Murder Most Festive

In Moncrieff’s disappointing debut, a golden age closed-circle homage set in 1938, tensions are high at Westbury Manor in Sussex, where the Westbury family is hosting a Christmas gathering. The presence of Lord Westbury’s old friend David Campbell-Scott is welcomed by the nobleman, but not by his youngest child, Edward, who regards Campbell-Scott as someone who uses his power to unethically plunder resources belonging to the subjects of the British Empire. On Christmas morning, Campbell-Scott is found dead outside the manor, an apparent suicide, with only his footprints in the snow leading to the body and the gun used to inflict the fatal head wound next to it. Another guest, Hugh Gaveston, whose thorough perusal of Mystery Magazine: True Crime Sensations! has taught him “that murder investigations were excessively enjoyable larks,” puts his interest in sleuthing into action by pursuing the theory that Campbell-Scott was murdered. Labored sentences (“Like one staggering across a desert, parched and ravenous, so Hugh approached the drawing room, seeking a respite from the uncertainty that beleaguered him”) are a drawback, and the impossible crime setup isn’t resolved satisfactorily. Readers seeking a riff on traditional whodunits would be better served by Christopher Huang’s A Gentleman’s Murder. (Oct.)