False Fire

February 27, 2017
Heley’s appealing 11th Abbot Agency mystery (after 2016’s False Wall) opens at a party in a posh London neighborhood. It’s putatively for two 10-year-olds—champagne for the adults and piles of presents for the birthday girls, who are the emotionally neglected children of first marriages. Bea, who runs the Abbot Agency, which provides domestic services, is there as the guest of her longtime friend Sir Leon Holland. After the girls have gone to bed, she’s disconcerted to notice that there are 13 adults sitting at the dinner table. Shortly thereafter, a fire breaks out, and Bea and Lord Morton, the grandfather of one of the girls, race upstairs to find the children’s room billowing with smoke. The blaze is blamed on the girls, but Bea steps up to defend them and uncover the guilty party. The incident turns even uglier with the subsequent deaths of three of the party guests. The capable, quick-witted Bea handles the insufferable suspects with Mary Poppins–like aplomb. It’s a pleasure to spend time in her company.

February 1, 2017
Fire disrupts a British family gathering.The Hollands are a sorry lot. Patriarch Josh spends much of his vast fortune covering younger son Gideon's business losses. Daughter Daphne is ready to shed her second husband, Alaric, in favor of Greek-god handsome Olympic hopeful Giorgio. Only older son Steve seems to have any common sense, and Josh has shunted him into the unglamorous maintenance side of the family's real estate empire. Perhaps to make up for years of neglect, Josh throws a splashy birthday bash for Alicia, his 10-year-old granddaughter, whose mother, Daphne, is too besotted with her latest beau to care and whose father has started a new family in Florida with his new tennis-champion wife. Alicia's school friend Bernice, similarly abandoned by her mother in favor of a new husband and baby son, is staying with the Hollands for half-term holiday, so her grandfather Leon is invited to the party as well. And Leon invites Bea Abbot, owner of the Abbot Agency, who turns out to be practically the only person who can keep her head when fire breaks out during dinner. She rushes upstairs to rescue the girls and convinces Alicia's other grandfather, Lord William Morton, to help the housekeeper escape the blaze. She even pulls Gideon's ditzy date, Faye Starman, to safety. For her pains, Bea ends up with two rambunctious schoolgirls in her house and a fire inspector breathing down her neck, all because Faye blames the calamity on the children. The 11th case for Heley's smart, unflappable heroine (False Wall, 2016, etc.) proves once more that dysfunctional families can be combustible.

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March 1, 2017
Another satisfying entry in Heley's British cozy series featuring Bea Abbot, owner of a domestic-help agency. In this twisty tale, Bea is at a dinner party when there is a massive explosion, and the dining room bursts into flame. A second explosion hits the second floor of the house, and Bea rushes to help two little girls, Alicia and Bernice, who are on the upper floor with their nanny. The children survive, but others are not so lucky. Bea is sure the fire was set, and she's determined to prove it. There is little evidence, but Bea is nothing if not strong-willed. When she learns that both Alicia and Bernice will inherit significant fortunes when they come of age, she figures that could well be the motive. A wealth of plot twists, a confusingly large but colorful cast of characters, an intrepid heroine, and a surprising but ultimately heartwarming ending make this an enticing read for genre fans.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)