Wednesday 12 April 2017

A Discovered Diamond review of DEATH of a CUCKOO by Wendy Percival


Amazon UK £0.99
Amazon US $1.23
Amazon CA  $n/a

Novella /Family Drama / Genealogy
Present Day
South West England

Now and again on Discovering Diamonds we review books set in the present day but which have a plot which involves the past or is of interest to history buffs of one sort or another – and Death Of A Cuckoo is such a book.

Following the death of Gina's mother, she is faced with the usual traumas of 'clearing up' her affairs. But in the post comes a photograph enclosed in a letter of condolence and Gina's safe life is changed forever. Added to that, she encounters an intruder in her mother's house. She turns to a genealogist for help and they embark on an investigation to find the truth.

This is a pleasant, light, tale – short enough that it can be devoured on, say, a long journey by train or plane. It has some twists and turns, some of which are a little predictable, but this little story is not meant to be an in-depth who-dun-it type read, it is aimed more at the ‘light entertainment’ reader. Death of a Cuckoo is, I believe, intended to be part of an anthology of similar style stories. As in most mysteries, sometimes things fall too easily into the investigators' lap and perhaps acquiring official documents in real life (birth certificates etc) might take a little longer than they do here. *[H.H. apparently you can obtain documents quickly - see Wendy's comment below!] But it is enjoyable and well written for all that and will especially be of interest to researchers into family history.
[H.H. which is why, at my discretion, Discovering Diamonds has included it in our reviews.]

© Richard Tearle

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3 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for including "Death of a Cuckoo" on the Discovering Diamonds review blog. It's most appreciated. I hope the story will appeal to your readers.
    And just so as you know... birth, marriage & death certificates can be acquired fairly quickly (within 48 hours if you're in a real hurry!) and as a keen family historian, I do aim to make my plots as authentic as possible on that score — which sometimes causes me a real headache at times to make it work! ;-)

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  2. Apologies that I have only just seen this comment, Wendy. And I apologise too fior that query: I should have known better really, but I genuinely thought they normally took longer.

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  3. That is the nice thing about permitting comments etc - we can discover things we did not know! Thanks Wendy and Richard!

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