"Because I Could Not Stop for Death" is the book about Emily Dickinson that I never knew I wanted to read. Flower's breathes new life into the character while creating a carefully constructed mystery. I loved every moment spent within these pages.

I love a good "historical figure solving mystery" book but this one is such a delight. I've always loved Emily's poetry and been fascinated by her life, this was a delight to behold. equal parts tender and tense, dramatic and soothing for the soul, this scratched that itch I didn't even know was bothering me

Because I Could Not Stop for Death tells the story of a housemaid, Willa, newly hired by Emily Dickinson to be a maid for the home, as well as a detective cohort. When Willa’s brother is murdered, she absolutely does not believe it is an accident. Willa and Emily Dickinson investigate the mysterious death.

The mystery was predictable yet so made for an enjoyable read. Willa's brother's killer is quite easy to figure out early in the book. This mystery doesn't bring any surprises or plot twists but I really enjoyed the characters and the storyline. I recommend this book (and new series) for fans of the Brontës, Louisa May Alcott and the Jane Austen mysteries!

Because I Could Not Stop for Death by Amanda Flower

I loved the idea of this story, and thought the writing was very well done. It was a bit darker than I anticipated, but I was enjoying the spooky, atmospheric tale. However, I will not be finishing this story because of some undisclosed trigger warnings that I learned about from another reader partway through the story, namely animal cruelty. I'm so glad I did not make it to that part before I stopped reading, as that would have been very triggering to read. I checked the author's website and noticed she doesn't have a section for trigger warnings. I highly recommend she consider adding one.

Willa Noble can read and write and she's a very hard worker currently excited to get an interview to work as a maid of all work in the Dickinson home in Amherst, Massachusetts. Those hopes are nearly dashed when she's caught in the pouring rain on her walk to the house to meet with the housekeeper. She was tempted to give up when she is splashed by a passing carriage but she persevered. The housekeeper allowed her in and listened to her, but was turning her away when Miss Emily spoke from the doorway and said to hire her. Willa was surprised and please--things were looking up for her.

Shortly after getting her new position, she's notified her brother died in a tragic accident at the town stables. Willa is convinced that it was murder. Questioned by Emily Dickinson, Willa tells her about her brother and her concerns. Emily decides that they will investigate.

The two of them begin to look into Henry Noble's death. Actually, Emily is leading the investigation, and Willa is just caught up in her fervor to discover the truth. Henry had a plan that was going to help him and his sister, and make him a hero. That plan probably got him killed but Willa doesn't know what the plan was or who was involved.

Told through the point of view of Willa, we never really know Emily's thoughts unless she told them to Willa or wrote her instructions. Though Emily is the driving force behind the investigation and the one with the connections to allow them to ask questions there are still some very scary moments when their lives could be at stake.

It's an interesting mystery involving a historical figure that led a life that many find mysterious, curious, strange, or privileged. No matter, the story is well plotted and an interesting peek into a period of history lately being found central or coincidental to the plot.

Because I Could Not Stop for Death by Amanda Flower is the first in a new mystery series featuring none other than Miss Emily Dickinson herself. Willa is Emily's new maid and confidant, and as their friendship grows, Willa opens up to Emily about her brother's recent death and how she believes it wasn't an accident. Together, they launch an investigation, only to find that corruption runs deep in the small town of Amherst, Massachusetts.

This first book does a great job of setting up the character of Emily Dickinson, poet detective--balancing the real historical person with the author's reimagining of her character. And Willa is a sweet and charming balance to Emily's polite and removed demeanor. It will be interesting to see where the author takes the series in the future.

This book (and presumably the ones that will follow) would be perfect for fans of historical mysteries and books that reimagine famous historical figures. While very different in tone to the Apple+ tv show, Dickinson, it would probably appeal to the same audience.

Thank you very much to Netgalley and Berkley Publishing for my e-ARC for review.

