Customer Reviews

The Keeper of Secrets

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In 1810, newly ordained parson, Tobias Campion is taking up a position as Vicar to a parish in Warwickshire, under the auspices of a distant cousin, Lady Elham. On the very first night, he prevents the attempted rape of a servant girl, Lizzie, only to discover her hideously mutilated body in the woods, a few weeks later. With the help of his manservant, Jem and his new friend and neighbour, Doctor Hansard, they are determined to find the murderer and the reason for other attacks and disappearances around the neighbourhood. The quest takes them over the countryside to a private asylum near Bath where Lady Elham's son is confined after repeated attacks on both humans and animals. I found this book to be an excellent read, fast flowing yet with many twists and turns and can only hope that this is the beginning of a series of books featuring the Rev. Tobias Campion.

In 1810, young Tobias Campion arrives to take his position as the parson of a small countryside parrish in Warwickshire. Because his belongings have been delayed, he stays with his distant cousin, the Lady Elham, where he is forced to intervene when one of her son's drunken friends attack a young maid. The girl is Lizzie Woodman, gentle and stunningly beautiful. Campion, his loyal groom and a local swain are smitten by her.

We know in a brief prologue that someone is dead, but we don't know who or why or when. Much of the first part of the book is spent setting things up. Campion has come from an extremely privileged background and has to make adjustments living on his small salary. He's also exposed to the poor of the parrish, living in earth-floored cottages if they are lucky and huts worse than animal pens if they are not--and is shocked at their deprivation. He befriends the local doctor, Hansard, a traveled man who became rich abroad but who gambled most of his money away. Campion attempts to make the lives of the poor of his parrish a bit less miserable, giving sermons on charity and trying to teach the children to read. These things do not sit well with many who believe in the status quo and people keeping to their proper place in life.

Then there are deaths... One that is determined to be either an accident or due to health problems, but which is still troubling. Then another that is obviously murder. There is an obvious suspect... a young man who likes killing animals. But can they find him and prove it? By they-- I mean Campion and his man with the help of Dr. Hansard, who have personal reasons to be looking in on the murder(s).

Campion is a sympathetic character, worldly in some ways, but also young and idealistic. The older Dr. Hansard is both teacher and companion. There are convincing details of daily life and local politics. The mystery is not bad. There are some nice twists, although I actually could spot the killer before the end (something I'm ordinarily not adept at). Overall, I was very pleasantly surprised by this book. I will eagerly look for the next in the series and may check into other books by this author.

In spring 1810, Reverend Tobias Campion, who has turned his back on a life of privilege, takes up his small Warwickshire parish of Moreton Priory. Alas, his first night in the village as the guest of his distant cousin, Lady Elham, is exciting for all of the wrong reasons. Tobias intervenes in the attempted rape of Lizzie Woodman, a housemaid in his cousin's home. While this makes him a hero to some, it brings him the enmity of others.

Nothing is quite what it seems in at Moreton Priory. Tobias makes friends with Dr Edmund Hansard, uses his social conscience in relation to the lives of the labourers and poor of the village, and consequently offends some of his parishioners. At the same time, while he has deepening feelings of affection for Lizzie, he is aware that others are also attracted to her. Soon, though, a number of deaths and accidents occur and soon Reverend Campion and Dr Hansard join forces to try to uncover some answers.

It is not particularly fast-paced and some may find that the scene-setting takes too long. However, once the scene is set and the characters established, the novel is full of twists and turns and some insights into the social history of the times. It is the historical setting rather than the mystery that makes this novel most enjoyable. This is the first book in a series and I'll be reading the next book `Shadow of the Past' to see how what the future holds in store for Tobias Campion.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

The Keeper of Secrets by Judith Cutler is basically the anti-Sebastian St. Cyr novel though both are set during the Regency. While the St. Cyr novels deal with an overtly grizzly society and mix the horrors of the outskirts with the vicious underbelly of London; Tobias Campion and friends are nestled in shrouded Moreton St. Jude: a village seemingly outset from the crimes of urban centre....

Tobias Campion is a young minister who has recently stepped into clerical role in the small country parish of Moreton St. Jude. Relinquishing his family's rich status and devoting himself to a higher calling, Toby is confused by the sinister under-workings of the seemingly small and well-functioning town.

Together with his servant Jem and the delightful Dr. Hansard, Toby is forced to utilize his intuition, integrity and deductive skills to solve whether or not one Lord of the Manor was killed by accident and the gruesome murder of a young maid with whom Tobias ( minister or not ) was completely smitten.

The book is wracked with social commentary and minutiae on daily life in rural Regency England. This is the coziest of historical tea cozies and, like the best detective stories, the murder and mystery take second precedent to the charm of daily life and the excellent, if soft-handed, characterization of the village people.

Rather than spouting facts about the Regency period and some of its social inequalities and atrocities, Cutler, instead, couches her humane and inspiring story within the confines of Regency setting. You do not feel you are reading a historical novel because you are so very much involved in the historical novel.

The people and places and little happenstances of every day life are what colour the outlines of this superbly-written mystery.

Though set a century-and-some before, Cutler's tale reminded me very much of Foyle's War: another character piece where murder is sewn into the fabric of society and daily life in Hastings, as daily life in Moreton St. Jude, is painted in unobstructed colour. All of the characters are easy to emotionally invest in and the tale plays out in vividly relatable circumstance.

I so look forward to reading Shadow of the Past.

In this very enjoyable historical mystery more than one character is the keeper of secrets. In fact, upon reflection, it would seem that almost every main character had a least one secret. The way Judith Cutler managed to weave all those secrets into a suspense novel was a delight for me to read.

Tobias Campion was given the living of Moreton St. Jude by Lady Elham, a distant cousin of his mother's. Tobias felt a calling to the clergy, even though his secret was that his wealthy family made it unnecessary for him to ever earn his own living. This world will prove to be a very different place from the one he has inhabited all his privileged life and in this world Tobias will come directly in contact with the poverty and privations suffered by the poor while the rich remain unmoved by those conditions. Tobias meets the beautiful housemaid Lizzie Woodman when he rescues her from the unwanted advances of another house guest at Moreton Priory. Her safety then becomes his concern and when she disappears, he sets about trying to find what has happened to her. Dr. Edmund Hansard and Tobias join forces to try to solve the strange and awful happenings which keep coming faster and faster as this story progresses.

I thoroughly enjoyed the plotting and the characterizations in this novel. Judith Cutler wrote a moving depiction of the incredible differences in the lives of poor and rich in Regency England and used her parson as a fine example of how men and women of conscience were moved to help with whatever means were at their disposal. I found her characters to be very interesting. I thought the pace of the story moved a little slowly for quite a while, I'm sure in order to give her the opportunity to explain who and what kinds of people her characters are. Nevertheless, it did seem to go slowly until the investigation began in earnest. After that point, the story positively flew. I did not guess until toward the end who the guilty party was nor the many secrets which were leading to the crimes. For readers who enjoy period thrillers, this one is well worth your time to explore.

Judith Cutler is one of my favorite writers, and I'm a bit puzzled as to why she's not more well known on this side of the pond. Her characterizations are often brilliant, she knows how to plot and to set a fine pace. She's even made me laugh countless times, so she's no stranger to humor.

Her series about young police officer Kate Powers shows how difficult it can be to juggle a personal life with a demanding career. Her series about an older police officer Fran Harman portrays a very caring woman toward the end of her career, and she's also written two laugh-out-loud funny books centering around Josie Welford, a middle-aged pub owner in the West Country. When I discovered that she'd written an historical mystery, I almost clicked my heels together in glee. I couldn't wait to see what Cutler could do in a different time period. She does a very fine job indeed with young Parson Tobias Campion in the spring of 1810.

