As Anne Glenconnor reminds us a few times, she was lady in waiting and friend of Princess Margaret, and a frequent visitor to Mustique. The main character is obviously based on herself and there is some name-dropping! The story is not particularly exciting and the characters are not very well developed, so it is difficult to feel any emotion for them. However, hats off to her for writing a novel in her eighties!

Oh dear. I’m afraid this just isn’t a very good book. I’m disappointed because I really enjoyed the author’s autobiography, but this is just not up to the same standard.

The main character is a thinly veiled fictionalised version of Lady Glenconner herself - which will be obvious to anyone who has read her autobiography - which just makes for slightly strange reading. It’s immediately obvious who the murderer is from the first couple of chapters and the constant name dropping is just really grating.

Such a shame.

Death in Paradise meets Tatler!
This is a beach read - read it quickly and enjoy the ride, but don't think too deeply about it as the plot is rather thin and the characters not really credible. While quite enjoying the mystery, I found the constant name-dropping annoying and did not feel it added at all to the story.

This is a standard murder mystery albeit set in the more unusual setting of Mustique where a storm is awaited. The island is owned by an aristocratic couple with a strong sense of entitlement who operate a dated class system on the island. The frequent references to the late Princess Margaret who indulged herself there are irrelevant except to boost the self importance of the lead character who had been a lady in waiting. Solving the crime falls to the new young detective sergeant whose long term family connections with the island would normally rule him out as the investigating officer! The perpetrator is fairly obvious but it all ends satisfactorily.