When the book arrived, I flicked through it initially and spotted the phrase, ‘Mel…the motorbike’ and thought this may just be for me.

The prologue is set in London in 1941 and we’re introduced to Mel Greenway, on her nineteenth birthday, the day ‘the letter’ dropped through the letterbox, the letter inviting her to enlist. Unlike some, Mel sees this as an exciting prospect, a chance to break free. It is also, however, the worst night of the Blitz, when Mel loses both her parents and her brother, as well as her home, and meets Derrin Bradley for the first time. She feels an unfamiliar spark as he holds her hand while she lies trapped in the rubble, surrounded by the death and destruction of all she knows.

Fast forward to the end of the war when fortunes have changed and women like Mel, who have learned unlikely skills and proven useful in the conflict, are relegated once more to being merely women in a male-dominated world. Not only that, Mel faces class division, too. She is in fact Lady Melinda Greenway but the death of her father and brother means she has no claim to the Avonby Estate when the previous Lord dies in a plane crash.

A motorbike riding, trained mechanic, Mel is an unlikely ‘Lady’. The war has changed many people, even if the attitudes of the establishment have quickly reverted now the conflict is over, and when Mel finds herself with nowhere to go, she is forced to accept an offer of accommodation in the grand house she should have called home. She finds herself regarded as the impoverished relative who has to work for the estate to help ‘pay’ for her keep. Her cousin’s wife, Laura, has little regard for her and the servants find it hard to accept her Ladyship as one of them.

Her special skill, that of noticing detail and reading people, proves invaluable once more, as does her ability to fix a car!

Lady Melinda is happiest outdoors and quickly makes herself useful, leading the restoration of the grounds of the estate until, one day, her ‘vigorous weeding’ uncovers the body of a young girl buried beneath the roses. The police are called and she finds herself thrown together once more with Derrin Bradley who just happens to be the investigating police officer. Who is the girl (who it turns out was pregnant) and how did she come to be buried there, in a shallow grave? Was the body meant to be found and how long had it been there?

As the investigation progresses, there are occasional flashbacks explaining the relationship between Mel and Derrin more clearly. They had previously worked together, their skills complementing each other. She had not only been an excellent mechanic but also an effective ‘walking lie detector’ with exceptional observational skills, recruited by the army to help in more unusual cases; the sort which meant she had had to sign the Official Secrets Act. Of course, theirs had been, on occasions, more than just a professional relationship and the ‘will they, won’t they’ scenario is continued throughout the novel.

All this melds nicely with the plot which has been cleverly woven and the denouement is not so wide of the mark given the pertinent clues and identities which are revealed at suitable intervals.

The victims, both of murder and attempted murder, start to pile up on the Avonby Estate and Derrin worries about Mel’s safety at the house given that the motive for events is not clear and it appears she could be a target. While she navigates her feelings for Derrin, so too, she has to navigate the advances of a potential suitor, Lord Richard Stanley, and the snooty arrogance of Laura. Meanwhile, she happily realises that her cousin, Jonathan, is actually a decent chap, despite his choice of wife.

Her special skill, that of noticing detail and reading people, proves invaluable once more, as does her ability to fix a car! Shadowy figures are identified and motives are eventually uncovered so the truth can ultimately be revealed and while Avonby might have been left limping, at the end, it is still intact and ready to face the future.

The principal characters are well defined even if Derrin does remain something of an enigma and the supporting cast plays a valuable part. The sense of period is sustained with social attitudes to the fore. All this melds nicely with the plot which has been cleverly woven and the denouement is not so wide of the mark given the pertinent clues and identities which are revealed at suitable intervals. I found it a quick, enjoyable read and could easily see a return of Lady Melinda and Derrin Bradley as a popular crime-fighting duo.


A Thorn in the Rose is published by No Exit Press