The Victoria Vanishes

Starred review from August 25, 2008
Officialdom casts a skeptical eye on the unorthodox crime solving of London's Peculiar Crimes Unit in Fowler's excellent sixth novel to feature senior detectives Arthur Bryant and John May (after 2007's White Corridor
). While the unit's members scheme to insure their professional survival, a serial killer is targeting middle-aged women who drop dead in pubs, apparently of natural causes. Bryant puts the investigation on his team's docket after realizing that he observed one of the victims, shortly before her demise, enter the Victoria Cross, a pub that hasn't existed for almost a century. Characters who could easily have been caricatures in lesser hands assume enough depth to make them both plausible and engaging. If this is indeed the last in the series as the conclusion suggests, then the versatile author has ended on a high note. Those who appreciate Fowler's special blend of the macabre, dark humor and impossible crime puzzles will wish they haven't seen the last of Bryant and May.

October 1, 2008
Someone is killing middle-aged women in busy London pubs, including one that was torn down 80 years earlier. Only the Peculiar Crimes Unit is capable of getting to the bottom of this intricate tangle. Readers are treated to a startling blend of solid police work, the Peculiar Crimes Unit's unusual investigative methods, and the tips provided by Arthur Bryant's collection of odd friends. The cliff-hanger ending is sure to puzzle the followers of this popular paranormal series ("White Corridor"; "Ten-Second Staircase"). Fowler, one of the most original writers working in the mystery genre today, has once again produced a unique and engaging crime novel that will appeal to readers who enjoy unusual crimes and detectives with a British accent.

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from October 1, 2008
Cackles and chills await readers in Fowlers sixth installment in his series featuring Arthur Bryant and John May, two irrepressible British sleuths a bit long in the tooth. As senior detectives in the aptly named Peculiar Crimes Unit, the pair tackles quirky cases no other copper can crack. Detective May is the more affable of the two, while pipe-smoking misanthrope Bryant relishes every opportunity to rankle the ranks. This time around, theyre after a perpetrator preying on middle-age women in the citys most popular watering holes. His methodengaging victims in conversation as he injects them with a toxic cocktailenables him to go virtually unnoticed among the nightly hubbub of pubs. Bryant and May discover a connection between the victims, but the most critical clues, it turns out, are embedded in the history of the alehouses themselves (including the long-gone Victoria Cross, where Bryant swears he saw one of the victims just moments before her death). Meanwhile, Bryant must contend with a failing memory, May with failing health, and both with the possibility that the ever-more-peculiar Peculiar Crimes Unit will be shut down for good. Dry wit and a heady dose of British history make this crisp whodunit good to the last drop.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)