The Unexpected Return of Josephine Fox: Winner of the Richard & Judy Search for a Bestseller Competition

Set in Romsey, Hampshire, in 1941 this was billed as a mix of Agatha Christie and Midsomer Murders. A pub has been destroyed by a German bomb. Seven people were known to have been in there when it was hit but when the lifting team starts to dig, eight bodies are discovered. The ‘extra’ body is that of a 15-year old girl, dressed in her finest red dress, dead from a blow to the head but with no blast injuries. To the disgust of the town’s establishment the local coroner and solicitor, Bram Nash, refuses to sign her off as a bomb casualty. A friend of Bram’s, Josephine Cox, has recently returned to the town and she starts to investigate to discover who the dead girl might be. In doing so she discovers the girl had recently had a child, and with her questions she manages to stir up a hornet’s nest of depravity and malice. The case is eventually solved and although the perpetrator of the crime was fairly obvious from the start it is the unpicking of the clues which makes this book so readable. The story is well told and the social strands of the town are well described. This is Clare Gradidge’s debut novel and certainly earns 4 Stars.
Review by: Freyja