The Chapel in the Woods (A Jack Haldean Murder Mystery, 11)
This is another intricate and thoroughly enjoyable ‘who-done-it’ from prolific author Gordon-Smith. Set in the rural Sussex countryside in the 1920s, the narrative initially offers the reader a basic missing-persons conundrum that becomes more complicated as time unfolds over several months, with murder, unexpected intrusions, and possibly wild large cats.
The plot seems simple enough: a wealthy Canadian businessman buys a somewhat run-down estate originally built by a 17th-century privateer who settled down to a life of luxury with his Peruvian princess wife. Unfortunately, reality was unkind in that the wife soon died, leaving the husband in despair. In her honour, he built a chapel in the woods. Over the ensuing decades, the estate hosted an increasingly bizarre assortment of descendants until the final one died, with the buildings, including the chapel, slowly falling into disrepair and the now-untended grounds returning to nature.
Enter a wealthy Canadian businessman who wants a British country estate and purchases the domain. Unfortunately, events do not unfold seamlessly, in that his trusted employee disappears with thousands of dollars of diamonds, and a caretaker is murdered in a gruesome manner in the locked chapel. Oh, and the musings and actions of a big game hunter add spice and exoticism to the mix.
There is nothing like South American mysticism and a shrouded history with eccentric individuals, coupled with the possibility of a rampant jaguar, to get the locals chatting. This literary strategy is an interesting strength of the tale; that is, the detail that Gordon-Smith provides as she brings in numerous and sundry locals to the overall narrative. In many ways, these ordinary peripheral characters offer insights and colour that provide most entertaining sidebars as the various interconnected mysteries are slowly unveiled.
