Still Life with Murder by P.B. Ryan

Narrated by Leigh Ryan

Still Life with Murder is a couple of firsts for me – first time for the author and first time listening to the narrator. I love mysteries, so it was no problem (and actually a welcome break) to go from the emotional pull of romance to the tension of a murder mystery. Adding to my anticipation was the historical flavor – the novel is set in the post-Civil War era of the 1868, in the affluent society circles of Boston.

I was immediately captured by the character of Nell Sweeney, who was under the wing of a physician and acting as his nurse. The author has a skillful way of implying more than you are initially told; Nell has escaped from a shady past, and is desperately determined to escape into a better life. Unexpectedly, she is offered a post as a newborn girl’s nursemaid, to live with an affluent family in a beautiful Boston mansion. Leaving her kind physician protector is difficult, but her only chance to ever care for a child and further escape her past, proves to be an irresistible lure.

Life is good in Boston; Nell loves her tiny charge and has settled into life at the Hewitt mansion. Viola Hewitt has proven to be a kind benefactress, despite her tragic past – a bout with polio that left her in a wheelchair, and the loss of two of her sons at horrific conditions of Andersonville in the Civil War. Nell, content to be an acting-mother to the tiny girl, stays quietly in the background, away from Mr. Hewitt and their two remaining sons. Abruptly, Nell is brought out of the background and into the seedy criminal underground of brothels and opium dens when Viola discovers that her eldest son William, one she thought dead, has been accused of murder. Viola, forbidden by her husband to interfere, has asked Nell to investigate and prove the innocence of Dr. William Hewitt.

As she pursues the truth, Nell is shocked and disturbed to find less innocence and more signs of guilt surrounding the handsome and now dissolute William Hewitt. He has been sucked into a sordid world as a result of his addiction to opium, a drug whose arms he embraces to escape what we would now call post-traumatic stress from what he experienced during the war. Despite all signs to the contrary, Nell’s gut feelings are that William had a reason for his actions, and she is determined to help Viola and find the truth before William hangs.

I enjoyed the characters and plotlines of the mystery, and found myself wondering what would happen next every time I was forced to stop the audiobook at the end of my morning or evening commute. There were parts of the author’s descriptions that I felt, however, were too drawn-out and overdone; the minutely detailed descriptions of every component of the opium den – the pipes, the materials, the vapor, the color of the tubes – all went way past painting a picture and into prurient fascination.

The narrator, Leigh Ryan, is early in her career but shows a lot of promise. Her characters are distinctly different and her accents are present but not overdone. I was able to sink into the book and forget about narration (a good sign) until about three-quarters into the book, when it felt as if the narrator was reading instead of acting. The sentences began to have same cadence, whether it was a tense scene or one of more action.

I loved the fact that I (somewhat smugly) thought I had figured out the real killer, and was proven wrong with a slight twist; great suspenseful writing! I will definitely follow-up with the remaining books in the series to see how P.B. Ryan, Leigh Ryan, and the characters of the series evolve.

Victoria

Narration: B-

Book Content: B+

Steam Factor:  Glad I had my earbuds in (you will keep the earbuds in the for drug use and brothels more than the sex)

Violence: Escalated Fighting

Genre: Historical Mystery

Publisher: Patricia Ryan

Still Life with Murder was provided to AudioGals for review by the author.