Kate Shackleton

I think I've found a new mystery series that I like. Kate Shackleton is so much better than the dreadful Maisie Dobbs. She narrates the stories and she actually feels like a real person rather than some rich person's pet charity and philosophical experiment. Kate Shackleton is the daughter of a police superintendent, and her husband never came home from the Great War; she's effectively a widow, but she still holds out hope that Gerald is merely missing and surviving somewhere with amnesia. Post-war, she fell into searching for missing persons for other people, and eventually she gets hired as a professional detective and hires an assistant at the urging of her supportive father. The first case, incidentally, is a fictional mystery involving the Low Moor Explosion in August 1916. It's also set around the weaving industry, with the family being mill owners who secretly profiteered from the war. There's also a cameo by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Lady Jean, who are apparently good friends with Kate's family. She doesn't like their spiritualist cause but humors them so they'll give her advice about solving her case.

Overall I liked the first book, and the writer skillfully places the 1916 flashbacks between the 1922 chapters. Nothing gets boring or tedious, because there's no unnecessary rambling; you can see right away what the plot point or character reason is for including that flashback. There's a lot of physical and emotional trauma in the book, what with the missing person, murders, and even a doctor treating war veterans for their postwar nightmares, but the book doesn't overindulge in psychobabble or other such extraneous crap from Maisie Dobbs. I look forward to continuing with this Kate Shackleton series. It's not as light and frothy, like with Daisy Dalyrmple always falling over bodies (she was doing it about once a month for the first dozen books), but the characters are enjoyable and the writing's great. I'm only puzzled by her repeatedly using the word "buffet" to mean a bench or seat, instead of a sideboard or table. I wonder if it's a British usage I don't know.

I've also read some Alyssa Maxwell mysteries lately, and they're pretty enjoyable so far. The Lady and Lady's maid series is set in post-WWI England as well, and there is a prominent love interest who is a wounded war veteran.