I am a great fan of historical mysteries, but A DECEPTION AT THORNECREST didn't offer enough sense of time, or sense of place to transport the me to another period. If it weren't for the activities at the Vicarage and the staff at Thornecrest, the story could have been contemporary. It just lacked period detail and any kind of "country house" insight that makes a good light historical mystery fun to read.

I also read for character, more than plot, and I didn't feel the chemistry between our protagonists. This was not my first experience with Ashley Weaver's detecting duo, but she has not provided me with sufficient incentive to want to encounter them again. And, for that I am sorry. I love to encounter familiar characters in a series, but this one didn't offer me enough to bring me back.

Netgalley provided mw with a complimentary copy of this book in return for a candid review.

This is a bit of a cross between Agatha Christie and Downton Abbey. It's roughly the same time period and again we see the action from the top side, rather than the lowly servants. The main character is pregnant and yet she manages to solve two deaths (after which she gives birth). The ending was unexpected in several ways - and I don't want to spoil the book to tell, but one way has to do with the deaths and another with her husband and his step brother. It's a fast read - a good beach book.

Ooooh, this is simply delightful. Throughout the series, we've seen the couple become closer and fall in love again. This book tests that relationship but never rocks the boat. A wonderful installment to a witty, mysterious series.

I enjoyed A Deception at Thornecrest. This is one of my just read series! I love seeing how Amory and Milo's relationship has evolved and how they have grown during the series. This is so evident as they look forward to becoming parents and have another new edition to the family in Derian. The mystery is so well done, I appreciate that I didn't realize who the villain was until Amory figured it out. I am looking forward to their next adventure!

I want to thank NetGalley, the publisher, and author Ashley Weaver for providing me with an ARC of the novel A Deception at Thornecrest!

I read this as a standalone and had no trouble at all, but I will definitely be going back to the beginning of this series! I loved the setting and the British mystery throughout. The writing style is spot on and the historical detail is something to be admired. I can’t wait to start with these characters from the beginning; I can only imagine how much better this book would have been with all of that information under my belt!

Thank you again to those named above for the chance to read and review this novel!

This book is the best in the series for me. I truly enjoyed the country setting and I think it’s because it’s such a contrast to previous books in the series with constant socializing. As Amory is eight months pregnant, she and Milo are largely staying at home though he is going to London during the day. He is away one day when a young woman shows up at their doorstep, claiming to also be married to Milo. But all is not what it appears and it is the first of several surprises. The next surprise is that Milo has a half brother he didn’t know about, but who felt free to use Milo’s name to pretend to wed another. The true mystery of the book is who has murdered a local young man during the village spring festival. Milo prefers to stay uninvolved but Amory has time for many village visits as she tries to determine who could have done such a thing.
The different ties that bind people together are a recurrent theme in the book - Milo and his newfound brother, who was abandoned by their father; the vicar and his wife, who have taken in their daughter’s best friend after their daughter died in an accident; the romance between various characters. This mystery is perfect for British mystery lovers who enjoy a country setting.

Amory and Milo are back and baby makes three. While resting at Thornecrest while waiting for the birth of her first child, Amory and Milo are drawn into a murder in the village that could hit closer to home than they realize. I very much enjoyed this new chapter in the Ames' story. Weaver's characterization is always on point and, having binged the first 6 books in the series earlier this year, I really appreciate the consistency in the voice of the characters.

Okay I want you all to read this book and I want you all to buy it now. But don't read it yet if you haven't read the first 7 stories because while the murder is a standalone, it is the characters that I love.

I was so eager for this one. For much of the series, we have found Milo and Amory Ames in the most delicious locales: from France to Capri, a seaside resort and, most recently, Manhattan. But I had longed to see them on their home turf, Milo's family home. Here, Amory is expecting their first child and playboy Milo is finally settled down more interested in business in London with his solicitor and the prime breeding horses than of dalliances that make the society pages. Sure, Milo has been notorious, but as Weaver has so deftly brushed over his character, shading his changes little by little, it is quite believable that he has turned a corner. Indeed, one might believe that it was actually their being so close to death and murder that helped patch their relationship. They are never more so equals (even in their spats and tiffs) than they are here, on neutral ground.

