This book is set in 1800s but I felt it was much more modern than that
The mystery was cosy and the ending was good as were the characters
A reasonable cosy mystery

First time reading a novel from this author and was really surprised by how much I loved it! It had enough suspense, comedy and action to keep me reading. I love a murder mystery and this one didn't disappoint

Thanks to #NetGalley the publisher Alison & Busby for providing me with a digital ARC of #MurderattheNaturalHistoryMuseum in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own and not influenced in any way. This is the fifth book in a series and I have read them all. I loved reading this book right from the start and could not put it down. All of the characters are well written and the plot of this book was interesting. I never tire of Abigail Fenton or Daniel Wilson and would happily read this book again. This book comes highly recommended

Thank you to Net Galley and Allison & Busby's for this ARC. I really love this series and i'm so grateful to Net Galley for introducing me to such a great writer. Story line and characters are brilliant and i always learn a little new nugget of interesting history every time i read a new books form this series. I believe the author has started a new series so looking forward to reading that but really hope to read more from the Museum Detectives!

I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Great mystery!! I love the museum aspect of it all.

Thank you kindly to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for this review copy.

I received a free ARC copy of this via NetGalley and the publishers Allison & Busby in return for an unbiased review. This was the first in the series I’d read, though it is the fifth if you read in order. Unlike some series, it didn’t feel the need to rehash the Daniel and Abigail’s previous storylines too much, which I’m grateful for. This started out quite well as a story - I’m always a little wary when authors introduce well known historical figures (here we have Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde, mentions of Gilbert and Sullivan’s, etc.), as it “pulls me out” of the story to see real people mixed in with fictional characters. However, as I said - a decent book until it gets to about the 83% Kindle mark, and then it jerks rapidly into fairly preposterous drama. A character suddenly turning from mild mannered into a murderous person holding another at knife point? Fairly unbelievable. The slightly rushed ending and implausible action/fights at the end spoiled the book for me sadly - it has been a decent story up to then. I’ll probably give another book a go though, see if it was a one off.

Murder at the Natural History Museum was a fun mystery novel which I found fun and fast paced. There were some lulls in the middle but all in all, a fun book with a good mystery . I appreciated the well written main characters and female character that wasn’t a two dimensional stereotype! I would read more from this author

My first read in the series and I was thrilled to it only find a very well crafted mystery, paired with intriguing well well defined characters that I enjoyed reading about. I am pleased in see the main character paired with an intelligent, well spoken, independent female partner. I look forward to reading their further investigations together as a team.

I enjoyed this book. It was a nice quick read. It had nice characters and nice story. I like seeing real people as characters. I do like the Victorian period. This is the first book by this author that I have read. I will be continuing this series.
Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read this book in exchange for my honest review.

I DNF this book. I thought that this is another cozy mystery for me. But I really got disappointed. It's all so full of dialogues between the characters and I think it's mostly consists of that. I just wished that this book is an okay read for me but I really got bored reading this. I am so sorry to the publisher but thank you for giving me a chance to read this book. It's just not really for me.

Murder at the Natural History Museum was fairly well written and had a lot of real facts in it. I enjoyed it until about 35% when it dulled down, but it did pick back up about 60% through the story. I was not completely expecting the ending!

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

This is the first of this series that I have picked up to read. This book was written for the mystery loving history buff as it contains some validity of historical accuracy. I found myself googling to see if some information I was reading was true, and it was. When choosing this book I did not realize it would be set in the past which is not the type of book I typically choose but I see the possibilities and interest of the right kind of person to love this book. I know a few myself, that I will be recommending this book to. It is all about your interest in book not if it was a good for bad read. For me I was not drawn into the book and it was more dry to me, where I like the twist and turns that keep me on the edge of my seat reading to the wee hours of the morning. This book did not do that for me but it may for you! If you enjoy mystery and history I would tell you to give this book or another one in the series to try because It could open you to a whole new world us readers love to find that might just fit you right!

When a new dinosaur exhibition is set to open at the natural history museum, a dinosaur skeleton is found vandalised. Well-versed in museum mysteries due to previous cases, Daniel Wilson and Abigail McKenzie investigate. A day after starting their vandalism investigation, a dead body is found at the museum, by none other than Bram Stoker, who was given early access to the exhibit to promote it. Lots of suspects emerge, each with something to hide- including Stoker himself, who knew the victim.

The plot and characters were easy to follow even though this was my first book of the series.
While the book is set during the 1800s, the conventions of the time are mostly not adhered to. The main characters are interesting and I loved that Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde were involved. Museums obviously make great settings for murder mysteries! I have always loved the Natural History Museum, though I was scared of the animatronic t-Rex when I was little.

The latest installment in the Museum Mysteries series takes place in and around the Natural History Museum. Without giving any spoilers, I'll just say this book stays true to form and I enjoyed it immensely. The characters are well-developed and the pace of the book never lags. A thoroughly enjoyable read! Thank you to the author and publisher for providing me with an ARC in order to review.

Thank you to Allison & Busby for an eARC via NetGalley of ‘Murder at the Natural History Museum’ by Jim Eldridge.

