Customer Reviews

MacPherson's Lament

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

 

 

This is the seventh book in the series about amateur sleuth/forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson. While it is an enjoyable read, Elizabeth doesn't appear on the scene until over half-way through the book! This time the book focuses on Elizabeth's older brother, Bill MacPherson, who is not as captivating a character as his younger sister or his new law partner, A.P. Hill.

The main story involves Bill as he begins his law career as a partner in the firm of MacPherson & Hill. Bill's first case is to handle his parents divorce. After dealing with that, he figures that helping the sweet old ladies at the Home for Confederate Women sell their house will be a piece of cake. Unfortunately, Bill ends up getting charged with fraud, theft, and murdering 8 elderly women.

At this point Bill's younger sister, Elizabeth, returns to Virginia in order to save her brother's name and career; and try to stop her parent's divorce proceedings. Armed with a clue from cousin Geoffrey, Elizabeth rushes across the south in an effort to locate the Confederate Women and save the day.

This is an enjoyable book, but the charm of the Elizabeth MacPherson series is the unbridled lunacy and fun as Elizabeth stumbles into trouble wherever she goes; from her cousin's wedding, to the Scottish games, or an archaeological dig in the outer Scottish islands. Unfortunately, in an effort to branch out the series, Ms. McCrumb decided to focus on another member of the MacPherson clan. If she decides to branch out again in the future, I recommend concentrating on eccentric cousin Geoffrey Chandler!

I was all set to enjoy this book as much as I enjoyed Ms. McCrumb's later Appalachia series. Unfortunately, I found that her earlier work does not compare to the work that she produces today.

MacPherson's Lament is a continuation of the series about forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson and the travails of her southern family. This book concerns her brother, Bill, who unwittingly sets himself up for charges of fraud when he sells an antebellum mansion for a group of Southern ladies to a Yankee fortune hunter. He finds out later that the house really belongs to the State of Virginia--his clients disappearing to parts unknown.

Elizabeth helps him out of this predicament in addition to helping his law partner, A. Powell Hill, with a murder case she is trying in court.

One review says that the book would lead to "a Civil War secret that may be the key to the ugly truth...." I did not find one at all, just a series of misunderstandings and disappointment.

For those who like them, this would make a very enjoyable cozy mystery read. I was expecting more, though, and like one reviewer I really saw no mystery in the book. But, I still like Sharyn McCrumb's work and plan to read the further adventures of Elizabeth MacPherson.

Newly minted attorney Bill MacPherson sets up shop in Southside Virginia with law partner A.P. Hill (yes, she is descended from the General). As A.P. busies herself in a murder case, Bill finds himself in hot water when some old ladies whose house he's just sold just maybe don't own the house. And just why did they want the money wired to the Cayman Islands? And where are they? It falls to sister Elizabeth to sort things out.

Quick moving, an easy read. Even though as a lawyer myself (Virginia, too), stories about a lawyer's troubles are not entertainment for me, it was still an enjoyable read. ...

Somewhat of an annoyance for me were a number of errors McCrumb made about Virginia law--for example, the prosecutor would be referred to as the Commonwealth's Attorney. More an annoyance than anything else but it displays a lack of research detail.
Well worth reading.

This series is quite different from the Appalacian Ballard series but vive la difference. There is a lot of sly humor tucked away, especially if you have read the others (not necessarily in any particularly order). Think more of the family and friends saga of Stephanie Plum but with more literary wit and you have the gist of it. I am waiting impatiently for the next book (PMS Outlaws was the last) to see where Bill and AP are going, what cousin Jeffrey is up to and how Elizabeth will reinvent herself.

I read this book, and liked it. It really seems to grab your attention...It has everything in it... the setting of the Appalachians...a murder mystery...Sharyn McCrumb puts all of these together in one great book. I enjoyed the parts on how Sharyn described in detail the characters. She describes perfectly the "southern" style, and the "southern" talk... Read this book and you will enjoy it very much.

After a number of books, it's kind of nice to see the minor characters getting a major role. I thought the Civil War references were incredible, as a sweet and funny satire of all us Southerners still fighting the war. Anyway, I found this method of a mystery less infuriating than many writers who have their heroes act like a cross between MacGuyver and Robocop.

McCrumb greatly sets her books in the Appalachian. She is very detailed about the surroundings in the appalachia.

I really enjoyed this book, it was very funny. However, I think it is mischaracterized as a mystery, there really is no mystery to it. But I enyoyed it all the same.

The next book in Sharyn McCrumb's popular "Elizabeth MacPherson" series of mystery genre books disppoints, as did the last few installments of her heroine's exploits. It is inexplicable to her readers, one would think, that an author who can create near-literature in the form of the Ballad series can continue to scribe the near-vacuous Elizabeth, and her friends and family. The only character worth reading, anymore, is her rather delightful cousin, who never hesitates to cause trouble.

But the character of Elizabeth refuses, arbitrarily, to grow, as any normal human would. Elizabeth *never* actually solves a mystery; she is Watson to our Holmes, or worse, Wooster to our Jeeves. Yet, there is no character whom *does* solve the mysteries; Elizabeth is nothing more than an air-headed bystander to the proceedings, and invariably misguided, or, worse, stupid. As Poirot once remarked of Hastings, all we have to do is view Eliabeth's (Hasting's) concept of the! crime, and we *know* that it's wrong.

The original Elizabeth MacPherson books were, initially, at least somewhat humorous. And, if McCrumb would devote one-tenth the time in writing and development to these books that she does to the Ballad series (she spent four years researching for her latest, "The Ballad of Frankie Silver") they would be not only "good reads," but worthwhile, as well. But, one can only assume that she has enough fans so that she can continue to simply whip out MacPherson books like so much mind confetti, so that she can dedicate "real" time to her other work. After all, in a country where "The Bridges of Madison County" stayed on the NY Times Bestseller's List for longer than anyone can remember, I am quite certain that the same type of reader will eagerly await and read the "third-tier" McCrumb books...the Elizabeth MacPherson series. For myself, I shall stay with the Ballad series, unless and unt! il McCrumb decides to spend just a little more time on the ! characters, plotlines, etc., of the MacPherson books.