Amanda Flower has long been one of my favorite cozy mystery writers. I love her Amish series and when I found out she was writing about one of my favorite poets, Emily Dickinson, I knew I had to read this book. This book is told not in Emily’s point of view, but from her maid, Willa’s. This book starts with Willa going to the Dickinson house for an interview for a maid’s position. She doesn’t think she is going to get the job and when the housekeeper dismisses her, she is surprised when Emily tells the housekeeper to stop looking for a maid and to hire Willa on the spot. Willa is determined to do a good job for the family and is honored to have the opportunity to work for such a prestigious family. She feels like her life is taking a turn for the better for once.

That feeling is short lived when Willa finds out that her beloved brother, Henry, has been killed in an accident at the local stables. Willa goes to the stables herself to see where her brother spent his last days. She is shocked to learn that her brother was not killed in an accident, but was brutally murdered. With this carrying heavy on her shoulders and with no one else to turn to, she tells Emily who is determined to set out on an investigation to find out exactly what happened to Henry and why he was murdered. From Amherst, Massachusetts to Washington D.C., Emily and Willa use the Dickinson’s family name and status to chase down a murderer. With the hostility brewing between the North and the South over the issue of slavery, they soon find themselves right in the middle of a political fiasco. Not knowing who they can trust in their small town, it seems that everyone is not who they appear to be, Emily and Willa soon find themselves as targets in the investigation. Can they race against the clock to find justice for Henry or will they find themselves to be the next victims?

I really enjoyed this book because it provided a different perspective of Emily Dickinson and the country as it embroiled itself in the fight of slavery. The book dragged slowly in some parts and that was a little hard to get through, but nonetheless, this was a good strong first book in what I hope to be a promising new historical mystery series. The next book in this series will be released in September of this year, and I am hoping to be able to read more about Emily and Willa’s adventures.

Overall Rating: 4 stars
Author: Amanda Flower

Series: Emily Dickinson Mystery #1

Publisher: Berkley

Publication Date: September 20, 2022

Pages: 334

Genre: Historical Mystery

Get It: Amazon

Disclaimer: This book was given to me by the publisher, through NetGalley, in exchange for my honest review. I reviewed this book without compensation of any kind. All thoughts and opinions are solely mine.

I really enjoyed reading this historical mystery. Willa has just been hired as a maid in the Dickinson household. When her brother dies Emily and her set out to discover what happened. I liked the relationship between Willa and Emily. The historical background of the underground railroad was interesting. The trip the family takes to Washington DC was a lot of fun. The mystery was good and there were enough suspects to make it interesting. I was able to figure out the who did it. The book was well researched and easy to read. I am looking for word to the next adventure.

Because I Could Not Stop for Death is the first book in a new historical cozy series by prolific author Amanda Flower. Released 20th Sept 2022 by Penguin Random House on their Berkley imprint, it's 338 pages and is available in paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references throughout. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

This is a promising start to a "famous-person-as-amateur-sleuth" cozy subgenre. Emily Dickinson's new housemaid loses her tearaway brother in suspicious circumstances and although it's treated by the police as a mostly routine accidental death, there are troubling inconsistencies which Miss Dickinson and young Willa investigate.

The writing is consistent and engaging, with well turned prose and clear and clearly rendered characters. Some of the characters' motivations are less compelling, and the dialogue is occasionally a bit stilted (not just because it's a period mystery). Overall, however, it's a good start and eminently readable. It's not at all derivative, but for fans of J.C. Briggs' excellent Dickens Investigations, this series checks many of the same boxes and will likely appeal.

Four stars. An entertaining start to a new historical cozy series.

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

Because I could not stop for Death tells the story of Willa who becomes a maid for Emily Dickinson. When Willa’s brother is murdered, she don’t believe it is an accident. Willa and Emily Dickinson investigate the mysterious death.
With many mysteries surrounding famous historical figures, I wanted there to be a mystery novel that featured Emily Dickinson as the protagonist. However, I could not recognize Emily. I did not find her to be a good amateur sleuth. As for the mystery, it was very predictable. The killer is easy to figure out early in the book. Thus, this mystery brings no surprises or plot twists. Still, I recommend this for fans of the Brontës and the Jane Austen mysteries!

