Book Review - Georgette Heyer's No Wind of Blame
No Wind of Blame by Georgette Heyer
Published by: Arrow
Publication Date: 1939
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)
Ermyntrude Carter is hosting a shooting party at her home, Palings. Little does she realize that it won't be fowl that is shot. She is a former actress and a wealthy widow with a precocious daughter, Vicki, who likes her ensemble to match the moment and the character she is emoting. A flair for the dramatic runs in the family. Ermyntrude made the mistake of choosing the feckless and philandering Wally Carter as her second husband and it has caused her no end of headaches. But if her guest, the Georgian Prince Alexis Varasashvil, has anything to say about it Wally won't be Ermyntrude's husband for much longer. She has put up with Wally's scheming and his sighing and his complaining, but knocking up a local girl might just be the last straw. And as for the blackmail letter.... Well, the Prince's offer of marriage is looking better and better. Who cares if he's also a fortune hunter? He's better than the one she's got. But then the one she's got claims that someone has taken a shot at him. No one believes Wally and what's more, no one cares. But then attempted murder because murder when Wally is shot and killed. He was crossing over a little bridge to the neighbor's house to discuss a new get-rich-quick scheme he's thought up and that, as they say, was that. But no one was near the weapon and it just doesn't seem possible. How can a weapon fire without someone on the trigger? The only evidence of a crime really is Wally's corpse. The local police see this murder as way beyond their pay grade and call in Scotland Yard. Inspector Hemingway arrives on the case and sees that everyone has a motive, from the misused wife, to the courting prince, to the quirky step-daughter, to the ward, to the neighbor, all the way down to the brother of the pregnant girl. And each and every one of them isn't being very cooperative or honest. But if Inspector Hemingway is honest he realizes that first they need to figure out how Wally was killed before they can come to a who. The method will reveal the murderer. Or at least that's the hope.
I picked up No Wind of Blame for one reason and one reason only, I wanted to read Envious Casca. I have a deep seeded need to read holiday themed murder mysteries during the month of December. If it's set up as a locked room murder mystery with the snowbound residents of a country estate as the only suspects, well, all the better. And that in a nutshell is the glory of Envious Casca. But I saw it was the second book in the Inspector Hemingway series so obviously I felt I had to read No Wind of Blame first. I really shouldn't have done this because this book was truly awful. And to add insult to injury, Inspector Hemingway is hardly in it. So really, what was the point? Plus now that they've renumbered the series and this is the sixth in the "Inspectors Hannasyde and Hemingway" series I don't think if I had had four more books to read before getting to Envious Casca I would have ever made it. In fact most Georgette Heyer fans have a strict policy of not reading her mysteries. I can kind of see why if this was the only one I'd read. But my main problem was that the blurb on the back cover basically gave away the whole plot. AKA, why I write my own blurbs for my reviews. They're the blurbs books should have had in my mind. I remember years ago in his book The Polysyllabic Spree where he recounted his love of reading Nick Hornby called out whomever wrote the blurb to his copy of Wilkie Collins's No Name. The book has an ingenious twist that the blurb gave away. His advice was to buy the book but read nothing on it and I did just that. I mean I'm very anti spoilers, but if someone blurts out something in the heat of the moment it's far less egregious an error than writing it out, getting it approved, and then getting it printed on the back of a book. Did no one go, hey, perhaps we shouldn't say this? Maybe they assumed as the book was written in World War II that spoilers no longer mattered. Spoilers always matter! But more importantly is unique characters, kindness to fellow humans, oh, and not having a twist out of a Bond movie!
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