Agony Hill by Sarah Stewart Taylor (2024)
On the plus side, - a beautifully rendered portrait of a unique time and place in history - a bucolic, picturesque little Vermont town and farming community of Bethany in 1965. But even such a seemingly peaceful place is beginning to feel the effects of the escalation of the Vietnam War. and all the subsequent societal, political and cultural upheavals in store for America. Another plus - the finely created cast of characters including newly appointed State Police.. detective Franklin Warren, A former Boston cop, he arrives a damaged, haunted man, tormented by the memories of finding his young wife brutally murdered.
Still settling in to a small town where everybody takes an interest of everybody's else's business, Franklin's confounded by the apparent bizarre suicide of Hugh Weber, Bethany's most disliked farmer.. A man of hot temper and raging opinions, what could have led him to lock himself inside his barn and set fire to it? Warren finds no rational answers from Weber's weary, but beautiful wife Sylvie, now struggling to maintain the farm with the help of her large brood of children, nor any help from Weber's equally cantankerous, volcanic=tempered brother Victor.
And who's the elusive mystery man who may have started another fire and committed various thefts around town?
While it's fascinating to follow Franklin and the young green cop assisting him as they methodically track down clues and question potential suspects and people of interest, the book slows to a crawl in when it delves into the small down lives of the Bethany residents and their official busybody amateur detective Alice Bellows. The story than begins to resemble the most antiquated, snail-paced Cozy mystery that takes forever to get wherever it's going...
The only thing remotely interesting about the slow, slow townsfolk stuff is that Bethany has an unusual amount of neighbors with histories in the U.S. Intelligence community...........as if the place is Florida for elderly spies. A captivating idea, but nothing's really done with it.....at least in this first book in the series.
Still settling in to a small town where everybody takes an interest of everybody's else's business, Franklin's confounded by the apparent bizarre suicide of Hugh Weber, Bethany's most disliked farmer.. A man of hot temper and raging opinions, what could have led him to lock himself inside his barn and set fire to it? Warren finds no rational answers from Weber's weary, but beautiful wife Sylvie, now struggling to maintain the farm with the help of her large brood of children, nor any help from Weber's equally cantankerous, volcanic=tempered brother Victor.
And who's the elusive mystery man who may have started another fire and committed various thefts around town?
While it's fascinating to follow Franklin and the young green cop assisting him as they methodically track down clues and question potential suspects and people of interest, the book slows to a crawl in when it delves into the small down lives of the Bethany residents and their official busybody amateur detective Alice Bellows. The story than begins to resemble the most antiquated, snail-paced Cozy mystery that takes forever to get wherever it's going...
The only thing remotely interesting about the slow, slow townsfolk stuff is that Bethany has an unusual amount of neighbors with histories in the U.S. Intelligence community...........as if the place is Florida for elderly spies. A captivating idea, but nothing's really done with it.....at least in this first book in the series.
As I mentioned, the world building is truly admirable, but the book depends on this to wander about if it had all the time in the world to fully lay out its story. Which is why I felt myself exhaling long sighs when it left detective Warren to go leisurely poking among the Bethany folk. A solid cast of characters and a surprisingly heart-rending resolution to the primary mystery.......but you'll need a measure of patience to arrive at it. 3 stars (***)....I'd definitely check out the next Warren case if it involves the town's geriatric secret agent brigade.....
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