Bless the Bride

January 3, 2011
Set in 1903, Bowen's engaging 10th Molly Murphy mystery (after 2010's The Last Illusion) finds the maverick New York City PI at a major personal turning point. Her impending marriage to Capt. Daniel Sullivan of the NYPD will, at his insistence, mark an end to her sleuthing career, but she can't resist taking on one last case. After a powerful and affluent Chinatown businessman, Lee Sing Tai, asks her to locate a missing piece of valuable jade jewelry, Murphy soon ascertains that the less than forthcoming Lee really wants her to trace the missing bride he recently purchased in China. Searching for Lee's bride while keeping her activities a secret from her fiancé is a considerable challenge for Molly, who also ends up with a murder to solve. Molly's compassion and pluck should attract more readers to this consistently solid historical series.

January 1, 2011

The preeminent female private eye in 1903 New York prepares to wed.

Now that Molly Murphy is about to marry NYPD Captain Daniel Sullivan, she's vowed to retire from detective work (The Last Illusion, 2010, etc.). But the time she's spent in the country with Daniel's carping mother drives her back to the city for one more case. It seems simple: Wealthy Chinese businessman Lee Sing Jai hires Molly to search for a jade necklace missing from his home. Molly scours the pawnshops near Chinatown to no avail until Lee admits that he's really searching for a runaway bride. Molly thinks that the young woman may be seeking shelter at a mission. She's right, but when she finds Bo Kei, a much more dangerous situation arises. Bo, who's been sold by her family to Lee, is in love with his young assistant, who helped smuggle her in from Canada. The wealthy suffragette neighbors with whom Molly is staying while Daniel is updating her house agree to hide Bo. The stakes are raised, however, when Lee is murdered and Daniel discovers that Molly is involved. Molly is forced to acknowledge how important her work is to her. Can Daniel live with such an unusual bride?

The latest of Molly's fin-de-siècle adventures provides insight into the plight of the Chinese community along with a nice romantic mystery.

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February 1, 2011

It is 1903, and Molly Murphy (The Last Illusion; In a Gilded Cage) is about to marry NYPD Capt. Daniel Sullivan, who does not want her to continue working as a private investigator. But she takes on one last case when she is hired to find the missing wife of a wealthy importer and head of a Chinese tong. Trouble always manages to find Molly, and this time she is dodging both the criminal elements in the Chinese community and those in the police department. VERDICT Bowen always gives her readers an excellent story full of historical tidbits and the realities of life in Edwardian New York City. This may appeal to fans of Victoria Thompson.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2011
Just weeks before she is to marry New York police captain Daniel Sullivan in 1903, private investigator Molly Murphy leaves the sewing of her trousseau in the capable hands of her future mother-in-law (who bemoans Mollys woeful stitchery skills) and takes on one last case, having promised Daniel shed stop working once theyve wed. Powerful Chinatown businessman Lee Sing Tai hires Molly to find his missing bride, a commission she is loath to fulfill upon learning that the bride is actually a concubine obtained from China solely to give Lee (whose holdings include brothels and opium dens) a son and heir. When Lee is found dead after a fall from his rooftop, Molly is relieved of her obligation. But when the death is ruled a murder, initially raising the possibility of tong wars, the bridebeing sheltered by Mollybecomes a prime suspect. The tenth entry (after The Last Illusion, 2010) in this engaging, award-winning series captures early-twentieth-century New York; touches on the immigrant experience during that era; and brings the case to a satisfying conclusion, leaving open the equally compelling mystery of what lies ahead for the independent-minded Molly.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)