Stephanie Barron has added a Christmas mystery to her excellent series featuring Jane Austen as an amateur detective with Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas (#447). Jane is invited to a cozy Christmas house party along with her family after an encounter with a chance- met traveler. Removing from her brother James' parsonage, where his scorn for all holiday pleasantries as pagan rituals is evident in the cold hearths and parsimonious meals awaiting Jane, her sister Cassandra and their mother, is a delightful prospect. Not only will the females have the advantage of a warm house and lively conversation; James can indulge his love of the hunt at The Vine.
But after a young Naval officer tragically meets his death on the grounds of The Vine and it is learned he was carrying a document vital to the resolution of the American War, things take a sinister turn. The house party is trapped on the estate by a snow storm, and it is evident to Jane and at least one other house party member that the officer's death is murder, not accident. Jane must puzzle out the motive to disclose the murderer amongst them.
What could be a better way to spend these hectic pre-holiday hours than wrapped in a stylish literary mystery if you are a Jane Austen aficionado? I was intrigued by Jane's interest in this volume with the progress of the American War. Of course, once you think about her brothers' involvement as Naval captains, the implications of the war's continuation would have had a direct effect on her family. It has the added factor of being an angle not often pursued by other authors' imaginings of Jane and her characters' lives. A neat twist, and a satisfying mystery.
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