Running in the Shadows: A Lizzie Crane Mystery
Running in the Shadows transports readers to the excesses of 1920s USA, with multi-day house parties, glittering fashion, alcohol that can be served and consumed but not sold or transported, and plenty of intrigue. It opens with jazz singer Lizzie Crane dipping a glass into a three-tier champagne fountain supported by three human-sized marble nymphs, and ends with a scene from an Edward Hopper painting.
Lizzie and her band The Troubadours have been engaged to entertain guests at a spring equinox party in Salem, Massachusetts, held at the mansion of art collector and suspected art thief Isaac Roman. But on the first evening, Lizzie is upstaged when a naked woman on horseback rides through the crowd and sweeps away the talented artist Sebastian Amery. The next morning, it’s Lizzie who discovers Amery’s body tied in a tree, driven through with arrows. Lizzie and her business partner, pianist Sidney Somerset, are suspects in the murder, along with the young woman who spirited the artist away from the party. Lizzie sets out to prove her innocence and solve the case. Her search takes her to Amery’s studio, galleries, libraries, and art dealers in Salem and Boston, and introduces her to the world of art fraud.
This is the fourth book in the Lizzie Crane mystery series, and readers of the previous books will find themselves in familiar territory. Running in the Shadows is a stand-alone novel with sufficient backstory for new readers. It’s full of evocative description about art, furniture, and fashion, which transports you to the setting but is perhaps a little overdone in places. The final chapters provide a satisfying resolution to the mystery.
