Customer Reviews

Death at Sandringham House: Her Majesty Investigates

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I really enjoyed this one. I loved the winter setting in Norfolk and the descriptions of the royal get-away residence. Loved "Margo" and "Lilibet." Very comic stuff. Benison does a great job of sending up the Brits, and giving some humanity to the over-criticized Royal Family. Great stuff!

Although I didn't enjoy this as much as "Death at Buckingham Palace", it was still alot of fun. I love all the slang! I grew up with a fair amount of British television and didn't find the slang hard to understand, but I think some would. It would be nifty if the author provided a glossary of some of the more obscure terms, which are also some of the funniest. I realize, though, that authors rarely do this. Once again, I found the characters interesting (although maybe a little less believable), the plot complex and hard-to-figure-out and the descriptions fun. I have to agree with some of the reviewers here in that I found the plot not as riveting as either of her two other works. Still, a great read!

I read this book because I thought the plot would be quite interesting. It is about the Queen, solving a murder mystery with the help of Jane Bee who is a housemaid, working for the Queen. The story takes place in the time between Christmas and New Year when the Royal family spends some time at Sandringham House. But when the body of a woman that looks exactly like the Queen is found in the village the quiet days are over. Jane who is present when the body is found is interested in the case and so is the Queen, especially because the tiara the woman is wearing had been stolen a long time ago. The Queen asks Jane to keep eyes and ears open for her and soon Jane finds out that there are many suspects. But before they can solve this mystery a second body is found. This second body gives the Queen all the clues she needed, to know who the murderer is and so on New Years Eve she is able to solve the mystery.

What I really liked about this book was the story. This book is 100% fictional and not based on a true story or the real characters but I really loved to imagine the Queen in the role of Sherlock Holmes. The story itself is not about the Queen, the heroine is Jane Bee and as the reader you'll always get her point of view and insight in her thoughts only. Till the end she doesn't know who the murderer is and so the reader doesn't know either but you can guess with her who did it.

Still I rated this book with three stars because the whole story was too fantastic to be true. To start with, the idea of the Queen, discussing a murder case with a housemaid, is very strange but without this idea there would be no story so you just have to accept it. Then many suspects talked too much and too freely about what had happened to Jane. If I were a suspect I wouldn't talk to a stranger about it at all. The suspects were another problem for me. The body was found in the village but somehow it turned out that there was a link from the dead woman to almost everyone who worked or was a guest at Sandringham House and who appeared in the book. Two of the suspects even found the body the evening before it was officially found but were too afraid to report this to the police. Last but not least, the dead woman, and please keep in mind that she looked like the Queen, is described throughout the whole book as very attractive for men. Who should believe that?

It is definitly not a book I'll read for a second time, it was not a page turner but it was not absolutly boring either. That's why I rated it somewhere in the middle. There are better books to read and if you have read all of those I would recommend you to buy this book. It's nice for entertainment but it's definitly not a must read.

Lots of fun! Jane Bee, lowly housemaid to Queen Elizabeth, happens to be on hand when Her Majesty discovers a body - one that happens to be dressed up as the Queen, complete with tiara. The Queen is not amused and recruits Jane to become Her Majesty's eyes and ears. Working together they solve a 50-year-old mystery involving Wallis Simpson's wedding jewels and identify the killer. A well-constructed mystery and Jane's tongue-in-cheek commentaries on life in general, and life in the royal household in particular, keep you turning the pages

I love English mysteries but this one was hard to stay with. I became more involved towards the end, but not enough to give it a good recommendation. I liked the ensight into the royal family and their society, and the "upstairs, downstairs" relationships with the servants. I liked the spunky heroine, and the effeminate footman, Davey. However, it was hard to understand some of the British jargon/slang (I'll admit that is my problem, not the author's), and the plot was just not that intriguing.

Jane travels with the Queen to her vacation spot and is recruited by the Queen to find the murderer of a look alike woman. Though the book has lots of Brittish jibber jabber it's still a great read. I recommed it to any mystery lover who has an intrest in the Royal Family.

There was a novelty when I read her first book, Death at Buckingham Palace, but I would not recommend this book to my friends, unless they are interested in British Royal family very much. I know this book is a fiction, but I wonder if the Queen is really called "Lilbet" by Margo(Princess Margaret.) As for the mystery book, the author did not try to neatly tie loose ends, for example, three numbers on a blackmail letter, or the royal blackouts at Sadringham. Also, the involvement of Jane's father, a Canadian cop (RCMP) doesn't blend in well to the English village setting. The premise itself (the maid helps the queen on criminal investigation) of this series is a bit hard to swallow, so the author shouldn't have added another unlikely charcter as Jane's investigation assistant, even if it was her father. Having said that I haven't totally given up on C.C. Benison. I probably will read the third book after, say, six months interval. This book belongs to the category called 'tea and cake'-- you don't have to carefully follow word by word to find clues in the plot. This is perhaps both the weakness and the good thing in this type of mysteries.

First time I have read this author. It was recommended to me by a friend.
All 3 books arrived quickly and in new condition.

I enjoy the "Her Majesty Investigates" series very much. This book arrived in a timely fashion and in excellent condition. I was very pleased.

very interesting book to read, would love to find the 3rd book by the author