Death Brings a Shadow by Rosemary Simpson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre: Mystery
Content: Some pretty brutal deaths, including a lynching


In spring 1889, Prudence and Geoffrey set sail from New York Harbor on a private yacht bound for Bradford Island, where her friend Eleanor Dickson is to be wed. The Sea Islands along the Georgia coast serve as a winter playground for the likes of the Carnegies, Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, and Dicksons. Despite her Yankee pedigree, Eleanor is marrying a Southern gentleman, Teddy Bennett, and Prudence is thrilled to be the maid of honor.

But days before the wedding, the bride is nowhere to be found. A frantic search of the island turns up her drowned corpse in an alligator-infested swamp. Prudence is devastated, but as they prepare the body for burial, she and Geoffrey discover evidence of bruising that indicates Eleanor was held under—most dishonorably murdered.

This was an ok addition to the series. I liked it but I didn't. I feel like this series started out really strong. I loved the first book, and really liked the second one, but the last two have not been as good. They both have the same problems really. One, there is no real mystery as to who the murderer is in this book. It was very obvious. The mystery was about why they did it, but that wasn't too hard to figure out either. Once again Prudence was stupidly reckless in the name of independence. She wants to be taken seriously but then does something stupid and gets mad and stamps her foot when Geoffrey follows her. The foot stamping was just childish.

I didn't particularly like the setting of this book. It felt weird and out of wack with the tone of the previous ones. I also thought the dangers of the Island; alligators, snakes, the swamp, etc. were played up a little bit too much. It seemed like no one could go anywhere without something happening.

The whole big theme of this book was the South and how it struggled to recover after slavery. There was a lot of emphasis on how prejudiced the South still was years after the slaves were freed. I've no doubt that was true. There was a mentality there that could only be erased after several generations passed, and unfortunately some still have it. I have a hard time wrapping my head around how people can look at another person as not a human being, but chattel just because they are different.

At this point I think I will continue on with the series, but that could end up changing. I'm slightly on the fence.
Thanks to NetGalley and Kensington Books for providing me with an ARC of this book.