Leaving Everything Most Loved

January 21, 2013
Agatha-winner Winspear broadens her heroine’s horizons while offering only routine sleuthing in her solid 10th Maisie Dobbs mystery (after 2012’s Elegy for Eddie). In the summer of 1933, Maisie feels a desire to travel abroad to gain the kind of experience and understanding of other cultures that stood her late mentor, Dr. Maurice Blanche, in such good stead. Meanwhile, Detective Inspector Caldwell of Scotland Yard needs her help on a case. Two months after the discovery of the body of Usha Pramal, an Indian woman serving as governess for an English family, in a Camberwell canal, the trail of the person who shot her dead has gone cold. In her search for answers, Maisie develops a strong empathy for the murder victim, who wished to found a school for underprivileged girls. The tribulations of Maisie’s employees and her ambivalence about a marriage proposal tend to overshadow the detection. Agent: Amy Rennert, Amy Rennert Agency.