A review by hannahstohelit
murder in the family by James Ronald

4.0

OKAY. The first half of the book, I was like "this is really great but also it could only be one of three people." And it was really great- the atmosphere was well established, the central family was charming, and I loved the scene where the children all tell the evil aunt what they think of her- lots of stories never give the family the chance in situations like these. The second half just went way too fast, crammed way too much detail into too few pages as though Ronald was just trying to keep things moving, and to be honest there were no clues. I would call this a thriller rather than a mystery- stuff just happens in a particular order rather than any actual detection happening. We know who must have done it because

we can tell that Ronald has written this family to be lovable and in such a way that we know they'll be okay

- so we know it has to be

the uncle, the housekeeper, or the companion, and all things being equal it's probably the companion because she's the one who discovered the body, and again, there are no clues

. The final switcheroo element was fun, but again, very little if any actual detection which could be disappointing.