Queen of the Flowers : a Phryne Fisher mystery

Phryne saw me through 6 weeks of convalescence and I read as many as were downloadable in order. I just love them all. They're such fun, fast paced and with endearing characters to make them very enjoyable.

Awesome book. I love all of the Phyrne Fisher Mysteries they are fast moving and she is a great character. Love reading all about the details in the book, it makes you feel like you are right there in the city or home.

I LOVE the Phryne Fisher mysteries! Queen of The Flowers is no exception! It only got 4 out of 5 stars because I didn't understand Phryne's reaction to her missing Ruth. This story had everything! Kidnappings, elephants, folk music and musicians, and so much more.

It is interesting how many of the stories start with a missing girl. Miss Fisher is asked to find a young woman who has gone missing. Usual crew, but then one of her adopted daughters also goes missing. Nice side story about daughters long lost father. Manages to have enough character to overcome what is formula writing.

Murder on a Midsummer Night by Kerry Greenwood is yet another installment of the wonderful Miss Fisher Murder Mystery stories featuring the Honorable Miss Phryne Fisher. This one is set in the scorching heat of summer and finds her investigating the apparent suicide by drowning of a junk-shop owner.

The only problem is that things aren’t quite what they seem to be. The junk-shop isn’t full of junk, and the man himself seems to have been something of a business marvel. With a gift for hunting up treasures and selling the unsellable, he was something of a genius in his field.

Of course, his mother insists he would never have killed himself and certainly never by drowning and so she hires Phryne to discover the truth.

At the same time, Phryne is called upon to hunt for a missing heir. An illegitimate son was born to a woman with a healthy estate. He is now one of the heirs to her fortune. Without finding him, or what happened to him, they can’t distribute the estate to any of the heirs.

As always the dashing and impeccably dressed Phryne looks at the world in her own unique way. She uses resources the rest of us may not consider (like her ward Jane with the autopsy). The author manages to juggle two complex cases yet the reader doesn’t lose the way.

A Glimpse Of The Past

With all of the books in this series, there is a fast-paced adventure complete with a few harrowing moments. There is that here too but I particularly enjoyed reading a little more about Miss Fisher’s past. Reading how she interacts with her sister in the present was fun as well. (Two more different siblings you are not likely to find).

This is an excellent addition to the series yet works well as a stand-alone book. Very enjoyable.

Reviewed for LnkToMi iRead in response to a complimentary copy of the book provided by the publisher in hopes of an honest review.

Australian author Kerry Greenwood rarely commits a misstep, but she does a bit in <i>Murder on a Midsummer Night</i>, the seventeenth novel in this usually lovely series. The Honorable Phryne Fisher investigates two unrelated matters: the murder of a mama’s boy junk dealer and the whereabouts of an illegitimate baby put up for adoption in Ballerat, Australia, in the 1860s.

The indomitable Mrs. Manifold — certain that her devoted son would never kill himself, whatever the incompetent coroner might claim — hires Phryne. Sure enough, Phryne finds that Augustine Manifold did not drown himself in the sea, but was drowned in a soapy bathtub. The Bright Young Things that associated with young Manifold are over the top — even for Phryne Fisher and me. That thread goes a bit off the rails, and the resolution is not very believable. However, Phryne, aided by devoutly Catholic Dot Williams, Phryne’s devoted companion and ladies’ maid, unravels the mystery of what happened to the baby born to the desperate 16-year-old Kathleen O’Brien in 1864 in a fine fashion. So three stars to a novel that’s literally only half-bad.

Queen of the Flowers, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries #14, finds the socialite lady detective solving the disappearances of several young ladies. The carnival is in town, bringing old friends; several shady characters are looking for Rose--they are so vile the most vile bar has banned them; and Phryne is slated to be the Queen of the Flowers in the upcoming 1928 Flower Parade. Now, if only the Flower Girls would stop disappearing...

I have been watching the Miss Fisher Murder Mysteries on Netflex as entertainment while hand appliqueing in the evening. The books are being published by Poison Pen Press and I thought it would be fun to read one.