This is the fifth in Eldridge’s Museum Detectives series set in the late nineteenth century, featuring former Detective Inspector Daniel Wilson and archaeologist Abigail Fenton.

In late August 1895 the newly dubbed ‘Museum Detectives’ are asked by the director of the Natural History Museum to investigate damage to a dinosaur skeleton. There is some evidence that the fossil-hunting mania of the notorious Bone Wars of America may have reached Britain.

Then a museum attendant is found dead by the renowned theatre manager Bram Stoker, who may have had a personal connection with the deceased.
This is only the first body in a puzzling case that involves cameos from a number of late Victorian celebrities.

Overall, I found this an entertaining whodunnit. However, despite this I had two reservations. There were so many characters introduced that at times I lost track of who was who. More importantly, I didn’t feel that the historical setting was particularly convincing. The dialogue was very modern as were the social interactions. For example, no one seemed to blink an eye at Daniel and Abigail setting up home together out of wedlock. There were also historical inaccuracies.

These anachronisms were distracting and kept breaking my sense of engagement with the novel. More is needed than famous personalities and horses and carriages to make an effective historical mystery.

I know that this won’t be an issue for many readers but given that there are so many authors who take great pains to recreate a sense of the historical setting of their novels, this was a disappointment for me.

An enjoyable read. I have read three of the previous Museum Mysteries, and they have all been enjoyable. Long may the series continue. As an avid reader of historical mystery books, I am rather hard to please and am somewhat intolerant of infractions in terms of anachronisms and historical inaccuracies of all types, but these books pass muster all round! At the risk of some political incorrectness or other, I'm sure that this is due to the Author being neither American nor young!

Daniel Wilson and Abigail Fenton, the euphemistic 'Museum Detectives' have another case on. This is an interesting specialism for a detective agency in the usual run of things because one might wonder how many crimes take place in the average museum that would require the services of an enquiry agent. This aside, the story is a good read and the mystery has twists, turns and red herrings enough to keep even the most exactly mystery fan interested.

The main protagonists are very likeable, though their relationship leads to the only anachronistic aspect of these books. Abigail and Daniel are 'courting' but also living together as man and wife. In the mores of the day this would brand Abigail as no better than she should be and ostracised from all but the lowest levels of society, but everyone else around them seems to accept this as perfectly normal. This strikes a most unrealistic note, while almost everything else seems quite correct for the period. This aspect of their relationship was used in an attempt to discredit them in a previous book but even then, it was no more than a damp squib.

In terms of social politics of the time, the book blows hot and cold. The writer is quite definite and correct about the differences in perception and treatment by the establishment between the rich and the poor in a generic sense, or more accurately, between the upper and lower classes, but he then seems to become a little confused when it comes to gender. I am all for strong female characters but it is unlikely that, even in an era where the current monarch was a woman, one would come across quite as many strong women as this story seems to imply. All the female characters in this story come across as having much more strength and moral fibre than the male characters. One might believe this if the story were contemporaneous with today, but set in the repressive Victorian era???

The book successfully mixed real and fictional characters and events to form an enjoyable romp. This being said, the relationships between the central recurring characters are somewhat hackneyed for this genre, but not to the detriment of of book. We have the competent main detective, his faithful sidekick, the friendly detective from the official police force, the unfriendly detective from the police force, the tame reporter and the reliable forensic medico (although the last two do not make an appearance in this book).

One thing I would stay stood out and was a tad wearing for the number of times it occurred. All the characters seemed to be most sceptical and critical of the detectives' methods - even the detectives themselves! Take this example of a typical piece of dialog -

Detective: 'I will have to investigate this witness's story to see if my theory is correct'

2nd character: 'But you might be wrong'

Detective: 'I might be, yes, but I still need to check'

2nd character: ''Yes but what if you are wrong?'

Detective: 'If I'm wrong I will try a different line of enquiry'

2nd Character: 'But you will have wasted all this time'

Detective: 'I might do, yes, but I still need to check'

2nd character: 'Yes but what if you are wrong?...'

... and so on. This typical exchange went on so many times that I began to wonder how any of these characters thought detective work was done if not by asking questions and testing theories. Even the detectives themselves questioned each other in the same way, as if this were not the standard way of going about detective work. It both exasperated me and made me laugh by turns. Abigail Fenton herself had her own way of interpolating the same type of interrogation whenever Daniel expounded a theory

Daniel: 'I don't think XXX is guilty'

Abigail: 'Is this your policeman's instinct again?'

Daniel: 'If you want to call it that, but my experience says 'no''

Abigail: 'Has your policeman's nose ever been wrong?'

Daniel: 'Yes, but hopefully not this time'

This attitude of hers seems paradoxical, since she clearly respects him as an ex-Scotland Yard detective of many years standing and long experience, but she then constantly questions exactly the virtues she seems to extol. It seems an odd way to behave to me, especially when one can palpably imagine the cynically raised eyebrow as she questions him, as though she places no faith in his 'policeman's nose' at all. It say's a lot for Daniel's nature that he has not called her out about it as yet.

