The Family Way (Molly Murphy Mysteries)
Anthony and Agatha Award–winning Rhys Bowen’s series about Molly Murphy, a bubbly Irish immigrant in New York City at the turn of the twentieth century, is now in its thirteenth installment. Molly, who has always had a gift for getting to the bottom of things, established her own private detective agency in New York. Now, though, she is married to a police captain, is named Sullivan rather than Murphy, and is pregnant. When she receives a letter begging for her help in locating a disappeared Irish maidservant—and when she subsequently learns that five infants have been kidnapped in the same month—Molly is ready to take action, but her husband ships her off for an enforced rest with her mother. Ah, but Molly is nothing if not dauntless. The ways she finds to keep investigating, and the trouble she lands in as a result of that investigation, will be more than enough to keep series fans satisfied. Others may be puzzled by the (at times) overly simplistic writing here, which gives the book a tone not in keeping with its subject matter. --Connie Fletcher