Out of the blue, Duncan Kincaid's ex-wife Vic contacts him after years of no communication, to ask his help. She has been working on a biography of a poet who died just five years before, an accepted suicide based on the manner of her death and her multiple previous attempts to take her own life. However, after reading through the private papers, most especially letters to the poet's mother, Vic has become convinced the other woman was murdered, and she wants Duncan to call in a favor to get the local constabulary to look into the death. No one wants to be bothered, naturally, but Duncan is persuaded that Vic's instincts might be valid.

What follows presents multiple challenges to Duncan's view of himself and his life, as well as his relationship with Gemma. The past he's digging into contains any number of secrets that the people whose lives overlapped with Vic's and the poet Lydia Brooke's might want to keep suppressed. Fans of the Bloomsbury group in general, and Rupert Brooke in particular, will enjoy the many references to that literary enclave; fans of this series will find plenty to ponder as Duncan's personal life takes a dramatic turn or two. This was good, although the major underlying secret only came to light very near the end, and the conclusion felt a bit convoluted and rushed. ( )

The fifth entry in the Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James series weaves the poetry of England’s WWI soldier-poet Rupert Brooke into a case tied to Kincaid’s former wife and the biography she's writing about another English poet. And as unlikely as it sounds, poetry in a murder mystery, it works. It breaks out of the conventional mystery format of the earlier books by focusing on the tangled emotions and conflicts between Gemma, Duncan, his ex-wife, and her Oxford University co-workers. One development in particular made picking up the next book a sure thing for me. ( )

As engaging and engrossing as all in this series! I only gave it four stars because I was angry about the character killed off. ;) ( )

Another fabulous mystery about Kincaid and James. Well written. I think it took me till about 3/4 through to guess the murderer. Which for me is darn good. Read these books in order to get the full character development of the main characters. ( )

Fünf Jahre nach dem Tod der Autorin Lydia Broke nimmt Superintendent Duncan Kincaid den Fall noch einmal auf. Denn seine Exfrau Vic glaubt fest an Mord und bittet ihn um Beistand. Als sie wenig später selbst umgebracht wird, verwandelt sich das Ganze für Kincaid in einen Fall von höchst persönlichem Interesse ...