Patricia Grey

It seemed for a while in the 1980s and 1990s that the biggest growth area in fiction was the sub-genre featuring female private detectives. This boom was seen on both sides of the Atlantic, with a crop of excellent female sleuths appearing. Prominent among the American ranks were Sara Paretsky’s redoubtable V I Warshawski, Linda Barnes’s Carlotta Carlyle (who subsidised her investigation work by driving a cab around Boston), and Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone, who featured in the ‘Alphabet’ series. Back in Blighty we had, among many others, Liza Cody’s Anna Lee (brought to life on television by Imogen Stubbs), Joan Smith’s fiery academic, Loretta Lawson, and Michelle Spring’s wonderful Laura Principal (another some time academic).

Liz Evans had already published a few non-crime novels under other names, but chose to enter into this busy sector with Who Killed Marilyn Monroe?, which introduced ex-copper Grace Smith, who worked in the fictional coastal Kent resort of Seatoun. This book marked her second outing, and was very enjoyable.

There are certain aspects of life as a fictional private investigator that seem hard for any writer to shake off. The sleuth has to be jaundiced in their outlook on life (feasible, really given that they constantly mine the seedier aspects of society), live dangerously near the edge of financial survival, and thrive on wise cracking ripostes to any challenge. As far as that goes, Liz Evans leaves no cliché knowingly overlooked, but the book is none the worse for that. Grace Smith is capable and effortlessly empathetic, and her one-liner remarks are funnier than most.

I don’t want to embark on a synopsis of the plot as it is quite intricate, and I don’t want to risk inadvertent spoilers. I did, however, find it an appealing addition to a well-populated genre, and I will be looking for further books in the series.… (meer)

Grace Smith has always been one of my favourite of the fraught, vaguely madcap female private detective sub-genre for a bunch of different reasons.

Firstly I love Grace herself. Slightly bats definitely, sometimes refreshingly stupid, often times bordering on out of control, there's something refreshingly real and unmanufactured about Grace. She's the sort of girl you could see yourself having a drink with and whilst you might be a bit worried about the state of your shoes at the end of the night, your personal ego's not going to come away feeling somewhat underbaked.

Secondly I really love the supporting cast, particularly the other staff at the Detective Agency that Grace works at, most of whom are somewhat mildly bats in their own right.

Lastly I really like the plots of the books, and CUE THE EASTER BUNNY is no disappointment in those stakes, although, to be honest, the ongoing jokes about rabbits got dangerously close to being the biggest attraction.

I've been dodging the inevitable here I guess - is she the English Evanovich? Hate these sorts of comparisons as, apart from the coincidence of similar sorts of central characters - they are different books about different people in a completely different location. Given the choice, if it's my money being shelled out, Grace Smith is a better bet. None of that coy will she / won't she and with which bloke (which last time I tried a Plum book was still dragging on....). With Grace Smith there's nothing coy or cutsey - she is what she is, her love life is as on and off again as she bloody well wants it to be and besides, it's not the only thing in this girls life.

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/cue-easter-bunny-liz-evans… (meer)