The Scarlet Macaw

September 16, 2013
Hozy's third mystery is a magnificent combination of two stories a century apart. The contemporary mystery begins with the murder of art gallery owner Peter Stone in Singapore. The loss of her mentor devastates artist Maris Cousins. Grieving and unable to paint, she explores the contents of a trunk Peter inexplicably left to her. The books and letters within are all by the early 20th-century British author E. Sutcliffe Moresby. As Maris delves into the mystery of why Peter gave her the trunk, she also begins to piece together the tragic love story of Annabelle Sweet who traveled to Singapore in the 1920s to marry Sutcliffe Moresby's friend. Readers join Maris in the search through the novels and love letters for clues to what links Peter to this historical tragedy. Meanwhile, a charming Swedish officer working with Interpol takes an interest in art and Maris while he investigates a complicated smuggling operation. Hozy skillfully transports readers between the two centuries and builds suspense with questions of who can be trusted.

April 1, 2013

Artist Maris Cousins can't quite believe it when Peter Stone, her antique-dealing mentor and friend, dies from a poisoned drink. She and Dinah, his half-sister, struggle to understand who would have it in for the well-liked man. Peter's ex-wife and business partner, Angela, brusquely tells them to get on with it. The Singapore police are baffled and Maris falls into a depression. Gradually, she begins looking through the art and personal letters that Peter left her in his will. Concurrently, Interpol is pursuing a smuggling operation and those agents have set their sights on the antiques trade. Readers understand the case more clearly thanks to cleverly inserted short stories that describe the culture of 1920s Singapore. VERDICT Hozy's (A Cold Season in Shanghai) luscious prose makes this literary stand-alone a memorable read. Her talent for juggling multiple narrators (alternating between the present and 1920s Singapore) and interspersing with clue-laden short stories is impressive. Leisurely paced, it has tremendous crossover potential for nonmystery readers who favor classic tales such as those of W. Somerset Maugham.

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2013
Artist Maris Cousins loses her ability to paint, even to see colors as she had previously, after witnessing the death by poisoning of her friend and mentor, Peter Stone, owner of a prestigious Singapore gallery. Puzzled by Peter's bequest to her of an old trunk containing letters, paintings, and first editions of books by a popular early twentieth-century English author, she dips into the short stories, which detail the travails of Englishmen and -women who made their way to Singapore or Malaya decades earlier, only to contend with monsoon rains, unrelenting heat, and unbearable loss. As Maris herself rebounds, her creativity reignited at the sight of a scarlet macaw after she falls in love with a suspiciously secretive visiting businessman, she finds a clue to the underlying cause of Peter's murder. Fiction echoes reality continually throughout this novel, which seems less a mysterywith a wrap that's a bit abruptthan a family saga, notable particularly for its vivid sense of place in modern Singapore.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)