Body on Baker Street by Vicki Delany – A Review

Pages: 320
Published: 2018

Gemma Doyle owns the Sherlock holmes Bookstore in West London, Massachusetts. A best-selling author is killed during a book signing event in the shop and a friend of Gemma’s is accused of the crime. Two very good reasons for her, with her best friend, Jayne Wilson, playing Watson to her Holmes, to investigate. Not that Gemma needs much of an excuse.

This is the second book in the series and I don’t think I missed anything by not reading the first, except, possibly, the beginning of her on-off relationship with Detective Ryan Ashburton. In this book the romance is definitely off.

Until I read this novel I didn’t really know what a cosy mystery was. Now that I know, I’m not sure that I like them much. I thought it was a novel where the crime has no blood or gore and is solved by an amateur sleuth, but no, there’s a lot more to it, or less, depending on your point of view. I recently heard it defined on a podcast as, essentially, those two things plus the crime usually takes place in a town or region where readers would like to live; the sleuth is almost always a woman who lives in a house that would normally be beyond her means; there’s a community that helps or hinders her and there’s friction with the local police force. Body on Baker Street certainly ticks all these boxes. West London is a small seaside town and the novel is set at the beginning of the tourist season. Gemma part owns her house and her business with her great-uncle, Arthur. Yes, he is called Arthur Doyle. The house is big enough for them not to have to see one another if they don’t want to. The point is moot, however, as Uncle Arthur is on holiday. Gemma has friends, despite being quite abrasive. She also keeps telling her best friend that her boyfriend isn’t good enough for her. It turns out that she’s right, but that’s dangerous ground for a BFF. There’s also conflict with the local police. Ryan’s partner, Detective Estrada, loathes Gemma and pounces on every opportunity (of which there are many) to accuse her of having committed the crime. There are clues and red herrings dotted all over the place.

Gemma is supposed to be English and much fun is had from her misunderstanding various American expressions. It’s as if she’s never seen an American TV series, an American film or read an American novel, although she does admit that she only pretends to confuse ‘playing hookey’ with ‘playing hockey’. On the other hand, she says and does things that had this Englishwoman wondering why an American had chosen to disguise herself in this way.

It doesn’t take long to read the book. I found it hard to like Gemma and some of the things she does to solve the case seem absurd, but she does solve it, another essential element of the cosy mystery.

The book has many good reviews, so it might be of interest if cosy mysteries are your thing. When I took it out of the library, completist that I am, I also borrowed the next two books in the series, so there will be reviews of these coming up as well.

April Munday is the author of the Soldiers of Fortune and Regency Spies series of novels, as well as standalone novels set in the fourteenth century.

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