Lonesome Road

My first Miss Silver and her third. I feel like classic detective pulp is a treasure trove. There's tight pacing, succinct characterisations, and an effective mystery with classic misdirections and some in-your-face clues.

Miss Silver is classically unobtrusive here. She hangs around the background and shows up to expound some wisdom. (Most of the time we are guided through the story via other characters' points of view, a partially omniscient third person voice which I always enjoy.) She uses her retired spinster schoolmistress persona to get people to underestimate her. And of course does the matter-of-fact final flourish of revealing the solution.

I do have Miss Silver 16 and 19 on my tbr, but I reckon I need to start collecting them all.

Rating: 3.5* of five

Much more modern in that Miss Silver is quite the force in moving the story. Much more Golden Age in that The Ladies are Ever So Ladylike and one silly chit of a slip of a girl gets all twisted up and confused by A Big Bad Man. Also irritating is the fact that it takes a man to sort out Miss Rachel Treherne, a quite redoubtable party until it comes to her ghastly family and their disgusting behavior.

Well, autres temps autres moeurs, don't you know, and in the end the right couples are coupled with the Big Baddie most satisfactorily served a comeuppance. If Miss Silver is ever silver screened, this entry in the series will be loaded with a lesbian subplot that is absolutely accurate...right there for anyone with ~2 show more eyes to see. Dunno that it'll make diddly squat difference. You either like this book or you don't, but forevermore don't read on because the final formula is fixed with this book and the next 25-plus don't vary it.

I also liked a lot that Miss Silver came to Miss Rachel Treherne's attention via Hilary Cunningham, née Carew. I don't recall if this little easter egg is repeated, but I hope so. show less

The third entry in the Miss Silver series of 1930s detective stories finds our gumshoe heroine engaged from the opening chapter, a departure from the two previous books. And she takes a more active role, going undercover to help an heiress figure out which of her family members is trying to kill her. Bad luck for her that they all seem to have a motive. The plot moves quite briskly, and there are a few twists thrown in to keep things interesting.

One of the things that struck me with this book, as with the others I've read in this series, is how obviously clues seem to be telegraphed along the way and then how laboriously the case gets explained when it comes to the wrapping up. I suspect it's an artifact of the time period, when show more mysteries and private detective stories were not so prevalent in culture, but it seems that nowadays authors are more subtle when dropping clues, even if they are playing fair with the reader and giving them all the info they need to figure out whodunit.

As an aside, I felt very much the same way when I read Sherlock Holmes for the first time a few years ago. All of his tricks seemed so obvious that I couldn't understand why he was so celebrated. Then I realized that the only reason they seem obvious to me is because I've been reading mystery authors who stole shamelessly from the canon for decades. At the time Arthur Conan Doyle wrote the stories they were breathtaking in their originality, and their success led to so many copycats that Sherlock's feats of brainpower seem almost pedestrian to modern readers. IMHO, of course. YMMV. show less

This was the third in the Miss Silver mysteries, published just 2 years after THE CASE IS CLOSED.
Rachel Treherne has been given Miss Silver's contact details by Hilary Carew who was at the centre of that case.

Miss Silver agrees to visit Rachel at home and to see the situation for herself. They bring the date of Miss Silver's visit forward by a day when snakes are left in Rachel's bed. And, in case there was any doubt her life was under threat, someone attempts to kill her on the very night Miss Silver arrives.

Miss Silver ends up being no mere observer in this case, often taking a very active role in the investigation. Rachel has a number of people very heavily dependent on her, some harbouring a grievance that they did not do better show more under her father's will, and some resenting that Rachel has been left in charge of so much wealth.

A very readable story, that keeps the reader going with the desire to understand what is actually happening.

For those looking for a comparison between Miss Silver and Agatha Christie's Miss Marple: the similarities end with the grey hair and the knitting in the lap. Miss Silver is a much more organised and systematic detective, free with her advice, and willing to take active steps to follow the investigation through. Miss Marple is more an observer after events have occurred, always comparing her observations with her memories of village life. While Miss Marple often predicts outcomes, she rarely takes active interventive steps (although I am sure you can think of exceptions here) show less

Rachel Traherne has inherited wealth and property and a number of relatives who consider themselves dependent on her, as they inherited nothing. She also has recently had three attempts made on her life.

Having heard from a friend of Miss Silver and her detective abilities and her discrete style of investigation, Rachel asks Miss Silver to find out who is trying to kill her. The money is the focus and the anonymous threat letters and attempts on her life are accelerating.

Miss Silver comes to stay at Whincliff Edge (the property) to observe the various relatives and their attitudes. Rachel’s sister and family exhibit the most demanding while putting on a “concerned for Rachel” act. There are also four other cousins who are in and show more out of Whincliff and also have asked for money. Suspects abound!

Dressed in dark coloured dresses, heavy stocking, Jewellery long out of style, conservative shoes and a net on her hair, carrying a fabric bag filled with knitting needles and yarn hides the fact that Miss Silver is an adept detective. She is able to observe the behaviours and piece together who is involved in the attacks.

Along the lines of Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, I find the Miss Silver series enjoyable. Set in an earlier time that moves in a slower pace, it is steady in the plot line. show less

Synopsis: Rachel Treherne has always had a steady head on her shoulders; it’s why her late father named her the sole trustee of his considerable fortune. But the decision galled a number of Rachel’s relatives, including her married older sister, her socialist nephew, and her father’s ambitious young cousin. Rachel fears she may be overreacting to the anonymous letters she’s received threatening her life, but then someone tampers with the chocolates she bought herself. If her cousin hadn’t partaken first and noticed an unwholesome taste, who knows what may have happened? Miss Silver suspects someone in Rachel’s inner circle has grown tired of being a poor relation, and she travels incognito to the Treherne country home to show more unmask the culprit—before it’s too late.
Review: This story follows the same pattern as all the other books. I was tired of the sponging family within a few pages and hoped that they would all get bumped off. It's annoying that there are very few strong woman characters. show less

The Lonesome Road of the title refers to the path in life followed by Rachel Treherne, who inherited a large sum of money from her father and is now concerned because she believes that one of her dependent relatives may be trying to kill her. She calls in Miss Silver to investigate and find out just who is trying to kill her and why. Wentworth builds the tension throughout the book, which ends in a nailbitingly tense denoument. Wonderful.