Elizabeth MacPherson is a feather-brained shallow woman who nonetheless becomes periphally involved in nearby murders. She is a teacher and is studying forensic anthropology for her graduate degree. However, to her dead bodies are similar to rocks; her real passions are her Scottish boyfriend, Cameron Dawson, and the English Royal family. When he calls from his family home in Scotland to Elizabeth in Virginia to tell her of an invitation from to Queen to attend a garden tea party at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, she is thrilled. However, she is not invited since only spouses can attend. Elizabeth and Cameron are only engaged, but not due to marry for at least a year! Elizabeth is not going to have this - so she immediately sets everything in motion for a wedding in three weeks. Only one person can accomplish this. Aunt Amanda Chandler, who we met in book one of the Elizabeth mystery series, is called into action. Since she is 100% southern belle, this turns out to be as easy as managing her mansion. The Dawsons will fly over from Scotland, the wedding will occur, then the couple will return to Scotland for the party with the Queen.Unexpectedly, a local woman, Clarine Mason, finds out from a phone call that her husband died in a car accident in California. The problem is he already died in a car accident in California five years previously! She has his cremated remains sitting in front of her. Opening the lid of the vase, she determines that there are definitely bones in there. Who died? As before, Geoffrey Chandler, Elizabeth's cousin, becomes curious about the situation. He conducts an investigation while Elizabeth and Amanda turn the house upside down preparing for the wedding. The police also explore various leads after confirming that this time Mason did die. Obviously a fraud has been committed and perhaps a murder as well. The next steps are to search newspaper records for obituaries and a visit to the local crematorium. But instead of answers, they find a recently created corpse on the floor of the office.I've actually put more emphasis in my review on the murder then what is present in the novel. These Elizabeth MacPherson books (now Dawson) are not really cozy MYSTERIES, but are COZY mysteries. The stories are full of humor and situational comedy skits, with a lot of fun deriving from eccentric relatives and small-town animosities. Elizabeth, an incredibly regular and normal, if shallow, person with a touch of Southern Belle, doesn't really solve anything except in handling family and friends and her own domestic or social disruptions. This series is literally the most lightweight of summer, or family holiday, reads I've ever come across, not counting Romances, where some parts of these seem to tread. The Virginia sunlight is blindingly pure of shadows. The writing skill of the author is good and there is no harm in spending a few hours with Elizabeth and her friends. These early books have varied in style and temperment while the author develops the character (In my opinion, I've never had a series character shift quite so much though, as well as the tone of the writing, but it all appears to be settling into a typical cozy genre, with a small dollop of murder in a separate dish).
Wedding Plan Machinations Dominate Very Light MysteryIt's amazing how reminiscent is this book of Margaret Maron's Deborah Knott series, in which Judge Knott usually presides over a light mystery as an excuse for 250 pages of southern folksy chit chat. In "Knot", it's the same thing with the leading lady, Elizabeth MacPherson. Liz is a forensic pathologist, a profession apparently in vogue given the Kathy Reichs series of books and TV show "Bones". However, MacPherson is really little more than an amateur sleuth whose plying of her trade in this book lasts about five minutes while she informs an enquiring mind that an urn full of ashes is a mix of human and animal bone fragments that appears to be the leftovers from a crematorium. The only excuse for a mystery is to be found in why another character was misled into thinking her husband was dead, only to have him show up at a morgue in California some five years later (again!). It turns out a frustrated travel agent turned crook was providing false disappearance proof (ashes) for people who wanted to get lost from their current lives. Meanwhile, two-thirds of the book is about MacPherson's pending marriage on five weeks notice (a year early) in order to attend a royal tea in England. While the writing style was charming enough, even frequently witty, the almost total lack of a plot, the complete superficiality of the characters, and the "who cares" reaction all that engendered did little to endear either the author or her work, assuming this one is representative, to this reader. The "Cat Who" books by comparison are probably more entertaining and just as meaty, read that "fluffy!" While we won't chalk this up as a complete waste of time, it's really a stretch to consider this a mystery. We'd say this might be a good choice for those that find Janet Evanovich just a little too intellectual!!!
What do You think about The Windsor Knot (1991)?
Elizabeth gets married in this book from the series, and while her fiance still feels a bit flat and underdeveloped to me, she was more like herself in this book and the general feel of the novel was light and fun. My favorite of Elizabeth's cousins, Geoffery, played a larger role than he usually does, and that was a bonus. (He reminds me of Val Kilmer's Doc Holliday in Tombstone.)I liked this book better than Paying the Piper, but it still won't be one of my faves by this author. It was fun, and made some interesting connections in the storyline. There was a lot of trivia about the British Royals in it, which is not terribly interesting to me, but others might enjoy that aspect more. I did find it a bit disconcerting when some new characters entered the novel after more than 100 pages in, and at first there was no rhyme or reason to the introduction. Eventually they were tied to the main storyline and they were essential to the plot, but it felt odd that they weren't a part of things sooner. Overall, an entertaining read.
—Suzanna
