Hotspur (Foxhunting Mysteries) [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

Sister organizes the horse's burial but before it can be put in the ground, the body of a woman wearing a sapphire ring is dug up. The body is that of Nola, the daughter of Tedi and Edward Bancroft. The young woman disappeared one day in 1981. Also vanishing at the same time as Nola was Guy Ramy, her boyfriend and the sheriff's son. his body as shortly found later. Sister, with the help of some friends, both human and animal, are able to solve the decades old murders and bring peace to two grieving families.

Fans of the Mrs. Murphy series are going to love HOTSPUR, an enchanting tale where the animals delight the reader with their ready wit, common sense and love for their humans. Sister is a memorable heroine who knows how to guide the members of the Jefferson Hunt Club in the direction she wants them to go. Reader will want to finish this book in one sitting so they can find out who the killer is and what the motive was.

Harriet Klausner

It would be helpful to read "Outfoxed" before Hotspur. As I maintain two residences I don't have my copy of Outfoxed handy, but I thought one of the provisions of Peter Wheeler's will was that Doug become joint master. In Hotspur he has been shipped off to a neighboring hunt and does not participate in the story; I missed him.

I suspect we haven't seen the last of Carter Howard and I look forward to another installment in the life of the Jefferson Hunt's members.

"Hotspur" centers on the murder of Nola Bancroft. Nola, was the beautiful and capricious younger daughter of the well heeled Bancrofts, Edward and Tedi. And about twenty-one years ago, she disappeared. Since she was dating the sheriff's dashing son, Guy, and her parents openly disapproved of that relationship, everyone assumed when the couple suddenly disappeared that Nola and Guy had eloped. But as the years passed and nothing was heard of the pair, local gossip also included the speculation that Guy had murdered Nola in a fit of anger and left town in order to avoid arrest. The recent discovery of Nola's body now bolsters the latter theory. But "Sister" Jane Arnold, Master of the Jefferson Hunt Club doesn't believe that Guy murdered Nola, and she's determined to discover what really happened even if it means reopening old wounds and stirring things up -- even a murderer's ire...

While I rather enjoyed Brown's descriptions of the Virginian countryside, the ins and outs of what goes on in a hunt club, and her character-descriptions of both the animals and humans (and what makes certain individuals tick), I still felt that a lot could have been left out since "Hotspur" was supposed to be (primarily) a murder mystery novel. For example, Nola's body is discovered at the end of chapter 1, and yet it is not until somewhere around chapter 15 that Brown delves into the mystery subplot again. And since I had checked out the book on the strength that it was supposed to be a mystery novel, this really left me feeling a little frustrated.

"Hotspur" is not a bad read. If you enjoy books about small towns, with well developed characters, and bits about nature and animals and our (human) relationship with animals (and theirs with us), and don't really mind that the mystery subplot takes a long while to get underway, than you will probably not be disappointed with "Hotspur." But be advised, Brown does take a while to get into the mystery of who murdered Nola and why.