Murder by Suicide (Ellie Quicke Mystery Series #2) - Softcover

Heley, Veronica

4.11

773 ratings by Goodreads

9780007122943: Murder by Suicide (Ellie Quicke Mystery Series #2)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0007122942 ISBN 13: 9780007122943

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers, 2003

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The second in a series of Ellie Quicke Mysteries, based in a church setting and featuring a recently widowed woman who finds herself to be something of a sleuth. When Ellie returns home from her Christmas holiday, she is shocked to hear allegations of foul play at the vicarage. Within days, the vicar, Ellie's good friend, is dismissed and transferred admist rumours that he was having an affair with Nora, the plain but talented organist. Everyone is furious with Nora for the departure of the vicar, yet Ellie tries to help the disturbed woman. Nora shows her some of the threatening letters she has received and tells her of some menacing harassment she is enduring. But it all becomes too much for Nora, and the village is shocked when she commits suicide. Ellie decides to get involved, despite warnings from Roy, a newcomer who is showing romantic interest in her. As she begins to decipher a series of clues and strange confrontations, she realizes that her own life is in danger.

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About the Author:

Veronica Heley is the author of Murder at the Altar and many other books. She has published with Corgi and Frances Lincoln, amongst others.

From Publishers Weekly:

Cozy fans who enjoyed Ellie Quicke's debut, Murder at the Altar (2000), will welcome the appealing middle-aged sleuth's second, even stronger outing from British author Heley. Widowed Ellie is just starting to recover from the recent death of her beloved if domineering husband, Frank. Returning to her village after a three-week stay at her daughter's in London, she learns that poison-pen letters pointing to scandal at St. Thomas's Rectory have led to the reassignment of her dear friend and vicar, the Reverend Gilbert Adams, and the emotional breakdown of the fey Nora, the church organist. Ellie agrees to help try to find out who's behind the letters. One evening, Ellie investigates a light in the church, a view nicely depicted on the novel's atmospheric dust jacket, and witnesses a "suicide" that she alone considers to be murder. Dismissed by the local police, Ellie puts her own life at risk to seek the truth. Our smart and determined heroine must also deal with her late husband's imperious aunt Drusilla; her spoiled, self-centered daughter, Diana; and a new man in her life, the suspiciously smooth Roy Bartrick ("There's something too devil-may-care about him," asserts a neighbor). Minor characters introduced in the first book, like the inimitable Mrs. Dawes, take on new depth. Readers will cheer as Ellie takes charge after a lifetime of deferring to the wishes and wants of others. Anglophiles will relish the loving descriptions of those parts of London that make the great metropolis seem like a quaint village.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

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