Another of Abigail's paradoxical tendencies is that she has accepted Daniel as a paramour despite the differences in their social status, yet whenever he mentions incidents from his less affluent childhood, she barks at him that that is all in the past and he has left that life behind him. As if a man's past can be shucked as easily as that.

For all their human failings though, the characters are likeable and the story enjoyable. I look forward to the next one, although our intrepid detectives may need to expand overseas to keep themselves in museum work. I'm not sure how many more notable ones there are left in England.

It’s August 1895 in London when Abigail and Daniel are called in to determine who bludgeoned an iguanodon dinosaur fossil. The remains were found with a cryptic note, “Because of he that betrayeth”. But the next morning, a man is found strangled in the same location with another note around his neck, “The price of treason”. Now, Abigail and Daniel must solve both vandalism and a Murder at the Natural History Museum.

I adored the use of real historic personages as suspects. And who knew Bram Stoker was red-haired! Oscar Wilde’s trial and conviction, for what was considered indecent behavior at the time, is a prominent part of the book. The tight one-hour timeframe for the murder and the numerous red herrings make the Murder at the Natural History Museum a perfect case for armchair detectives. It’s a jolly good time! 4 stars!

Thanks to Allison & Busby and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for my honest review.

I jumped at the chance to readthis book, as I have red all the others and loved each and every one of them.

London 1895, History Museum, Daniel Wilson and Abigail Fenton are tasked with looking into and vandalism within the museum, even though they are more akin to solving murders, they agree.,however, a dead body does actually turn up, an employee in fact and this turn of events, sets them out onto adventures and twists of investigative trials and tribulations and i thoroughly enjoyed it.
I really was entertained with all the plots and sub plots and i totally recommend this one, It is one of my favourites me thinks.
Give this a try!
Kind of a shame, that i finished it so quickly, but I am going to invest in a hard copy for my collection and am going to listen to it on audio ( if it does have one)

As mentioned I have read all the the other books, but i do feel that, you you can enjoy this without partaking in the previous four, having said that i am going to contradict myself to a degree and say that , I do think, that if you really want to connect with the charecters, then it is best to start at the beginning.

It was quite difficult to not write in spoliers and gush them all over the page.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publishers for the chance to read this, I was so happy to gets my pesky little hands on it!

I had the opportunity to read and review this book for Netgalley. In short, I’d love to read all the previous installments in the series. The main characters are new additions to my favourite characters circle. Welcome.

If you thought that museums are wonderful but quiet, dusty and boring places where nothing exciting happens, think again. You can’t even imagine to what length people would go and what they would be willing to do to secure a place on trustee committee or position of curator or… contract to deliver bones and fossils.

A very unorthodox (for Victorian times) pair of detectives: male and female for that matter (and living together ‘in sin’, my oh, my) – Abigail Stoker and Daniel Wilson come on the scene to investigate seemingly harmpless incident, destruction of the exhibit… But the case takes unexpected twist becoming a murder investigation which, in turn, drags many more secrets, misdeeds and outright crimes that surround Natural History Museum.

I loved the pair. I want to be their friend. And I definitely want to be invited to the wedding. Abigail and Daniel are surrounded by many colourful characters. Amazingly, police detectives and constables are not thick, short-sighted and purely stupid here as in most Victorian-times cozy mysteries (or not all of them).

Villains are big, pompous, titled and overbearing. Women are scheming, intelligent and fearless. Reader gets a very unexpected, unorthodox picture of Victorian London and its elite, a very unexpected.

Real-life personalities and celebrities are… just that.. real people. Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker, Bernard Shaw and many more… Reading this book felt like watching Midnight in Paris but set in 19th century London.

Mystery and suspense a plenty. Readers is entertained along the way with many sub-plots, back stories and descriptions. But they all are in the right place and at the right time.

Given that this is fifth installment, reader is getting only glimpses of the previous adventures. However, this book reads well on its own.

Overall, I enjoyed the read for characters and sprinkling of real-life personalities and celebrities. This book made me search far and wide for Oscar Wilde works and biographies.

My had is off for the author and his creation. 5 stars.

Murder at the Natural History Museum is the 5th Museum Mystery by Jim Eldridge. Due out 22nd Oct 2020 from Alison & Busby, it's 352 pages (print version) and will be available in hardcover and ebook formats (ebook available now). It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

This is a well plotted and interesting murder mystery. The characters are well developed and have a solid background and chemistry together. The pacing was variable, at points it dragged a bit for me, but overall it moved along at a good pace. The clues were presented well and the denouement and resolution were satisfying. I admit the dialogue threw me. I wasn't aware that the book was set in the 19th century and was surprised when I found out because the vernacular is completely modern (I thought it was a modern cozy and only discovered my mistake when the author threw Bram Stoker in there). My other small quibble is that it seemed the author included almost every famous contemporary person, actor, current event, landmark, and news headline in the narrative. It interfered with my suspension of disbelief in several places. The book does work well enough as a standalone (as long as the reader remembers it's not set in the current day).

All in all it's a readable and engaging cozy mystery with lots of skullduggery and shenanigans, a soupcon of danger, and a good plot.

Three and a half stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.