Jacqueline Winspear has certainly proven time and time again that she can write these English mysteries and make them as good and fun as Agatha did with Miss Marple. Here is the next title featuring the fun, independent and witty, Maisie Dobbs - an investigator extraordinaire - solving yet another crime in this ninth installment of the line.

We begin this book as WWII looms in the near distance. Readers are first shown a young woman by the name of Maudie Petit who is working hard in a barn, making sure everything is clean and fresh for the next day. Maudie is one of those tireless workers who gives her services pretty much everywhere in order to make enough money to live. She’s also been going her very best to hide a secret - the secret that’s about to be born among the horses and the hay. This is how Eddie Petit came into the world, and he’s been able to calm horses down and be their best friend ever since.

Maisie knows Eddie as one of those ‘gentle giants.’ People said he wouldn’t live long after he was born; he has been called ‘dumb,’ ‘slow,’ and he isn’t known for much of anything except his true gift with horses. This gift, however, has garnered him a very solid reputation - even being called by royalty to help the Queen’s horses at one time. So it was a horrific day when Eddie was killed at the paper factory, crushed by one of those huge rolls of paper that somehow came off and killed him. Maudie can barely live without her beloved son, and friends of Eddie’s beg Maisie to find out if this was an accident or foul play.

Maisie begins her hunt as she always does - with elegance and class. People are telling Maisie that Eddie was truly different over the past few months. He seemed to be ‘thinking’ more. He learned how to write, read, and he seemed to be hiding the secret that his brain was far less slow than anybody originally thought.

This crime could involve everyone from a childhood bully of Eddie’s who finally got his ultimate torment on the poor, simple-minded boy - all the way up to CEOs of corporations, like a newspaper man who has more money than he knows what to do with. While all this is going on, readers are also given a much deeper look into Maisie’s personal life, as she struggles with the fact that a poor girl like her from the opposite side of the tracks is now living in a mansion with a millionaire, James Compton, who is completely and utterly in love with her. Although she feels strange in this world, Maisie also knows that James wants marriage, and she will soon need to make a decision on whether or not the ‘poor girl’ can live comfortably as the ‘rich woman.’

As always, Ms. Winspear gives her readers and fans a lovely Maisie who shows the strength, independence and charm that isn’t shown much anymore - unless you’re talking about women turning into vampires. The history that’s offered is truly amazing, and the reader will feel as if they’re sitting in England just waiting for Hitler to commence his brutality. Perhaps the tenth installment will find Maisie directly in the fight, using her ‘mad’ skills to help her fellow countrymen.