cover image Million Dollar Baby: A Marjorie McClelland Mystery

Million Dollar Baby: A Marjorie McClelland Mystery

Amy Patricia Meade, . . Midnight Ink, $14.95 (384pp) ISBN 978-0-7387-0860-7

With its 1930s setting and unlikely pairing of a rich dilettante and an earnest young woman, Meade's debut will strike a chord with fanciers of Dorothy Sayers's Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane. When Creighton Ashcroft arrives in his Rolls-Royce Phantom in the little town of Ridgebury, Conn., he creates quite a stir. Unimpressed by the car or its owner is mystery writer Marjorie McClelland, until she decides that Ashcroft might be able to help with her new novel. The history of a long-ago suicide at Ashcroft's newly purchased mansion and the accidental discovery of an old murder victim serve to bring the two together, while a handsome police detective provides competition and a foil. Meade uses the Depression-era setting to highlight the class differences between Ashcroft and McClelland, though she strains at times for the right balance of attraction and tension between them. Their repartee misfires as often as it dings, but this is a good first effort that bodes well for future installments. (Apr.)