Remembering the Dead is the 10th instalment in the "Penny Brannigan" Mystery series. At first I thought is this a reprint but realized I must of read a previous instalment. This reads more as a traditional mystery than cozy in my opinion and took me longer to read. It was like stepping back to when all I read was British mysteries. This can be read as a stand alone but recommend reading in order.

Canadian amateur sleuth Penny Brannigan attends a dinner party at a posh country house--where a historic chair disappears and a waiter is murdered.

Artist and spa owner Penny Brannigan has been asked to organize a formal dinner to mark the centenary of the armistice that ended World War One. After dinner, the guests adjourn to the library for a private exhibition of the Black Chair, a precious piece of Welsh literary history awarded in 1917 to poet Hedd Wyn. But to the guests' shock, the newly restored bardic chair is missing. And then Penny discovers the rain-soaked body of a waiter.

When Penny learns that the victim was the nephew of one of her employees, she is determined to find the killer. Meanwhile, the local police search for the Black Chair. The Prince of Wales is due to open an exhibit featuring the chair in three weeks, so time is not on their side. A visit to a nursing home to consult an ex-thief convinces Penny that the theft of the Black Chair and the waiter's murder are connected. She rushes to Dublin to consult a disagreeable antiquarian, who might know more than he lets on, and during the course of her investigation confronts a gaggle of suspicious travelers and an eccentric herbalist who seems to have something to hide. Can Penny find the chair and the culprit before she is laid to rest in the green grass of Wales?

Story is well written and the Welsh setting is lovely. I liked Penny but other character felt more alive to me. Love Mrs Lloyd, Jimmy and little Riley as well a few other characters.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves mysteries.

I requested and received an Advanced Readers Copy from the publisher and NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own

I am not sure how I did not pick up this series before, but I am so glad I did. I am going to read the previous books because this one was such a terrific book.
A top notch whodunit and great characters.
I highly recommend this book.
I voluntarily reviewed an advance reader copy of this book.

I'm not sure of what to think of Remembering the dead. As a cozy mystery it is unusual. There's a theft of a historic artefact and the death of one of the people probably involved in that theft. The investigation seems to mainly be about getting to know the victim and the background of the theft. There isn't a large pool of possible murder suspects who all had motive and various degrees of means and opportunity. The most likely suspects (the thieves) are unknown, so Penny has to make the most of talking to possible witnesses and strangers that are spotted in unlikely places.

I guess the mystery was okay, though there were a few too many coincidences and Penny didn't bat her eye at a few clues until later. It was a slow paced mystery and it wasn't always able to hold my attention. The use of a real historic artefact for the story was a nice touch.

At a dinner party held by Emyr Gruffydd at Ty Brith Hall he intends to unveil the historic Black Chair. Unfortunately during the party it is stolen, a waiter and a local man disappear. Inspector Bethan Morgan is called in to the case but local Penny Brannigan decides to investigate as well.
A modern light-weight modern cozy mystery, but I was not interested enough in the story or the characters to want to go back and read the series from the beginning.

Penny Brannigan and her friends and colleagues in North Wales are attending a fancy dinner at the local mansion to celebrate the exhibition of the Black Chair, a specially crafted wooden chair that was awarded to Wales' most illustrious poet in 1917. The chair, unbelievably for its large size, is stolen and a murder is committed during the dinner. Penny is drawn into the mystery, but her friendship with Inspector Bethan Morgan makes her involvement in the investigation less overtly contentious and she is not dismissive of police skill, as many amateur detectives are. Penny's nascent romance with Michael Quinn from the last title in series is part of the story, and I have to admit I felt very superior when Gareth was revealed as the better man, the one she should have chosen over Michael (even if Penny continues to insist that he's not the man for her). I hope Gareth hasn't permanently moved to Scotland (is it mean of me to hope his new romance fails?).

This was an okay cozy mystery. It is the tenth in the Penny Brannigan series but worked well for this new reader. Penny is a spa owner and artist and is apparently famous in her small town for solving murders.

She is asked to organize a formal dinner for a local landowner who plans to display the Black Chair which was given posthumously to the Welsh poet Hedd Wyn in 1917 after he died in World War I. The chair has been restored and is to be displayed in a restored farm site. In just three weeks, it will be visited by the Prince of Wales.

