Aunt Dimity and the Next of Kin

Why five stars? Because Nancy Atherton promises a light-hearted romp -- what I call airplane reading, something to take our minds off where we are and what we're supposed to be doing. We don't ask a lot of those books: just smooth writing, comfortable setting, likeable characters and enough interest to keep the pages turning. And that's exactly what Atherton serves up here. Visiting a nursing home, Lori befriends Ms. Beacham, legal secretary who dies almost immediately. Lori learns that this unassuming woman has left legacies to all sorts of people, including herself. And she agrees to take on a quest for Ms. Beacham's next of kin. Atherton breaks a number of mystery conventions with this book, leaving us with plot that's gentle even by cozy standards. Even MC Beaton wreaks more havoc in her country villages! A novice writer probably wouldn't be allowed these lapses. Still, Atherton plays fair with the readers, and I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the characters. As a newcomer to the Aunt Dimity series, I plan to go back and read more. After all sometimes we don't want a meaty tome: we're satisfied with an airy, exquisitely baked puff pastry.

What a find! I love mysteries, and for some reason, have just discovered Aunt Dimity with this book! I don't know how it took me this long, but I was thrilled to find out that there are already nine or ten more I can read! Other reviewers have described the general plot, so I won't. Suffice it to say that it is a wonderful example of an English "cozy", while still being intelligent and up-to-date with good character development, and a pleasant whiff of the (somehow rational) supernatural. At the same time I was reading "Confessions of an Economic Hitman", and while that is a good, instructive book, I must say that for several days I left it behind and turned with great relief and anticipation to "Aunt Dimity and the Next of Kin".

Please read the ENTIRE series - beginning with the first. You won't be able to put them down. In this last book in the series Aunt Dimity takes a backseat to the story - but it is okay by this time. You become so much a part of the family that you want to stay - not close the book. This series is home, a place to go when you feel like crying or giving up. It is a comfort zone of reading and I guarantee that it will lighten your life and you will search for more like it and be eager for the next in the series. Give it a try.

Aunt Dimity books seem to bring forth all manner of "cliches" from reviewers. Cozy, warm, witty, charming. They all fit but the Aunt Dimity books are more than that. The main character is Lori Shephard, an expatriate American living in a village in England with her husband and twin sons and a host of friends in the village. Lori was left her cottage by her mother's longtime friend, Aunt Dimity. Lori's mother was a widow who raised Lori on her own. After her mother's death, Lori is in the depths of despair, out of time, money and love. The "discovery" that the friend that her mother told her bedtime stories of over the years actually existed and had left Lori her estate, changes things for Lori. She finds that she can communicate with Aunt Dimity, and goes to her for advise over the years. With Aunt Dimity's insight and help, Lori solves a number of mysteries in her own village, and surrounding area. I love the Aunt Dimity series, cannot wait to start a new one and am always sad when it is over. My own copies are worn and well-loved and I have "introduced" Aunt Dimity to friends and family over the years, even the ones that I thought personally might not be "worthy" of reading her...and there has been only one that didn't fall for her. I only wish I could give this series more than 5 stars.