Maisie Dobbs

Maisie Dobbs is my new best friend. We were introduced a few weeks ago by my son-in-law, Ron, who in addition to being a copy editor at the Detroit Free Press, reviews mysteries for the Sunday edition. "Pardonable Lies" is the third book in Jacqueline Winspear's series about a remarkable young woman in post World War I England. Her card reads "Psychologist and Investigator", and although the level of psychological training available to her at that period has hardly given her skills we expect of the flamboyant profilers who are the product of modern criminal psychology classrooms, Maisie is a dab hand as a investigator.

She is a worthy inspiration for the likes of Kinsey Millhone and V. I. Warshawski. Under stress, however, they tend to run for miles, jump in the shower, pull on a t-shirt and jeans and get to work. Not our Maisie. She understands the restorative powers of hot water (A bath had been drawn for her, and the vapor of lavender lingered in the air), but when she sets out for France to sift through the physical and emotional debris of war and to confront her own demons, she wears "a gray-and-blue tweed jacket with a pale gray silk blouse, light gray woolen trousers, black shoes, and, to top off her ensemble, a dark gray hat with a broader brim than usual, a black band and a dark blue feather on the side, which was attached to the band with a deep blue stone in a sapphire cut. . . The clothes were not new, though she had retrimmed the hat herself recently."

There is much more to Maisie than a snappy outfit and the account of her adventures is both exciting and thought-provoking. Ron's point about the perspective of past history making comments on modern war more palatable, or at least less critical, is worth pondering.

Here's his excellent review

I look forward to going back to read the earlier books which introduced our protagonist and I await further Maisie Dobbs books from Ms. Winspear. I'm also wondering whether Kinsey and V.I. need to sharpen their images with a bit of creative hat-trimming.