Things go well getting the dinner organized but somehow between the appetizer and the main course somebody makes off with the chair. Worst of all, the leave the body of a young local waiter behind. Also a young learning disabled man who was supposed to man the coffee station after the dinner is missing.

It turns out that the young waiter was the nephew of one of Penny's employees at the spa. So while she understands the importance of finding the chair, she is more focused and finding her missing young friend and solving the murder of the waiter.

The story does bring back a couple of her old boyfriends. One is a retired police officer who is moving to Scotland because of a woman he met. Penny isn't sorry to see him go since their relationship lacked the spark she wanted. The other was a bit of a bounder who didn't happen to mention that he had a wife while he was romancing Penny.

The story nicely weaves a number of different plot threads on the way to this story's satisfying conclusion. Fans of the series will enjoy revisiting old friends. This new reader is eager to read some of the earlier books.

Penny an artist and spa owner living in Wales. Amateur sleuth . Historic artifact stolen and murder of a young man. This is tenth in a series, but I feel it can be read as a stand alone. Love the setting, not many books set in Wales.

New to me series, but the synopsis captured my attention with WWI history and a Welsh poet. The background was as interesting as I had hoped, a bit slow in places, but still enjoyable.

REMEMBERING THE DEAD is the tenth in the Penny Brannigan series by Elizabeth J. Duncan and my first time reading a book in the series. While there are some secondary relationships and characters who have likely developed over the series, this book stands alone in terms of its mystery and solution. While it may be best to read the books in order, especially if you are going to read the entire series, but even as a stand alone this book was very enjoyable. It did not feel as if I was struggling to grasp Penny’s relationship with others or within her small town in Wales.

The book opens with a prologue that depicts an annual poet award which, in this instance was won by a poet who was killed in WWI. The chair, which is the reward, is then shrouded in a black cloth and is known throughout history as “The Black Chair.” One interesting aside, this is an actual event and is the black chair is historically accurate. The rest of the story, however, is pure fiction.

In this book, Penny Brannigan is asked to organize a formal dinner where the newly refurbished “black chair” will be displayed. On the night of the dinner, Penny discovers a young man who has been assaulted in the garden and who later dies. To make things worse, when the dinner guests assemble in the library to view the black chair, the shroud is removed to reveal an ordinary dinner chair, the black chair has disappeared.

Penny, who has some experience in solving mysteries in the town before now, is once again drawn into the investigation. She is convinced the death of the young man and the disappearance of the chair are in some way connected. Her investigation is sanctioned by the Detective Chief Inspector for the area, who is also a friend of Penny’s and takes her into Dublin to talk with a former love interest who turned out to be less than honorable. She also discusses the theft with her friend Jimmy, a reformed petty thief who is now a resident at a nursing home, her business partner and others who have some connection to Penny or to the murdered young man.

The book is well written and moves the reader through at a gentle pace that makes it easy to enjoy. Penny and the other individuals who comprise the residents of her village in Wales are interesting and offer a delightful picture of life in a small Welsh village. It was not difficult to determine who was responsible for the disappearance of the chair. The murderer was not as apparent, due in part to the fact that the clues were not as apparent as they might have been. There were some other, smaller reveals which added to the interest in the book and providing additional satisfaction to the reader.

My thanks to Crooked Lane Books and NetGalley for providing me with an Advanced Digital Reader copy of this novel in exchange for an unbiased review. This review represents my opinion of the book. Based on this read, I look forward to going back and reading other books in the series.

When Penny is asked by her friend Emyr to help plan a dinner party in order to show a select few the famed Welsh treasure, the Black Chair, she agrees. With the help of several locals, everything seems to be going swimmingly. She's also pleased that her young friend Lane is able to help as a server, and seems to be doing well, until he falls in the back pantry and spills drinks. Although he insists he's fine, Penny's not so sure when Lane disappears. And when the showing finally arrives, so does the Black Chair.

But it doesn't stop there - a young waiter is found fatally injured, and so the house becomes a crime scene, and everyone is a suspect. Worse still, they need to find the chair in three weeks' time, when the Prince of Wales is going to dedicate it where it will stand in a museum. Penny also discovers that the dead waiter is the nephew of one of her employees, and the woman asks her to help find the killer.

