The discovery of a female murder victim in London's Dockland area launches Kissed a Sad Goodbye into a web of familial intrigue and decades-old grudges. With obstacles ranging from inspectors' intramural rivalries and heavy schedules to an expanding number of suspects and credible motives, Crombie draws her readers into subterfuge in commerce and the history of the Mudchute district. Of course not. But numerous people benefited from the murder. Each is a suspect, and only the protagonists' disentangling of class and economic differences, business partnerships, and romantic links will bring a solution.
Crime hits close to home.
In this mystery, too, social disparities and ill feelings from the past contribute barriers to the truth. Tom Corcoran is the Florida-based author of The Mango Opera and the forthcoming Gumbo Limbo.