This was such a fun cozy historical mystery! Emily Dickinson is one of my favorite poets and I loved seeing her in the position of amateur sleuth. I hope more in this series come out soon!

This is a very late review, but I really enjoyed this book! It's a great cozy mystery for literary buffs or those who like Dickinson in general. I enjoyed the characters, although Emily's dialogue felt a bit forced. She was very robotic, which I know is because the author tried to portray her as her poetic, deep self, but it just came across as a bit unnatural. Other than that, the storyline was good, and I liked that there was some traveling to keep the scenery fresh. I always love Amanda Flower's cozies.

Thank you to Berkley Publishing Group and NetGalley for this ARC!

Oh I absolutely LOVED this! Emily Dickinson and her maid team up to solve a tragic death against the backdrop of the Underground Railroad. I was hooked from page one and am kicking myself for waiting so long to read this!

Named for the first line of one of Emily Dickinson’s best-known poems, Because I Could Not Stop for Death begins a new series following the contemporary trend of giving historically famous authors a second vocation as amateur sleuths. Shortly after Willa Noble applies to the Dickinson household as a maid, her brother is found dead in the stable where he works, and Emily suspects foul play. Someone in Amherst is using information about the Underground Railroad for profit, luring escaped slaves to the stable as a safe stop, where they are then picked up by slave catchers and returned South.

This is a well-paced mystery with a few twists, although there are readable clues to the culprit. Repeated reference to Emily and her brother and sister, who are respectively 24, 26, and 22 at the time, as ‘children’ threw me, when a word such as ‘siblings’ may have served better. A couple of situations did strike me as unlikely but not enough to worry about, but what slows the narrative in places is dialogue which does not always read as something a person might say in the circumstances. I felt quite at home in Amherst, and there are very interesting details about Washington and the lives of the Dickinsons. Emily is opinionated, aloof, and independent-minded, as one might expect, but she’s likeable enough, and there are a number of other characters who may well feature in future investigations as their personalities are developed. The novel’s main interest lies in the turbulent and unsettling mid-1850s time period, a precursor to the Civil War.

According to Berkley, Because I Could Not Stop for Death is the first installment in author Amanda Flower's Emily Dickinson Mystery series. This book puts a real life historical character, Emily Dickinson, and her fictional maid, Willa Noble, on the cusp of a Civil War thanks to the 1950 Fugitive Slave Act which gave jobs to slave hunters to round up escaped slaves before they could escape to Canada and freedom via the Underground Railroad.

After leaving her former employers boardinghouse, and showing up in the middle of a rain storm for an interview, Willa is unexpectedly hired by the iconic American Poet Emily Dickinson, whose father is in his last days as a Whig Party politician. While Willa is getting her feet wet working for the Dickinson Family, she gets news that her brother Henry's death as been ruled an accident by the police, but not by her once admirer Office Matthew Thomas who as like a brother to Henry.

Henry had been working at a Livery Stables taking care of horses when he was killed apparently by his own actions in hurting a horse. Upon further reflection, Willa ends up getting Henry's diary which reveals that Henry was involved in something that likely got him killed. Something is very wrong in Amherst, and with the ever Emily Dickinson her, Willa travels from Amherst, to Washington, D.C, and back in search for answers as to who really hurt Henry and why.

The author brings in real historical people and interesting fictional ones to the mystery. Willa is a very sympathetic main character. Based on my limited knowledge of the poet Emily Dickinson, she seemed to be well portrayed in this fictional portrayal of an early period in her life. Class distinctions, slavery, the underground railroad, and the perilous 1850's in Washington, DC and New England are written realistically. The story is moving and suspenseful at times, but the pace felt somewhat slow.

I had no prior knowledge that this was part of a series. Especially since the story wraps up quite nicely, and there wasn't an actual need for a sequel.

