor, artist Nick; the vicar's wife, who keeps the
shop organized; and her niece Megan, one of the first woman detectives
in the Cornish police force, are recurring characters. (The series is
set in the late 50s or early 60s so Megan is a bit of an oddity and
has the usual struggles with troglodyte colleagues.) A COLOURFUL DEATH
takes us to another nearby town and an artists' community which is
fraught with jealousy and then murder. Nick is initially accused, but
once he is cleared the suspects are numerous -- almost everyone had a
motive for killing the rather loathsome victim. The plot is rather
complicated and, some might say, far-fetched (I don't think my husband
would like this book), but the characters and setting are perfect.
Mrs. Trewynn reminds me a bit of Mrs. Malory in Hazel Holt's series --
she is someone I'd love to know in person, as are the other characters
except for the villains! I'm looking forward to the next Daisy
Dalrymple too, but I'm glad to have this new series to enjoy. show less

Very nice cozy mystery. I always like Carola Dunn's writing and although I like the Daisy Dalrymple series more, this one is interesting reading. It's set in 1960's Cornwall and the setting is both familiar to me (the 60's) and fresh and new (Cornwall). The mystery is not much of the mystery -- I knew in minutes after the murder who had done it but that didn't matter -- the characters and plot were interesting.

The second book in the Cornish mystery series from Dunn. There's lots of local atmosphere, mists on the moors, high hills to climb, and Eleanor is an engaging central character - I particularly liked that she got to use her Aikido skills in this book. These aren't taxing scary novels, I guessed the identity of the murderer really early on, but in getting to the solution Eleanor, Nick and Megan get to visit interesting places and people, so the journey was an enjoyable one.

Second mystery involving this character by the author of the famous Daisy Dalrymple novels. Set in Cornwall during present times, an artist is killed in his studio and a fellow artist stands accused by another hysterical artist. The accused is friends with Eleanor whose niece Megan is on the police force and is called in to investigate the murder. Lost of gossip, lots of banter back and forth, and some solid police work with hints from Eleanor and the accused. Lots of local color too. Satisfactory ending but hardly a mystery.

While I enjoy Daisy Dalrymple mysteries, I could not get into this book at all- even though I was vacationing in Cornwall while reading it! I guess I like a murder mystery that keeps you guessing, and there was no guessing here. I give two stars for the local color, and feel I am being generous.