A Bitter Truth

A Bitter Truth (2011) Charles Todd

In the third Bess Crawford mystery, Bess has returned home for Christmas leave, but before she makes it to her parent’s home, she discovers a young woman huddled in her doorway. Taking pity on her, she ends up returning home with the woman, to make sure she is safe. A murder causes her to remain at Vixen Hill rather than returning home, much to her dismay.

This was a very interesting read for me. I had a very hard time feeling much sympathy for Lydia, and a hard time understanding why Bess remained so willing to help her.

On the other hand, I very much enjoyed the Australian Sargent who keeps popping up. He was amusing, and it was good to see characters who reacted to the horror of war with humor–it was a nice break from the cases of shell shock in other books.

One of the things this story made clear is how close the British were to the front–a trip across the channel took one from the war to home. The fact that people serving in France could be called back for an inquest emphasized this.

Here in the US, we haven’t truly had war on our soil for several generations. This reminds me how–in many ways–the US has been isolated, even when we were at war.

If you haven’t read a Bess Crawford book, you could certain start here, however, I don’t think this is one of the better books in the series. I take that back, it was good, but I spent so much of the book being annoyed at Lydia, it wasn’t as enjoyable.

On the other hand, I have the next book waiting to be read.
Rating: 6.5/10

Published by William Morrow

• Browse the archives:
  
• Wings of Fire » »
• « « A Test of Wills