Now Penny's on the trail of a missing chair, a missing young man, and a missing killer. With the clock ticking against her, will she find the murderer or will he or she get away with stealing a national treasure and a killing?

This was basically a closed-door mystery without actually being closed-door. To wit: the murderer had to be someone in the home at the time of the theft of the chair, or a person who allowed the murderer to enter. Thus, we set the stage for Penny to eliminate guests and decide who the murderer might be.

When she acknowledges that she knows nearly all the guests, we have it narrowed down quite quickly. But then there's the sticking point of figuring out why the chair was targeted, and why the young man was murdered. Thus begins the investigation.

However, a couple of things irritated me. The host, Emyr, was an idiot. He should never have allowed his guests to leave, instead telling them that the police would, in all likelihood, wish to speak with them before they went home. But nooo --- he didn't want to inconvenience his guests, of course, so he'd rather lose a national treasure and possibly allow a murderer time to escape somewhere else. I ask you, does this make any sense at all? Anyone with any sense would know to keep their guests in the home, inconvenience be damned. After all, it was a matter of time, and if any of them - including the servers - knew anything, one would think that the police would be able to tell from body language. Honestly, the police didn't even seem to be really concerned that Lane was missing, which seemed odd as well.

Even if they were townspeople, time is of the essence in a murder, and I have never known the police to be happy when people were just allowed to leave and go their own way - nor a host who would rather them do so than be upset with him. I also didn't understand when, later on, he was upset that the forensics team was combing his house and grounds when a murder occurred. What did he expect them to do? Just say, 'oh, well, he'll be upset, and the killer may turn up eventually.' One would think he'd want to be helpful to find the killer and the Black Chair, not be annoyed.

I have several of the Penny Brannigan mysteries, and while I admit that Penny is intelligent and knows what she's about, she's well, rather dull as a person. There's no spark to her. She was perfect to organize the evening as she's methodical, but she doesn't have any real life within her. I can't imagine us being friends as she'd more than likely put me to sleep on a regular basis. (Which is why I am glad the mysteries are well written!)

I also didn't understand why we were told that Penny was a 'fulfilled, independent woman' but then admitted how it would be nice to come home to someone; if she wants that, all she has to do is put herself out there and date once in a while. Also, why was Gareth even in the book? If she had no regrets about losing him, it seemed odd that he should appear in a couple of scenes. There was also another person Penny was once fond of who showed up here, but this book seemed a bit to be about Penny burning bridges behind her. Maybe others didn't notice, but I certainly did. Either that, or the author was trying to show us how much better off Penny was 'without a man in her life.'

Other than that, I felt the book was written well, and the plot was done nicely, too. There weren't a lot of red herrings; but then there probably wasn't meant to be. It was more that there were a number of threads which, when pulled upon, lead to even more threads, and all those threads finally wound up together to weave the story into a final fabric that came together in one piece.

Once we discovered the reason for everything happening, you have to wonder why people think the way they do. Every action has a consequence, and every consequence leads to another action on someone else's part. It's an inescapable part of life; and in this case it lead to a tragic outcome that could have been prevented but wasn't.

All in all, the story kept me reading throughout the night, and I do like that; Penny is very clever and is able to hear one bit of information that leads her to several 'aha' moments, which is a good trait to have; and I liked the fact that she didn't run headlong into situations that could cause her danger. She actually thought about her course of action before she decided to take it. In the end, I liked the resolution to the story, and everything, of course, was tied up nicely. Recommended.

I enjoyed this very much, especially the history. It's a gentle kind of cozy mystery with wonderful characters. #RememberingTheDead #NetGalley

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to read this book!

The first thought I had when I started was 'Oh no, this book appears to be later in a series I haven't read'. Yes, this is typical with me and cozies, and you either sink or swim. Thankfully, this is a swim kind of book and you became entralled by the mystery of the whodunnit. The set up was probably a little long for most people's taste, but I needed it coming into this blind. It meant I got a bit of backstory and had more of an idea of who and what to expect. Still though, it was a well crafted mystery and the eventual outcome was very satisfactory.

