PERHAPS A GIFT VOUCHER FOR MUM?: MOTHER'S DAY
Kerry Greenwood is the author of twenty-eight novels and the editor of two collections. Previous novels in the Phryne Fisher series are Cocaine Blues, Flying too High, Murder on the Ballarat Train, Death on the Victoria Dock, Blood and Circuses, The Green Mill Murder, Ruddy Gore, Urn Burial, Raisins and Almonds, Death Before Wicket, Away with the Fairies, Murder in Montparnasse, The Castlemaine Murders, Queen of the Flowers and Death by Water. She is also the author of several books for young adults and the Delphic Women series. When she is not writing she is an advocate in Magistrates' Court for the Legal Aid Commission. She is not married, has no children and lives with a registered Wizard.
A party invitation leads Phryne Fisher, liberated woman and amateur sleuth, on a hunt for a ruthless killer.Enjoying the Christmas season with her extended family and her lover Lin Chung, Phryne (Death Before Wicket, 2008, etc.) wonders whether to accept the invitation to the Last Best Party of 1928. Her mind is made up by the arrival of a deadly snake disguised as a Christmas gift and a note suggesting she forego the party. Never one to be cowed, Phryne journeys to the rented estate of Gerald and Isabella Templar, an extravagantly comely brother and sister who, having invested most of their fortune on wild parties in Europe, are continuing their raffish ways in Australia. Isabella's pet, a lovely girl child, has already disappeared, and soon after Phryne's arrival, Gerald's Tarquin, a beautiful and obnoxious young boy, goes missing as well. Hooking up with Nicholas Booth, a handsome young man whom she suspects is a policeman, Phryne wends her way through fabulous dinners and scandalous hashish-fueled entertainments looking for an assassin hired to kill the golden pair. Taunted by a trail of written puzzles, she follows the clues, makes friends with the staff, and relies on some toughs sent by her friends as back-up. Phryne and Nicholas both face death before the final pieces fall into place.One of the most exciting and dangerous of the adventures into which Phryne's fabulous and risky lifestyle have led her. (Kirkus Reviews)
