A Regimental Affair Book

Utterly preposterous. I enjoyed it quite a lot, because I do enjoy a really preposterous piece of melodrama.

It seemed, though, that Green put cards with a lot of plot elements into a bag and pulled them randomly. Let's see: a murder; an amateur sleuth; an evil young woman; secrets; the mysterious deaths of two men; more secrets; a young man with reason to commit murder; even more secrets... And then--oh, yes--let's add the amateur sleuth finding that he can't solve the crime without betraying someone who saved his life as a child, so he-- Okay, it just got completely ridiculous here. Coincidence piles onto coincidence, until we get absurdity piled onto absurdity. I couldn't tell if Green had written herself into a corner and couldn't figure out any other way to end up with a happily ever after; or if she thought this ricketty stack of unbelievabilities actually holds up.

Mixed with the usual crowd of stock characters--the profligate son, the noble father, the saintly woman--are some interesting characters. Amabel is wonderfully manipulative. (Though, what happens to her at the end? She just vanishes.) Caleb Sweetwater isn't a bad amateur sleuth: he notices things and thinks everything through. Until, that is, he melodramatically decides he can't go on with his investigation, and he goes off and-- (Oh, you just have to read this part; the word "coincidence" doesn't do it justice.)

The title is interesting, given that Agatha is dead before the book even starts. But it really is her book. (Though: Agatha, Agnes, and Amabel--couldn't Green have come up with more distinctive names? I mixed up Agnes and Agatha for much of the book.) She even gives testimony at the inquest into her death, via her letters. (Though they are entirely too long.)

The twist of who's related to whom is absurd, but if you've gotten that far, you've had so many ridiculous situations thrown at you that you just roll with it. (Really?!? A sailor who speaks the language happens to pass the murder house at the exact moment a Scandinavian maid screams out an important plot point before dramatically flopping dead across a windowsill? And he doesn't wonder if he should maybe try to help? He just walks on by with his buds?)

Still, fun read.

(I read the manybooks copy, which has this cover and a number of typos.)