Miss Fisher goes on the trail of her missing adopted daughter who had been searching for her birth father. She is also hiding Rose, a girl who nearly drowned, and whose life is threatened. Her investigations bring to light instances of abuse against girls, a professor's double life, and the workings of a gambling ship. Girls fight over a vacuous but angelic looking teen. All the gang appear: Dot and her beau Hugh, Detective Jack Robinson, Mr. and Mrs. Butler, and Bert and Cec, and of course the ravishing Lin Chung.

I enjoyed the humorous authorial asides such as "Phryne had rescued the girls from slavery at considerable trouble and expense." When Pyryne checks out a lead and is asked about it she replies that it was "Remarkably like being inside the Castle of Otronto without the giant hand, thought it might have put in an appearance later." I also loved her adage, "Guilt is a useless emotion and not to be indulged in."

I thought the book Phryne is very like the TV show one, well-heeled, confident, and nonplussed in the midst of danger. I did cringe a bit over her willingness to be considered her Chinese lover Linn's concubine ("Phryne, fortunately, liked being an amusement.") and her acceptance of prostitution as a welcomed career for impoverished girls.

It was an enjoyable, light read with wonderful historical ambiance and a definite Australian flair.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

I discovered the Phryne Fisher mysteries by Kerry Greenwood thanks to the fabulous TV series based on the books. There are several differences between the books and the TV series, most notably the romantic interest in one of the typical will they or won’t they relationships between Jack Robinson and Phryne. In the books, he is a friend and that’s it. In the books, Phryne has a long continuing relationship with Lin, the married Chinese man whose wife is also Phyrne’s friend. Altogether too shocking for television. Clearly, the books are more interesting. While reading Queen of the Flowers, I kept thinking I must have missed the episode, but the only thing that remained the same are the names and the flower festival.

The book though is exactly what makes Kerry Greenwood’s Phryne Fisher series superior to your average series. We have Phryne Fisher, the wish-fulfillment private detective, rich, brilliant, and independent, with a gorgeous 1920s wardrobe and 2020s values. In its form, this is a cozy mystery series bedazzled with glamour and fashion, but in function? Phryne’s cases are much too gritty and grim for any of the letters in the word “c-o-z-y” except the “y” which we need for the mystery.

This time, one of the young girls who will participate in the floral parade with Phryne for the flower festival goes missing and she is hired to find her. She is a troubled girl and considered “fast” even though she is just a child. In fact, she is the perfect age to attract Judge Roy Moore, or as happens, men like Judge Roy Moore. Of course, Greenwood wrote this before Roy Moore’s scandal, so she had no idea that vast numbers of people will decide the child molestation is far less important than a tax cut, so in Phryne’s world, there is this universal condemnation and horror that obviously is no longer realistic.

Queen of the Flowers is a compelling mystery. It is, as always with Greenwood, well-researched with authentic details of time and place. Sometimes, the wealth of research is a bit too obvious in Greenwood’s books, but not this time. There is another storyline that gives us the backstory on one of Phryne’s adopted daughters that is heartwarming and foreshadowed just well enough for us to be just ahead of revelation. I love this series and continue to look forward to reading more.

I received an e-galley of Queen of the Flowers from the publisher through NetGalley.

It's always fun to enjoy Kerry Greenwood and Hon. Phryne do what they do so very well. Queen of the Flowers, originally published in 2004, and now, re-released by Poisoned Pen Press in a new edition, is the 14th book in the series.

The series is wonderfully full of a sense of place and fully realized characters. The descriptions are spot on. It's always a joy to read a new installment of Phryne and family's adventures. This book is perhaps slightly grittier and more realistic than previous books in the series. The subject matter is tawdry and sad (human trafficking and abuse, among other things). I liked very much that this book includes more back story for Phryne's daughter Ruth; I've always felt Ruth was more of a foil for Jane's more assertive/analytical personality, so it's nice to see and understand a little more of Ruth and her motivations.

Just a delightful read. Perhaps slightly darker than the average cozy mystery, but Ms. Greenwood can certainly write masterfully and entertainingly. Well worth a read.

Stats:
Title: Queen of the Flowers
Author: Kerry Greenwood
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
256 pages, Kindle, Hardcover, Paperback and other formats
Original pub. date: 2004, re-released in new edition Nov. 7, 2017

Five stars, I <3 Phryne

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher.