Murder mystery set at Hernhill, near Faversham (KENT)

7th September 2022

Murder at Mount Ephraim by Julie Wassmer, murder mystery set at Hernhill, near Faversham (Kent).

The murder mystery is set at Mount Ephraim, a beautiful house and tended gardens set in about 800 acres, nestled in the beautiful English countryside between Canterbury and Faversham. In the the novel, there are details of the rooms and gardens, the Miz Maze, the Japanese gardens, the lake and the gentle ambience of the estate which make a good backdrop for an upcoming wedding.

Once again Pearl Nolan is at the heart of the story. This is no. 9 in the series but there is enough information woven into the story that provides sufficient background and thus Murder at Mount Ephraim can be read as a stand alone.

Pearl’s old friend Amy is returning from Thailand to marry Guy, an adventurer and whose family ties make Mount Ephraim the obvious choice for their wedding. It is a small group of people and even the day before, Pearl’s sleuthing nose is on high alert. She has a good sense of the group dynamics and is adept at overhearing snatches of conversations, which indicate all is not well among some attendees. There are secrets, of course, and backstories and she can bounce her ideas off fiancé, DCI Mike McGuire – he can guide and inform from the sidelines but this is not his patch. So  Pearl has to find out what she can under her own auspices and piece together the mystery as it evolves..

There is a murder, the clue is in the title, but why has one person been tragically singled out as the target?

It’s delightful to be transported to a real location and clearly the author is very familiar with the layout. There is a handy map as the novel opens and I suspect that – even though there is a fictional murder – the publicity around the setting will draw extra visitors to follow in Pearl’s footsteps. I will certainly visit when I am down that way!

I do very much like to learn new things through fiction. In this novel I learnt that Whitstable’s famous oyster had been replaced by its large shelled, grey competitor, the Pacific rock oyster which is more marketable as it can be farmed all year round – thus a whole industry has gone through intensive farming, replacing fishing and the true, original Whitstable oyster is hard to find.

As The Sun says, this is a mystery with “..all of the thrills without any of the gore..”

Tina for the TripFiction Team

Here the author talks about setting, choosing some wonderful illustrative photos to get a good sense of place

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