It all begins when a young woman arrives at Thornecrest unannounced and most unexpected when she introduces herself as Milo's wife. I mean, I gotta hand it to Amory, much like her, Milo hasn't always won my complete trust in past instalments and while Amory trusts him in her soul, it is quite certain her brain would wander for a moment. What transpires is a village mystery of the perfect serene British kind complete with a vicarage, a horse race, a county fair and sprawling estates. We're all going on about the best isolation reads, and this is certainly a comfortable one: completely cozy yet set apart by Amory and Milo's banter, their classic refinery and the family they forge to carry the tradition of the Ames' name along with butler Grimes and maid Winnelda. When Milo's rakish half brother arrives, Weaver again asserts herself as a master of characterization and deep psychological craft: softly wielding a balance of human tenacity and deceit. Not one peripheral character, for one, is one-dimensional.


Speaking of family, it is a major theme at the heart of the story and ripples throughout the chance encounters, the deception and, yes, the death that drives Amory back into action as a refined amateur sleuth. And I cannot help but think how perfect that motif brings Milo and Amory full circle, especially from their first adventure in "Murder at the Brightwell" when their estranged marriage coupled with Amory's sleuthing skills forced Milo to see her clearly perhaps for the first time. Thereafter, they've undergone a precarious waltz --never without chemistry-- but with an undercurrent of uncertainty and I admit that this estate-side tale was a giant exhale of relief to see them growing and working as a couple: with just enough of a cloud on the horizon to keep from a saccharine happily-ever-after.


One of the brilliant things about this series is the character of Milo. Weaver makes it look easy because she is such a master with a fluid pen and with Amory's wonderfully charming and astute first person, but I know that it must not be that simple to write a complicated man who is at once playboy and loyal, who wants his marriage to work even as he keeps one foot in the society world. Its an especially precarious balance because we never quite see inside his world or point of view, rather through whatever Amory is feeling for him in the moment. I confess, at the beginning, I thought perhaps he was a bit of a Percy Blakeney type: there had to be a reason for him to be so...well... Milo.

As the series went on, I wondered why I felt that way, whereas the mastery of Milo is the fact that he is a man from a troubled home, burdened by the legacy of an estate, ridiculously good-looking and obsessed with horses and gambling and now part of a marriage that happened rapidly and finally meeting his wife who is his equal in intelligence and charm. While Milo has his moments ( dear god, you'll want to staple things to his head sometimes), he has a steadfast nature that allows you to begin to predict how he will show his far more delectable, protective and loyal side.


And what I love about Weaver is that she does this by keeping Milo just at a distance: certainly from the reader and, yes, from Amory. When you go through the beautifully told series time and again, you notice that Amory begins to notice all of Milo's looks: many unreadable, many new. She learns new expressions, she fails to discern others. Its a smart move because it not only shows us that Amory, so adept at reading other people and so often able to follow her hunches and precision at human nature to help Inspector Jones and win the day, but also shows her vulnerability when she cannot read her own husband.

It's not that she's daft. It's just that she is peeling back layers of a complicated character and I wonder how often Milo wishes she could see what he is clearly trying to project: this slight division between them is, of course, what sparks throughout the book in its overt sexual chemistry.

The romance is subdued and often shown in slow burn moments: in touches and thoughtful gestures, in larger gestures given Milo and Amory's opportunities to protect each other, but also (most deliciously) in the many instances in which they catch each other off guard.


So all of this to say, yes, buy this book and yes, read this book. But I have an inkling the experience will be the most robust if you work through the series from its start. I'll often retreat back into Milo and Amory's world: as a reader to roam around for awhile, as a writer to learn from a genius at plotting and pace... and as a die-hard romantic to see if I can't just interpret one of Milo's new looks or gazes or glances filling up those bright eyes of his.


Love this series!

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This series keeps getting better and better. This one and the one before it are my two favorites (tied with the first). The direction the series is going is perfect for the characters.

I absolutely adore Amory and Milo and their interactions with each other. The writing style is just pure fun. I love the historical detail, while the mystery element is always solid.

If you’re a fan of this series, you will absolutely be delighted by this latest addition. I am SO looking forward to more Darien in the next book!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for my free digital copy.