I was excited to read a mystery with the famous Emily Dickinson setup as sleuth, but the characters and dialogue felt flat and I never connected with any of them. There was a big disconnect with Emily, she never felt like any more than a made up character. I should've been able to feel the anguish Willa felt at the loss of her brother but I didn't feel there was enough foundation or backstory to support the supposed grief Willa was experiencing. Or why she would say no to a proposal that seemed favorable and would've helped their situation greatly. Just a lot of unbelievable plot points.

Amanda Flower invokes issues of the Fugitive Slave Law and northern opposition to it in this historical mystery about Emily Dickinson and her maid. Henry, the maid's brother is dead and a horse is blamed. Because I Could not Stop for Death is a wonderful novel of social manners and the place in society of the Dickinsons whose father was a member of the House of Representatives and their maid. Read and enjoy as Emily and her maid solve whodunit.

Emily Dickinson and her maid investigate murder on the Underground Railroad

It takes audacity, as well as a love of the subject, to base a fictional mystery series on a historical figure as well-known and well-loved as Emily Dickinson. Amanda Flower pulls it off pretty well, if not quite perfectly. Her love and respect for “Miss Emily” is evident throughout the novel. I enjoyed reading this first novel in the series, and look forward to seeing what other mysteries arise in Emily’s life.

The story is told through the eyes of Dickinson’s fictional maid, Willa Noble, who serves as both co-investigator and, through her relationship to the murdered young man, as the initial impetus for the investigation. Her brother’s death has a profound impact on Willa, and she is determined to find out who killed him and why, in hopes of bringing the culprit to justice, but also to expunge her own sense of guilt for not protecting him better.

The investigation leads Emily and Willa into the hidden world of the Underground Railroad and the brewing conflict between “slave” and “free” states. It also puts both of them (and particularly Willa) into quite real danger.

I found the mystery puzzling for the first two thirds of the book, but eventually I figured out the villain (long before Emily and Willa did; I felt they should have caught on a little sooner.) The red herrings are, perhaps, a bit obvious in retrospect, but as I was reading, I was surprised several times by what the pair learned, or what the clues seemed to suggest.

Flower does an excellent job contrasting the young women’s personalities and their class differences. Willa is driven by a need to protect her brother and keep a roof over both their heads. She is a hard worker, and well aware of her place in society; the latter often makes her uncomfortable with some of Emily’s plans and actions. Willa’s mother had a great influence on her, as did her father’s abandonment of the family. Both factors affect her friendship with Matthew, an Amherst policeman who has feelings for Willa.

Flower’s Emily is impulsive, intelligent, and observant, except when her attention is caught by her “inner life” of writing. She can be decisive (particularly when acting on impulse) and outspoken—sometimes too much so, both in terms of the dictates of antebellum society and the caution needed by an amateur investigator. Flower captures the nature of most of the Dickinson family relationships quite well, but I wasn’t quite convinced by her portrayal of Emily herself, nor of the prickly relationship between Emily’s sister Lavinia and Emily. While the fictional Emily’s willingness to traverse the distance between the classes rings true with what I know of the real Emily Dickinson, as does her outspokeness, her interest in investigating a crime and her lack of caution in pursuing that investigation weren’t quite in keeping with the historical Emily I know, or think I know. (By the way, if your image of Emily Dickinson is of the reclusive poet in white dresses, you should know that this book takes place before that period of her life.)

I acknowledge, however, that I’m not an expert on Emily Dickinson, just an enthusiastic amateur. My own conception of “Miss Emily” is forged through reading her poetry, the play The Belle of Amherst*, and, more recently, a book about Dickinson as a musician.** She was an accomplished, even gifted pianist who, in her early years, studied piano and choral singing with the same dedication she later brought to her writing. I was a bit sorry not to see any mention of her musical interests in Because I Could Not Stop for Death, since the book is set during the period in which Dickenson was still actively engaged in making and enjoying music.

The other challenge of writing historical mysteries of any sort, whether based on a historical figure or not, is getting the history right. On the whole, I think Flower does a good job in this regard. I’m not aware of any historical connection between Amherst and the Underground Railroad, but given how many Massachusetts towns are associated with the Underground Railroad, and the necessary secrecy surrounding it, it’s certainly plausible that Amherst played a part. And the rest of the historical details seem fairly accurate to me. One blatant linguistic anachronism (in the early review copy) did throw me temporarily out of the flow of the story; hopefully it was fixed before the book went to press. Otherwise, the historical details served to bolster my sense of being “in” the story.

