(Disclaimer: this was sent to me by an agent.)
I hadn't heard of the Maisie Dobbs novels before, but now I think I'll have to keep an eye out. This was interesting.
In 1931, Maisie Dobbs is a psychologist/PI, as well as a former nurse in the Great War. She's managed to do pretty well for herself, but is still emotionally reeling (in a calm, quiet sort of way) from both the impending death of her first love, who was mentally destroyed in the war, and from being on the outs with her mentor.
Maisie takes a quiet-sounding job from an old friend- he wants to buy an estate in the village of Herondene and wants to find out if things are on the up-and-up there. No, they are indeed not, but for reasons it's hard to put your finger on. The lord of the manor is a drunken ass, but why is everyone else there so secretive? And why do fires keep breaking out at the same time every year?
Maisie suspects it has to do with the totally random zeppelin that fell on the town during the war, which landed on a bakery and killed almost all of the family that lived there except the son who died in the war at the same time. As an ambitious local reporter tells her, people have been acting weird about it ever since. But why would that be?
And then there's the local gypsy population, who of course are getting blamed for stuff. Maisie's a bit psychic thanks to having a gypsy grandmother, so she hits it off with the head of the tribe. And Beulah has a feeling that Maisie can help...
It's interesting to read. I enjoyed Maisie's bits of psychic detection, particularly when she talked about dowsing for silver. The plot itself is personality detection, which I enjoyed. I do wish Maisie showed a wee bit more of emotion, but for all I know, that might have happened in earlier books.
Anyway, I liked this, will keep an eye out for more. Four stars.
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