Cassandra Chan The Young Widow

The Young Widow

Cassandra Chan

St. Martin's, Aug 2005, $23.95

ISBN: 0312337485

Someone poisons ailing elderly Geoffrey Berowne using lilies of the valley. Local Surrey police feel they have the prime suspect his much younger wife Annette who inherited a fortune when she put her third husband under the ground. They look no further.

Detective Sergeant Jack Gibbons thinks the case is too simple if one assumes that Annette got away with killing her previous spouses then one can conclude she would do a better job covering her tail this time too. He wonders if someone is setting her up to take the fall using the mysterious deaths of her first two spouses as circumstantial evidence and the greedy motive of inheritance. However, he is also attracted to her even if she turns out to be a black widow. Jack begins looking at the greed angle honing in who wins if Annette is convicted of murder. Geoffrey's son Paul gains much more without a grieving widow to share money with and the victim's sister-in-law Maddie Wellman from his first marriage detested the intrusion of Annette especially in the will. Jack's best friend amateur sleuth Philip Betancourt worries about his fall into the spider's web so tries to solve the case to avert disaster.

Once the reader accepts that a long time pro like Jack would allow his wrong head to rule much of his actions, fans will enjoy a fine English police procedural. The storyline is cleverly designed with solid twists so that the audience does not know who will take the fall or whether Annette is a killer or just chooses bad luck husbands. Readers will enjoy this fine tale while wondering if Jack can save the day.

Harriet Klausner