Born to a life of wealth, Campion accepts a living in the small village of Moreton St. Jude, and his real education begins. His privileged childhood has not prepared him for the poverty in which he's surrounded. Fortunately he's guided by a fine cast of supporting characters: his childhood friend and (now) servant Jem, Edmund Hansard the local doctor, and the housekeeper of Moreton Priory, Mrs. Beckles. He is a sincere and quick learner which is a very good thing because things begin to happen. A poacher dies a suspicious death. A local aristocrat meets an untimely end, and Campion himself is viciously attacked. Just what is going on in Moreton St. Jude? What is the secret for which someone is so eager to kill?

Cutler once again has a marvelous cast with the lovable and naive Campion at the center surrounded by three stout hearts and true. The early nineteenth century comes to life under her pen, and her social commentary is in turns chilling and humorous. The only part of the book that was a letdown for me was the identity of the murderer. I don't consciously set out to figure out whodunit from the very first page. If I do figure it out, all well and good, but one phrase in The Keeper of Secrets leaped out at me, and everything fell into place way too early. I felt as though I'd stepped on the blade of a hoe and got whacked right between the eyes with the stick. Ouch.

That was a bit disappointing, but my championship of Judith Cutler is unchanged. I won't rest until I've read every single one of her books!

The book opens with a bang, as Tobias Campion steps in to save Lizzie, a housemaid, from attempted rape by a nobleman staying at his cousins' country estate. Campion, a newly-fledged vicar, is a guest almost by accident; he has arrived to take up the post of vicar of the parish, and is staying with his distant cousins only because the cart containing his household goods has temporarily gone missing. (It's clear from the preface, a chapter in which a character who is clearly Campion discovers hair that precisely matches the description of Lizzie's, that the hapless maidservant will end up as the key victim in the mystery.)

His life becomes entwined with that of the family and the maidservant in ways that he could never have predicted in this series debut by veteran mystery novelist Judith Cutler. Within weeks, Campion -- himself brought up in an aristocratic family in Regency England -- has confronted first-hand the plight of the poor, met a like-minded physician and found himself in conflict with his patrons. Then the lord of the manor drowns in what is hastily ruled an accident -- and the mysteries begin to multiply.

Unfortunately, the plot becomes overly ambitious, involving missing (perhaps dead?) coachmen, a missing heir to the estate, and ultimately a missing maidservant and missing dowager, who Campion and his allies seek for in vain in Bath. Some twists and turns take place without enough foundation and are downright irritating -- while Campion and the doctor spend days apparently searching for the dowager in Bath, she suddenly pops up back at Moreton Priory -- the reader never learns where she has come from. The number of red herrings trailed across the path (I won't cause further distraction or risk being a 'spoiler' by spelling any out) become a bit irritating. There are also hints about Campion's past life as the younger son of an aristocratic family educated about Eton or Cambridge that need either to be developed more fully or discarded altogether -- perhaps Cutler is trying to build up some suspense about Campion's decision to take holy orders, but if so, it doesn't really click. Nor was his romantic interest in Lizzie very convincing. The plot is transparent enough that the "who" was readily identifiable, even if the "why" took a little longer to take shape.

Nonetheless, the naive Campion discovering the realities of life in the English countryside of 1810 is an intriguing character in a setting that will be unfamiliar to many readers. (Most novels set in this time take place in the context of Regency society in London or fashionable resorts, or else in the context of the Napoleonic Wars, which are, oddly enough, referred to only in passing in this work.) And the plot, if viewed as a classic "cozy" in a historical setting, was solid enough for me to want to read the next book in the series. I'm curious to see how the characters of Campion & his sidekicks -- Jem, a family retainer, and Dr. Hansard -- evolve and the settings Cutler creates for them in which they will doubtless solve more crimes. It is Cutler's descriptions of the evolution of both Campion and Hansard and the world which they must navigate -- the social nuances of leaving calling cards, the relationships between different classes and professions -- that is the strongest part of the book, and delivered so deftly that it never distracts the reader from the action.

There's a chance that this could develop into an interesting series; there is also a risk that it becomes formulaic. Only time will tell. In the meantime, it's a good read on a cold winter's night for anyone who enjoys a decent mystery and isn't looking for anything too demanding or gritty.