The Anty Boisjoly Mysteries
Author's Site
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This is not a review as such, more a note of appreciation for a fine series of books that have given my wife and I many happy hours. I am not sure how we found the first in the series (The Case of the Canterfell Codicil) but we were immediately hooked.
The Anty Boisjoly Mysteries are a series of books following the eponymous gadfly as he solves impossible locked room murders in upper-class 1920s England. Aided only by his wit, his improbably ancient valet Vickers, several fortifying mid-morning cocktails, and occasionally a suitably dour Scotland Yard detective, Anty navigates family dramas, old wills, treasure maps, secret passages, old chums from Oxford, and of course, murders with aplomb and a ready supply of bon mots.
Fitzsimmons is obviously going for a mixture of P.G.Wodehouse and Agatha Christie here. Usually I find such pastiche tiresome but Fitzsimmons has a real ear for language and a gift for larger-than-life characters. The books' vivid settings are inhabited by rich but eccentric old admirals, vapid clubmen, flappers in daring hats - every cliche of roaring twenties London is laid bare and made fun of.
Each book is a comfortable read - just the right length as to not outstay its welcome. The mysteries are pretty clever as well, tricky but fair. Fitzsimmons is churning these out, there are nine already, but there is no sign of a drop in quality. In fact, I have just finished the eighth (Mystery and Malice aboard RMS Ballast) and it might be my favorite.
I highly recommend checking them out if you have any interest in mysteries.