The Shortest Journey

July 4, 1994
This slim mystery, a study of the relations between adult children and their parents, rings true in its depiction of the warmth as well as the petty cruelty that exists between generations. In the English village of Taviscombe, writer Sheila Malory, last encountered in Mrs. Malory and the Festival Murder , regularly visits several friends in the West Lodge nursing home. One day, one of them, wealthy Edith Rossiter, disappears. Her bullying daughter, Thelma, voicing her suspicions of her scientist brother, Alan, condescendingly asks Sheila for help. Sheila agrees, even though she has despised Thelma since they were classmates in school. Discovering that a cache of sleeping pills is gone from Mrs. Rossiter's room, Sheila fears suicide, but no further information surfaces until she and her son Michael visit another West Lodge resident, the harridan mother of another old friend. With its delicate detailing of English village life and characters one readily cares about, Holt's tale is a quiet charmer.