A review by nevclue
A Useful Woman by Darcie Wilde

3.0

I am always searching for more historical mysteries, preferably with a lady protagonist. This fits the bill. There were many things I liked about this. I liked Rosalind's practicality and her clear-eyed assessment of what matters in society and how it affects her standing. I find the willful ignorance of whatever the current society's mores in order to show "spunk" or whatever annoying. However, I think the handling of Rosalind's romantic relationships were not handled with quite the same deftness. On the plus side, the author has clearly done her research on the time period and the characters are believable. The mystery was okay. I guessed most of it fairly early on but it was reasonably compelling.