I RARELY don't finish a book but this just couldn't keep my interest. DNF:-( ( )

Well done, but sad. I recommend another review for a good description of the book.

Josephine meets up with Margery Allingham. Once again, I'm trying to figure out if there are any connections with Josephine Tey's books: perhaps To Love and Be Wise, in which Inspector Grant searches for a missing person, and maybe Brat Farrar, admittedly a big stretch.

Josephine Tey sees how childhood secrets destroy adult lives, but she nonetheless chooses to hide her suspicions about a crime from Archie, who is in charge of investigating it, and the possible young perpetrator, who could at least benefit from counseling (although that probably wasn't a thing back then.) It's a unlikely coincidence that this crime in London is in any way connected with the relatively small group of children---from the thousands evacuated from London---who end up where Josephine is staying. ( )

How is it that I'd never encountered Nicola Upson's Josephine Tey mystery series before now? However it happened, I'm glad I'm now on to it. Dear Little Corpses is the 10th volume in this series, but I had no trouble reading it as a stand-alone and am eager to get going on the nine previous titles I missed.

What makes Dear Little Corpses such a good read?

• It lies in that borderland territory between cozy (too frivolous) and psychological thriller (too menacing) that's my favorite mystery territory.

• This volume is set in the weeks before and after Britain's entry into WWII, and offers an interesting picture of the gradual emergence of the new normal UK citizens will be facing until the war's end.

• The characters are genuine and specific—no cardboard cut-outs, no incomplete background figures. Everyone's story is complicated, and those complications all contribute to the plot. The cast of characters is large, but each character was distinct enough that I could easily keep them all in mind without any "wait a minute—who was that?" moments.

• Josephine Tey is a lesbian, as was the case in real life. Upson does a solid job of depicting the balancing act that identity requires—though as a financially independent novelist, Tey doesn't face as many challenge as a more quotidian hero might.

• The mystery itself, about the disappearance of a child, one of 800,000+ children that were relocated from the city to the countryside to live with host families during the war, is plausible and unsettling enough to keep reads turning pages.

I admit I'm basing my enthusiasm for the series on a single volume, but I'm absolutely convinced that the other volumes will be as effective as this one and can't wait to read more. If you enjoy historical mysteries/fiction, WWII mysteries/fiction, or mysteries that have depth but don't turn into nightmarish gore fests, you're going to love this series.

I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Net Galley; the opinions are my own. ( )

I couldn't finish it because it was too well written for this time (March 2022) in history with the bombings in Ukraine and parents having to make the same kind of nightmarish sacrifices as in this historical novel set in England at the beginning of WW2. The writing is just too well done.
I requested and received a free temporary e-book copy from Crooked Lane Books via NetGalley. Thank you! ( )