Foiled Again (Sarah Deane Mysteries) [Hardcover]

J. S. Borthwick (Author)

Book Description

Series: Sarah Deane Mysteries | Publication Date: February 6, 2007

The Drama School at Bowmouth College is staging its annual Halloween masquerade, known for being a little unusual. This year it's Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet with a twist---Romiette and Julio instead. English professor and sometime amateur sleuth Sarah Deane has been recruited to assist backstage with the complicated costume changes.
Drama students are known for being mischievous and high-strung, but this year things are a little more serious: During rehearsals a couple of the student actors pass the time by taking whacks at each other with the stage props, and their horseplay leaves Todd Mancuso, the brilliant actor playing Mercutio, wounded. And when Sarah stumbles upon a badly injured student hidden away in a stockroom on Halloween night, events take a turn for the worse. By the time the production is finally staged, a member of the faculty has been badly injured and a student has been killed. Talk about drama!
Sarah gets involved, of course, to sort out a mess that involves academic politics, angry actors, and student activities gone horribly wrong.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Offstage drama threatens the production of a gender-bending play, Romiette and Julio, at Maine's Bowmouth College in Borthwick's entertaining 13th academic cozy starring Sarah Deane, English professor and sometime sleuth (after 2004's Intensive Scare Unit). While sparks fly among the talented young cast (two women clobber the arrogant male lead), interdepartmental politicking escalates between the English department head, Danton McGraw, and the director of the drama school, Sarah's friend Vera Pruczak. Miraculously, the production itself goes off without a hitch, but after the curtain falls Sarah discovers a faculty member critically injured, and later, a student is found dead. She brushes off police warnings not to get involved in her quest for the truth. With natural dialogue and lively characters, the imaginative plot unfolds at a leisurely pace with enough twists to keep the reader guessing. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

The Sarah Deane series turns 25 with this typically engaging cozy. Sarah, English professor and amateur sleuth, agrees to help out with Bowmouth College's production of Romeo and Juliet, but, like true love, the course of amateur dramatics never runs smooth; soon a faculty member is critically injured, and a student is dead. Naturally, Sarah sorts everything out eventually, but, as fans of the series know, it's the small moments of discovery and the charming characterizations that make the tale so enjoyable. Recommend this to mystery readers who prefer a slower pace and more emphasis on the subtle interplay of characters. David Pitt
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Minotaur Books; 1st edition (February 6, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312366558
• ISBN-13: 978-0312366551
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #766,195 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars 13th Sarah Deane mystery, February 19, 2007

By 

Armchair Interviews (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Foiled Again (Sarah Deane Mysteries) (Hardcover)

Bowmouth College's new play is a unique twist on Romeo and Juliet. They're staging a production of "Romiette and Julio," and things are not going well. The off-stage drama mounts until two female drama students attack Todd Mancuso, the actor who plays Mercutio in the production.

Sarah Deane is an English professor at Bowmouth where department tension (between English Department head, Danton McGraw and the Drama School head, Vera Pruczak) escalates with far-reaching consequences. The play proceeds, but following the performance Sarah discovers an injured faculty member, and then a student is found dead.

As usual, Sarah ignores all warning about not getting involved and is determined to find out 'who done it.'

Foiled Again is J.S. Borthwick's thirteenth Sarah Deane mystery and my first reading of her books. I've become a fan and will search out her previous novels.

The characters are quirky and interesting, the academic politics are delicious and the plot takes you for a ride and you don't want it to end. This is a wonderful book for those lazy afternoons where you just want a good read.

Armchair Interviews says: Check out Foiled Again, you'll become a fan.

1.0 out of 5 stars Fluff, Poorly Researched, Edited & Plotted, April 1, 2009

By 

Memune (Wash DC USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Foiled Again (Sarah Deane Mysteries) (Hardcover)

It seems that Borthwick's work is getting more and more careless as the series progresses. This one isn't particularly well plotted and had me skipping whole pages on which nothing happened. The ending feels as though Borthwick just stopped writing and typed "The End." Though many of the characters are well drawn, the reader is left not knowing why any of them acted as they did.

As with the previous books, this one is so poorly edited as to give the impression that St Martin's is staffed by eighth-grade dropouts; the typos, punctuation errors and misspellings are distracting enough to tempt one to act like Professor Lenox Cobb in "Dolly is Dead" and send one's copy back to the publisher suitably annotated in red ink. Borthwick also has not done her research and makes several quite obvious errors of fact that two minutes with a medical dictionary would have prevented.

Though I enjoyed the previous Sarah Deane books, I finished this one more out of a sense of duty than any real enjoyment. I doubt that I will read any more.

3.0 out of 5 stars Unsatisfactory, August 27, 2007

By 

DyNama (Ohio, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Foiled Again (Sarah Deane Mysteries) (Hardcover)

yes it was a "cozy" mystery with a slow pace and great character development, but i kept waiting for some startling conclusion, some insight, and was disappointed. maybe i missed something but there were 'way too many unanswered questions by the end of the book. if you're not a regular mystery reader you may enjoy this book--the characters are appealing and believeable--but the mystery part is weak.