I realized that I haven’t yet written about Charlotte Macleod’s mysteries.¹ This is not my most favorite of her Sarah Kelling Kelling Bittersohn mysteries but it is one of my favorites, and also a great beach read.

In this one, Sarah’s Aunt Emma is the star. Well-heeled Bostonian Emma never passes up a chance to do something dramatic like throw herself out of a burning building to raise money for the Fireman’s Relief Fund, or sponsor and take the lead in annual little theatre productions of Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, profits going to a good cause.

When an elderly friend complains to Emma that she’s not up to her own annual summer on the small Maine island that she owns – and the collection of “artists, writers, and people who need a quiet place to work and don’t have other resources to draw on” that she invited to stay on the Island – Emma offers to take her place. Emma’s been feeling a little run-down, missing her late husband more than usual, worried about her elderly friend, her failing singing voice, all the aches and pains that plague an active older woman – perhaps a quiet summer on a remote island will be just her speed.

Despite an incident on the daily ferry to the island – during an unusually deep nap², someone got into some costume stage jewelry Emma had brought along to repair – at first, Emma’s vacation seems idyllic. There’s a big comfortable house, staffed by the island caretaker, his cute tween daughter and her best friend, a couple of young men for outdoor maintenance, and a chef who makes dreamy pastries. There’s a collection of interesting historians, writers, artists. To liven things up, one of the guests is a psychic. And another is a too-charming Russian poet who is also a Count (and probably also a confidence man). The house is filled with sunshine and books and comfortable chairs. The ocean’s whispers fills the air.

Emma’s duties are light: in the morning, the guests partake of a buffet breakfast and Emma can join them or take breakfast in bed. After breakfast, lunch baskets are provided so that the guests can picnic with or eat in their cabins and not disturb the main house. During the day, Emma is at leisure to read or walk along the shore or nap or bird-watch or listen to music. There’s no Wi-Fi or TV, and the only phone is locked away to prevent guests from running up phone bills. The guests return at the end of each day for cocktail hour and an early dinner together. After dinner, if they wish, cards and board games are available, or people can talk or play the piano. When Emma decides she’s had enough, she announces she is retiring and the evening ends with the guests returning to their cabins.

Seems simple until a dead body shows up.

Who is this fellow in the diving suit and how did he get on the island? Why is he there? And why is the caretaker acting so suspiciously? Does the historian really believe there’s pirate treasure buried on the island? Who drugged the psychic and what are they afraid she’ll say? Why are the artists and writers building a raft? And who keeps hitting Emma over the head and knocking her out?

Emma, never one to quail at a challenge, determines to figure out what is going on and apprehend the murderer, restore order and peace to the island, and enjoy the rest of her summer doing what she does best.

Charlotte MacLeod’s characters are always so much fun. Emma is, as intended, a favorite: a mix of genteel manners, eccentric drama, and boots-on-the-ground practicality. In addition to the characters on the island – and, in particular, the Count, whom Emma charms by out-cheating him at cards – we are treated a brief guest appearance by Tweeters Arbuthnot, bird-watcher extraordinaire and pilot of his own private seaplane; and a longer appearance by Theonia Sorpende Kelling, a psychic seductress with a flair for unraveling mysteries and loose connections to the shallower parts of the underworld.

But what I really love about this book is the setting (of course). I want to spend the summer in a comfortable old mansion on an island off the Maine coast, reading and walking along the shore, and listening to the ocean from bed at night, with someone else to cook and clean, without TV, phone or Wi-Fi,³ and with interesting neighbors that come for drinks and dinner every night and stay to play games after dinner. And all for free.

That sounds like a heavenly way to spend a summer. Friends and I used to go to the Outer Banks for a week during shoulder season – we’d all bring a Lands-End bag or two of books, put them on the coffee table for all to pick from, and read our way through the week. We shared the cooking and walked along the beach and visited the lighthouse and went used-book shopping and bought too much hand-made pottery and made a pilgrimage to the nearby pirate island of Ocracoke. Sometimes we get to spend a week at an in-law’s summer house in the Finger Lakes, reading and watching the wind on the water and wine-tasting. I’ll take either of those options over the Hamptons anytime.⁴ If there’s anything I hate, it’s late summer in NYC – hot, humid, sweaty, dirty, and empty.

Ah, the fantasy of an island in Maine… And I know it’s a fantasy – there are always mosquitos or blackfly. Trash washes up on the beach. The sound of power boats invade the air. There’s always maintenance to do around the house. You like lying on the couch, reading, but it’s hard to read on your phone and everyone keeps interrupting you to encourage you to take walks and do something and you feel guilty enjoying your time the way that is enjoyable to you, and the day you do decide to leave the house, it pours down rain, and the little boys fight every day at 4 pm, regular as clockwork.

And it is still absolutely wonderful, made glorious summer by memory.

Reading The Gladstone Bag transports me to summers of the past.

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1. At least, I’m pretty sure I haven’t. It’s been a long year. ↩︎
2. Perhaps someone drugged Emma’s coffee? ↩︎
3. I used to pick bed and breakfasts for trips with my husband because they didn’t have TVs or Wi-Fi. One time, on the Blue Ridge Parkway, I woke up early and was surprised not to find him in the room. I dressed and walked the silent halls and lobby. In the breakfast room – it was empty, being way before breakfast time – I heard a sound coming from the kitchen. Turns out the sous chef had a little TV there and my husband had tuned in to that day’s stage of the Giro D’Italia. Love finds a way. ↩︎
4. I once went to a goodbye lunch for a coworker with four other coworkers at a bakery that was The Place for a chichi lunch then in Manhattan. Four of them kept talking about The Hamptons, their homes there, the best place to get whatever, no, dahling, don’t go to that grocery, you must go to this one instead, and whether they liked Ina Garten’s place before she moved it better or after. My other colleague and I glanced at each other out of the corner of our eyes, kept bland faces, and didn’t say a word – actually, we couldn’t get a word in edgewise and had nothing to say about the Hamptons anyway – because she liked the Jersey Shore – it’s not all like the TV show – and I preferred the Outer Banks. The lunch ended abruptly when a hoard of cockroaches flooded out of the basket containing the pastries. So much for The Place to dine. ↩︎