Evanly Choirs [Hardcover]

Rhys Bowen (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: ST MARTINS PRESS @ (2006)
• ASIN: B002BOVP8E
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,630,581 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Rhys Bowen's books have been nominated for every major mystery award and she has won thirteen of them to date. She currently writes two historical mystery series, each very different in tone. The Molly Murphy mysteries feature an Irish immigrant woman in turn-of-the-century New York City. These books are multi-layered, complex stories with a strong sense of time and place and have won many awards including Agatha and Anthony. There are 10 book so far in this series plus the free Kindle story, The Amersham Rubies--a great way to introduce new readers to Molly's spunky personality.

Then there is Lady Georgie, Rhys's latest,and very popular, heroine. She's 34th in line to the throne of England, but she's flat broke and struggling to survive in the Great Depression. These books are lighter and funnier than Molly's adventures. They poke gentle fun at the British class system--about which Rhys knonws a lot, having married into an upper class family rather like Georgie's, with cousins with silly nicknames,family ghosts and stately homes. The fifth book, Naughty in Nice, is in stores now, and watch out for a big Christmas book in time for the 2012 holidays.
This year the series received the Readers Hoice Award for favorite mystery series.

Rhys was born in Bath, England and spent a lot of time growing up in Wales with her Welsh relatives. Those childhood experiences colored her first mystery series, about Constable Evans in the mountains of Snowdonia. 10 books including the Edgar nominee Evan's Gate. She has lived in Austria, Germany and Australia, but has called California her home for many years. She now escapes to a condo in Arizona during those cold California winters. When she's not writing she loves to travel, sing, hike and play the Celtic harp.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An absolute delight, August 4, 1999

By 

Joan A. Curtin (Broadview Hts., OH USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Evanly Choirs: A Constable Evans Mystery (Hardcover)

EVANLY CHOIRS, the third book in a charming series by Rhys Bowen, returns the reader to the village of LLanfair, Wales and the world of Police Constable Evan Evans. The mysteries in this delightful series are intriguing, but the true joy in reading them comes from the feeling that you know the people of Llanfair.

Bowen has created a village full of wonderfully idiosyncratic characters; from Evans the Meat (butcher) to Evans the Post (mailman), to the alluring barmaid, Betsy who has set her sights on the charming Evan Evans (Evans the cop).

The murders are a fun puzzle, but the visit to Llanfair is priceless.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars As good as the others, August 13, 2000

By 

"sarasarah" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Evanly Choirs (Constable Evans Mystery) (Paperback)

I'm following these mysteries with interest and enjoyment. The plots are good but it's the characters that are the real draw for the book. Ms. Bowen is adept at creating a warm atmosphere and likable, humorous characters. And Evan Evans is such a wholesome, good guy that it's a heartening reading about him after a bit of darker literature. These books are my guaranteed pleasant reads and I'm happily looking forward to the next.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hwyl iawn i Rhys Bowen, August 24, 2000

By 

D. P. Birkett (Suffern, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Evanly Choirs (Constable Evans Mystery) (Paperback)

Basically a British cosy with a Welsh setting and Welsh village stereotypes instead of English village stereotypes. Most of the humor derives from stereotyping and there's no great dialogue. Sort of Welsh Agatha Christie. Some of the detail is not authentic. The crown and the chair are different contests at the National Eisteddfod (the only one with a robed gorsedd of bards.) The crown is for free verse the chair is for cynghanedd. Ingenious plotting with no cheating. The clue is planted early on. No sex and minimal violence. As the Booklist blurb on the cover says "a perfect book to curl up with on a rainy day."