The Oxford Detective Society by Faith Martin

 

Lyssa Moore is a biographer, specializing in people whose families want their lives told.  She lives in Oxford in a nice apartment where she has made friends with the couple next door, Carter and Jason.  Her husband died unexpectedly and Lyssa is dealing with that grief and looking about for a new project when she is contacted by a woman who wants her past relative's life written, vindicating her from the press she got when she was alive.

Amelia Montrose, known as Monty to her friends, was a rebellious child of the 60's.  She grew up in a wealthy family but rebelled against the expectation that she would attend university to find a wealthy husband.  Instead, she ran away at eighteen and went to Oxford where she met and fell in love with Glen Bannister, the lead singer of the Lucky Cuckoos.  They never married but lived together much to the delight of the press who labeled Monty as a sleazy woman.  Before the band could make their big break to the top, Glen died of a drug overdose.  The band basically dissolved after that and everyone blamed Monty, especially after it came out that he left her his estate while his family remained in council housing.  She was roundly reviled and held up as a siren who lured Glen to his death.  Now Monty's descendant, Elizabeth Grainger, wants Lyssa to look into Monty's life and death and see if she can rescue Monty's reputation.

But as Lyssa works, she starts to sense that things are happening around her.  She feels that she is being followed and someone breaks into her apartment and bugs her computer while setting up cameras and bugs.  Then there is Neville, who has lived downstairs for several years but never made friends with anyone in the building and is mysterious about his past.  It seems that wherever Lyssa goes, he is there.  Is he an evil presence?  Is Lyssa in danger?

Faith Martin is a well-known English author who has been writing for over thirty years and uses at least four pen names.  This is the beginning book of yet another series.  I had thought that she was a romance writer and had never explored her mysteries and was pleasantly surprised.  The mystery was complex enough to satisfy yet easy to follow.  It had an interesting plot and lots of characters who were interesting in their own right.  I especially enjoyed the insight into how a biographer does their research and how they convince people to talk with them.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.