ANGEL WITH TWO FACES

TITLE: ANGEL WITH TWO FACES
AUTHOR: NICOLA UPSON
Pages: 422
Date: 23/08/2010
Grade: 5
Details: no. 2 Josephine Tey Mystery
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Josephine Tey joins her friend, Inspector Archie Penrose, for a holiday on his family's estate in Cornwall. She is happy to get away from London for a while and hopes to start work on her next mystery novel in the beautiful surroundings.
What should have been a quiet and happy time though seems doomed from the beginning. On the day of her arrival a young local man is buried with questions being asked whether his death was a suicide or an accident.
When shortly afterwards a second young local man dies, Penrose is asked to lead the inquiry and soon he and Josephine find themselves linking the two deaths and stumbling upon lots of secrets, both among Penrose's friends and his family.
This is a hard time for Archie who finds himself questioning everything he thought he knew for sure and facing hurtful revelations. Josephine, as an outsider, has a clearer and more objective view of the people they are dealing with, but even she can't foresee the outcome or prevent more deaths.
This is a great series of books. The mysteries are very well plotted and presented. Descriptions of people and their surroundings are beautiful and life like and the characters in the story have, like real people, good and less good sides. At no point does Upson try to paint Josephine Tey as anything other than human, which makes her a very likable and real person for me.
As far as I know the third book in this series has recently been published, and I hope I'll be able to get my hands on it soon.