I’m really looking forward to seeing how the series and the characters develop. While they never felt “flat” to me, there’s certainly room to explore more depth in both the main characters as well as the recurring secondary characters, particularly Matthew and the Dickinson family. I also hope to see more complexity of plot as well as specific references to Emily Dickenson’s poems and music. But overall, the series’s concept delights me, and I’m eager to see where it goes from here.

FOOTNOTES:
* I have both read and seen William Luce’s one-woman play, The Belle of Amherst, and even performed a portion of it. Back in my college years, for an introductory course on poetry in which we studied Dickinson’s oeuvre for several weeks, I excerpted, memorized, and performed a 21-minute monologue from the play for my classmates (in lieu of a paper, and with the professor’s permission—though I don’t think he was expecting anything that long and elaborate!)

** Emily Dickinson’s Music Book and the Musical Life of an American Poet (George Boziwick)

1855 Amherst, Massachusetts

This historical mystery series is off to a good start!

Initially, I had a difficult time seeing a more outgoing view of poet Emily Dickinson. Love that the author explained in the afterward that the typical visions of a hermit like Emily are from her later days.

Fictional maid Willa Noble is new to the Dickinson household when tragedy strikes. Emily quickly sees an adventure and a chance to solve a mystery. Emily and Willa are an unlikely pair, but a strong one, as they work together to learn the identity of a murderer.

Look forward to continuing the series.

Slow, weak lead, but well researched

Thank you to Amanda Flower, Berkley, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a free ARC in exchange for an honest review, and thank you as well to Yasmine Hassan for inviting me on the tour and being the messenger. Apologies for reviewing late!

Slight spoilers

This was my first exposure to Amanda Flower, though I've seen her work around; she seems to be a favorite of my friend Elise Cooper, who interviews Flower regularly. Because I Could Not Stop for Death (ugh, that title's too long, it's bugged me since I first read it) was definitely a solid piece of work, but not entirely to my taste. It's pace was a bit plodding, the prose a bit stilted and lacking in energy, which is partly why it took me so long to finish reading it--it kept putting me to sleep. There were quite a few typos, too, which I only mention because it became distracting. But they're a natural consequence of ARCs; hopefully most of them were corrected in the final copy.

Willa didn't seem to have much personality, and I'm not sure she and Emily make for good sleuths. Not only do they seem to lack the finesse necessary for some aspects of detective work, but Willa's heart really didn't seem to be in it. For all that she professed to want to catch her brother's killer, she sat on his diary for how many days? Yeah it grieved her to read it, but someone eagerly searching for clues would have read it cover to cover asap. I don't think she had anything motivating her aside from her personal relationship with the victim, no general insatiable curiosity, no passion for crime solving or puzzles. Without those traits or the like, it's going to be hard for her to propel a mystery series---and also likely why this one lacked energy. Emily was eager, she kept urging Willa on and propelling this novel, but her unconventional opinions/standoffish personality and her role in society might put limits on who she can interact with as well. Yeah I honestly don't see this series succeeding, but I'd love to be pleasantly surprised.

Another thing about Willa was her awful romance thread with Officer Matthew Thomas. There was zero chemistry between those two. Zero development. Felt more as if he was there for plot convenience than anything to do with Willa's character, except he didn't have much to do with the plot, so he was essentially unnecessary. An interesting idea that wasn't well executed. There was supposedly a bunch of backstory to their relationship, but without witnessing it, it's hard for it to mean anything to me.

Flower's author's note gave me confidence that she researched the setting and Dickinson's life as well as she could, but I rather wonder if the fictional aspects were so weak because she was too busy being concerned with accuracy and respect to historical fact. It's surely a hard balance to strike, I don't envy her the task.

I'm not sure if I'll check out book two when it comes along.