I haven't posted a review on Flying High Reviews in 2025 until now. This a blog for books containing strong female protagonists. It's taken me about two and half months to find them. I'm not surprised that this review deals with a book I've chosen from the library rather than one that was sent to me by an author or publisher.
Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict deals with a group of real life mystery authors. Benedict chose Dorothy Sayers as the viewpoint character. The others are Agatha Christie, Baroness Orczy who is referred to as Emma in this novel, Margery Allingham and Ngaio Marsh.
From the Wikipedia article on Ngaio Marsh, I learned that Sayers, Christie, Allingham and Marsh have been called the Queens of Crime. Baroness Orczy, who is not known for writing mysteries, is not included in that group. She is best known for having written the historical fiction, The Scarlet Pimpernel, but she also had written crime novels about which I know absolutely nothing. In fact, Benedict's novel, the subject of this review, was the first time I learned that Baroness Orczy had written anything other than The Scarlet Pimpernel. So I definitely got an education from reading this book.
I feel that I need to mention that although I have read Sayers, Christie and the one well known novel by Orczy, I have never read any books by Margery Allingham or Ngaio Marsh.
The authors discuss how they write. Agatha Christie says that for her characters come last. It definitely shows. That is not a compliment. Although I watch Poirot on television, I don't find him interesting as a protagonist. She may start with plot, but her plots are formulaic. Christie was the first mystery author I read. Since then I've discovered authors I prefer whose work is more complex.
Dorothy Sayers says that she creates biographies for her characters. She wondered if they should create a biography for the missing May Daniels even though she isn't a fictional character. IMAO, that's definitely the wrong direction. That should be self-evident. She has an actual life which they need to uncover, not create. Knowing about her life should be a starting point for their investigation into her disappearance.
Dorothy realized that May shouldn't be viewed the same way as a fictional character after she attended the police briefing about May's disappearance. After that, it felt very real. She shared the information that the police provided with the other women in their group.
Since May's disappearance is the central mystery of the novel, I can't include any further information about it. I also can't reveal how the novel ended. I would give it the grade of B. This means that I liked it, but didn't love it.
