Stage Fright

April 18, 2005
Heavy with allusions to Thomas Wolfe, Lewis Carroll, Nietzsche, Kafka and other literary giants, British author Poulson's absorbing second Cambridge mystery (after 2004's Murder Is Academic
) concerns Professor Cassandra James's efforts to cope with single motherhood while making a trouble-ridden dramatic debut at the Everyman Theatre. She has rewritten Mrs. Henry Wood's 1860s novel East Lynne
as a play, and during rehearsals must deal with a ghostly apparition in the gallery, followed by the abrupt disappearance of her close friend and leading lady, Melissa Meadow. Cass comments that "life does seem to be mirroring art in a rather disturbing way" when an anonymous letter quoting a Byron love poem offers the only clue to Melissa's whereabouts. Much of the story concerns such maternal challenges as breast-feeding, squalling babies in "nappies" and postpartum depression, yet somehow Cass finds time to break into her missing friend's empty house and eventually track down both her own and Melissa's abusive ex-spouses and other lovers. Skillful blendings of reality with Tarot card prophesies and dream visions lead to a stunning resolution. Agent, Robert Hale (U.K.).

January 31, 2000
Formidable early feminist Nell Bray returns in her third adventure, after Hanging on a Wire , to help George Bernard Shaw in his efforts to protect his latest star. Isabella Flanagan, an American heiress married to Lord Penwardine, has left her husband to star in Shaw's reworking of the Cinderella story, which bears some obvious parallels to Bella's sorry marriage. The playwright believes that Penwardine, known as Guggles, may retaliate. After a censor from the Lord Chamberlain's office is found murdered backstage, dressed in Bella's costume, the leading lady returns to her husband's home without a word of explanation. Nell struggles to determine whether she's been kidnapped and why the censor was killed. Linscott infuses the lively tale with details and mores of the century's first decade, including an exciting flight in a Wright model aeroplane. Nell is a delight.

May 1, 2005
In this second addition to the series featuring Cambridge professor Cassandra James " Murder Is Academic," 2004), Cass is stuck at home with baby Grace while her husband is away on business. The disappearance of the leading lady in a local community theater production draws Cass into a real-life melodrama involving a jealous husband, a cloaked figure in the loges, an illicit affair, a kidnapping, and a surprise visit from her ex-husband. Self-centered actors, a bumbling detective, and a duo of screaming babies conspire to drive Cass nuts as she searches for clues as to why the leading lady would abandon her acting career, her marriage, and her newborn child. Or why someone would want to get rid of her. Encompassing attributes of both an English cozy and a classic "woman-and-child-in-danger" thriller, this quick little read is sure to please fans of both subgenres.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2005, American Library Association.)