(Her Majesty the Queen Investigates #1)
The first book in a highly original and delightfully clever crime series in which Queen Elizabeth II secretly solves crimes while carrying out her royal duties.
It is the early spring of 2016 and Queen Elizabeth is at Windsor Castle in advance of her 90th birthday celebrations. But the preparations are interrupted when a guest is found dead in one of the Castle bedrooms. The scene suggests the young Russian pianist strangled himself, but a badly tied knot leads MI5 to suspect foul play was involved. The Queen leaves the investigation to the professionals—until their suspicions point them in the wrong direction.
Unhappy at the mishandling of the case and concerned for her staff’s morale, the monarch decides to discreetly take matters into her own hands. With help from her Assistant Private Secretary, Rozie Oshodi, a British Nigerian and recent officer in the Royal Horse Artillery, the Queen secretly begins making inquiries. As she carries out her royal duties with her usual aplomb, no one in the Royal Household, the government, or the public knows that the resolute Elizabeth will use her keen eye, quick mind, and steady nerve to bring a murderer to justice.
SJ Bennett captures Queen Elizabeth’s voice with skill, nuance, wit, and genuine charm in this imaginative and engaging mystery that portrays Her Majesty as she’s rarely seen: kind yet worldly, decisive, shrewd, and most importantly a great judge of character.
Review
Thank you Netgalley for an audiobook and William Morrow for a physical Arc in exchange for an honest review.
Want to read about the queen and her quest to uncover the truth behind a mysterious murder that is revealed a night after a party at Windsor Castle? Well this is what this book is all about.
I want to start off by talking about the experience of listening to this book being read. The narrator for this book did a wonderful job of speaking in a way that transferred me to Great Britain and to the royal family. The narrator spoke in a British accent and the detailed wording of the book had many sayings that the British use, which I appreciate in the book. Its simple but very impactful details. The narrator also played the role very well, adding emphases when needed but not overly exaggerating the words. She spoke in a soothing way that kept me engaged without putting me to sleep. I really like the way it was narrated because it helped me get even more involved with the story and it's setting. I do have to admit, because of the accent sometimes it was hard to tell exactly what the narrator said which ended up in me getting lost a few times. The audiobook was only told from one narrator and the narrator only spoke in one voice which did make it hard to differentiate between different characters. But I did understand when when a new chapter started because the chapter number was said before the new chapter began. As for time changing within the same chapter, sometimes I could tell, other times I couldn't. The narrator didn't have to much of a pause or change i tone so unless I was paying a lot of attention, I didn't notice it. Other times I did, simply because the words of the book had something that told me time had passed.
As for the story itself, when I first read the plot of the book all I could think was, this is going to be interesting. I thought that it would be the queen herself solving the mystery, but it didn't quiet end up being that way. When a hired entertainer dies in the palace the queen leads one of her employees on several different adventures to try and dig up information on the case, as the local police are investigating. So yes, she does explore the details of the murder but the police are also the ones who figure out who was the murderer, even though I kind of gathered that she figured it out herself as well.
As for the murder itself, there were a lot of different aspects to piece together to know who did it. Especially considering that there was more than one crime to consider. It was hard for me to follow along in some places with the line of thought being expressed. For me there were a lot of different characters in question and I kept getting confused at who each person was. Some times it was also hard to understand who the book was talking about because it would be explaining the thoughts of one person and then suddenly switch to a different person without any warning. I found myself realizing way after I was suppose to that they were referring to a different character, so that got confusing at times.
I also can't say that I was super engaged with the mystery. The author did a good job of slowly revealing details and information involving the murder but I wasn't totally thrilled or engrossed with the mystery. It overall was not a hardcore thriller crime, it was what I expected. It was a nice cozy crime novel. I liked the twist of having this book be based in the royal family. I think it makes this book unique compared to others. I definitely recommend for people who like cozy mysteries. I myself did enjoy it. And it was very helpful that at the end the crimes from beginning to end were explained and I didn't have to fit the pieces together myself, because I probably wouldn't have been able to.