Riviera Gold: A Novel of Suspense Featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes

Bestseller King’s so-so 17th thriller featuring Mary Russell and her husband, Sherlock Holmes, picks up where 2018’s Island of the Mad left off, in Venice and later the French Riviera, where Mary is on holiday by herself in 1925. She suspects Holmes is off on an inquiry he’s keeping secret from her. Mary is feeling bereft because Holmes’s landlady, Mrs. Hudson, whom she has come to regard as a surrogate grandmother, has abruptly disappeared. The older woman, a reformed con artist with a link to a vast missing fortune in King’s revisionist portrayal, has many secrets. Mary learns that Mrs. Hudson may have even more secrets after the landlady, who reappears as a nurse maid to American socialites Gerald and Sara Murphy, is discovered holding a gun over the body of a murdered man in Monaco. Mary ends up investigating to clear Mrs. Hudson’s name. Holmes plays a minor role at best when he eventually surfaces, and some Sherlockians won’t care for the focus on the hidden life of Mrs. Hudson. This entry requires a high level of suspension of disbelief even for series fans. Agent: Zoe Quinton, Zoe Quinton Lit. (June)