An Act of Villainy
“You’ve stumbled upon another body,” Inspector Jones says to the wife-and-husband sleuth team Amory and Milo Ames. It’s in fact the fifth (body that is) that the Ames pair has come across and sussed out the murderer thereof in the latest mystery from Edgar-nominated author Ashley Weaver.
The body in question in An Act of Villainy is that of actress Flora Bell, mistress of socialite and play director Gerard Holloway. Capitalizing on their upper-crust ties to Gerard and his wife Georgina, the Ameses seek out and interview the most likely suspects, including Flora’s larcenous brother and fellow cast members of the play.
Replete with the trappings of 1930s whodunits (with the equivalent of a drawing room confrontation and jaw-dropping red herring), An Act of Villainy is a delightful romp. With a resolution that is surprising not only in revealing the identity of the murderer but also in the reason for the crime, Weaver’s novel is a worthy throwback to the classic murder mysteries of what many call the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.
