Kelly has read Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas (Jane Austen Mysteries #12)

"Book 10 of the 2025 Read Your Hoard Challenge

I've been having difficulty settling on a book recently. I pick up one, then another, but can't seem to concentrate on any of them. What cures that? Agatha Christie, of course! Especially if it's a Miss Marple. I admired the structure of the mystery as I read, watching Christie weave together a train robbery, an underhanded young heiress, an absentminded clergyman, and the anachronistic hotel that Miss M has chosen as her get away.

Despite the presence of my favourite old bird, Miss Marple doesn't actually solve this one. She is merely the sharp eared and observant bystander. Chief Inspector Davy, to his credit, quickly realizes that she is a valuable resource and treats her accordingly, but it is he who does the heavy lifting, figuring out the whole web of crime.

I must confess that I enjoyed the delightfully vague Canon Pennyfather. The fact that he would wander the world continually unsure where he was going was amusing. The people who know him wait quite a while before starting to worry about him. I've gone through the same chain of emotion: starting with wondering, moving on to mild annoyance, followed by exasperation, and culminating in being acutely worried. I thought Christie managed that emotional arc very skillfully.

One other observation—when the jeweler comments on Elvira Burke, that young heiresses are more strictly separated from their cash than other inheritors, it made me think of Brittany Spears and how hard her family worked to keep her under a conservatorship so they could avail themselves of its advantages. There's really nothing new under the sun, is there?
"