What I really liked in this one was the research into the area and the Chair. It made everything feel authentic and real, which helped immerse me in the story. I really liked the extended list of characters too, and that some returned from previous books where they might not have had the same role.

This is yet another series where I need to go back to the roots, but it looks like with book ten that it is still going strong. Five stars.

This 10th installment in Duncan's Penny Brannigan series is a real treat for cozy fans!! I'd estimate that I read about 60 to 70 different mystery series and this Elizabeth J. Duncan series is a top 3 series for me. Of the first 10 books in the series, this one was my favorite!!

In this series, set in a village in North Wales, this particular book involves a dinner party for a World War 1-connected event. The plot is outstanding and I intend this as a high compliment, but it has an old-fashioned feeling. Though set in the present day, the story is well-told and proceeds at just the right pace. I also love the series characters who, over the course of these 10 books, have become "friends," at least in book terms.

This may well be my favorite mystery of the year, so far. Highly, highly recommended for cozy fans. I'd give it more than 5 stars, if I could.

There was nothing that I didn't love about this book. I was taken to a locale I had never been to and introduced to a whole cast of characters that were new to me. The writing is so expert that I didn't feel lost, even though this was the 10th book in a series but the first one I had read. There was quite a bit of poignancy about past relationships that were ending, and a sweet loyalty to currently relationships, in one case that saved a life. All the clues were there and I guessed the thief early on, however the murderer was a bit of a surprise. I definitely will be looking forward to more in the series with possibly a boost in Penny's romantic life.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

New author and series to me and I am hooked on the series. Very well written and the setting and characters are interesting. I had to do more research after reading the book because the Black Chair was very interesting. Very interesting story and setting to pull you in and keep you reading.

Penny is organizing a dinner to showcase the famous Black Chair that was awarded to poet Hedd Wynn in 1917. when things go horribly wrong when she finds a dead body and when the famous chair turns up missing. She is set on saving a friend and finding the chair and the real killer.

Artist and spa owner Penny Brannigan has been asked to organize a formal dinner to mark the centenary of the armistice that ended World War One. After dinner, the guests adjourn to the library for a private exhibition of the Black Chair, a precious piece of Welsh literary history awarded in 1917 to poet Hedd Wyn. But to the guests' shock, the newly restored bardic chair is missing. And then Penny discovers the rain-soaked body of a waiter.

Thank you to net galley and the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book it was a great experience

Penny has been asked to organize an old fashion dinner party at the hall for her friend Emyr, where the unveiling of one of Wales national treasure the black chair would take place. Although the dinner was a success things didn’t go that well with the chair. Faced with two perplexing scenarios the disappearance of the chair and a murder, Penny finds herself involved in trying to solve the two crimes. A rather enjoyable and interesting read.

Another fine story in this very readable, thoughtful mystery series. The WWI connection in this entry is fascinating, adding a special dimension to yet another mystery for Penny to solve. The author has done an outstanding job in giving the readers an authentic historical background, intriguing characters, and vivid descriptions of the great Welsh setting. A highly reliable series that every library should acquire.

What’s better than a good cozy? A good cozy that weaves some actual historical content into the storyline! This tenth entry in the Penny Brannigan series does just that and hit the mark on all fronts.

When the Black Chair, a piece of Welsh history, is restored and heading back for a grand celebration, one of the locals manages to arrange for it to be shown at his country manor house on the journey back home. With a private dinner party arranged, Penny agrees to coordinate the dinner. But when the chair is stolen and one of the servers is murdered, Penny finds the death hits closer to home as it turns out to be the nephew of her receptionist at the spa.

Penny has a feeling that an old flame may have a hand in the theft, though she struggles to believe he would have murdered anyone. As Penny pokes around she finds more dots and begins connecting them. While her hunch is strong, the police can’t make an arrest without evidence and Penny seems unable to connect those last few dots.

UK cozies always seem to be cozier and this series is no exception. I enjoy the Penny Brannigan series and have yet to be disappointed. A great series to add to your cozy must read authors.

Remembering the Dead is a good cozy mystery, written well, and interesting characters. This is the first I have read in this series and I will go back and read more.