Middle Sister's March Reads

The Trouble with Harriet by Dorothy Cannell  Originally published in 1999, an electronic version of this entry in the Ellie Haskell mystery series was recently released. When Ellie first appeared in the 1980s, she was a mystery series anomaly--a pudgy, rather plain woman, an ordinary heroine to whom genre characters could easily relate. Written with a not-so-subtle wink towards romance novels and some hilarious, intentionally flowery prose, I loved the series. I don't remember reading this when first published, so I happily revisited Ellie and Ben and Merlin's Court, especially delighted with the title since The Trouble with Harry may be my favorite Shirley MacLaine movie. Ellie's long-lost father arrives unexpectedly at Merlin's Court with the ashes of his lady love, and in the spirit of the movie, her ashes keep disappearing. Not my favorite entry in the series, but I did enjoy the peeks into Ellie's history before she became Our Heroine, and it holds up remarkably well despite the lack of modern technology that often glares in reissued novels. And no typos or other mistakes as the story was moved to a digital format--hooray!  Recommended

A March to Remember by Anna Loan-Wilsey I had to read a book with March in the title in March, right? This march, however, refers to an historical 1894 march by unemployed men on Washington D.C., and sets a murder mystery in and around both those observing the march and those participating in it. The historical aspect was very interesting, as this was an episode of American history I'd never heard of. The topic was very timely given the current economic and political climate in the US. The books appears well researched, in terms of of both the march and the capital of 1894 (appears because I didn't do more than a cursory investigation of Coxey's March myself). Hattie Davish, the main character, is intriguing because she's a working woman (a typist and secretary) at a time when most of these would have been men. I appreciated her sensitivity to the Washington prostitutes and her self-realization that with out a job, she'd be int he same situation as them. However, I found a few parts of the story contrived (her future sister-in-law happens to be friends with the wife of an important government official who happens to have a personal interest in helping the 'fallen women,' the interest of the First Lady in Hattie's personal affairs, etc) and the attitudes of a surprisingly large number of characters astonishingly late 20th century. I know modern cosy readers don't want to be annoyed or embarrassed or aghast by the attitudes of their amateur detectives, but this was veering slightly towards a steam punk-like fictional re-imaging. Hattie's fiancee was Mr. Twentieth Century Sensitive Guy, almost too good to be true. But all in all, it was a quick read, with an interesting historical hook that sub-genre devotees should find very appealing.