What is SPFBO 9?  This is  a competition where authors of self-published fantasy can enter their work. The objective to find a winner out of the 300 entries submitted.  Ten judges (or judging teams) each receive 30 entrants.  Each judge/team will eventually submit one finalist to the second round where a winner will eventually be decided upon. Check out Mark Lawrence’s post here to look at this year’s entrants, judges and allocations list.  Also, check out this page to see all the lovely finalists and the scoreboard for Phase 2 of the competition.

Today I’m posting my review for Murder at Spindle Manor by Morgan Stang, the first book in the Lamplight Murder Mystery Series.

Where to begin with this review.  Well, I liked it very much.  It’s a bit crazily chaotic, well written, witty and packs in a lot of imagination.  It’s your basic, gothic-horror, gaslamp fantasy murder mystery.  What’s not to like really, I think the author has covered all the bases, particularly for the type of read I’m really enjoying at the moment.  Gothic – well you have my attention immediately, gaslamp – ditto, now add in the secret ingredient – fantasy murder mystery, with a locked room style case in the style of Agatha Christie – but with ghosts, monsters and other critters – consider me hooked.  Fantasy worlds with murder mysteries are absolutely my thing at the moment.  I can’t get enough of this type of story and so I was more than happy to pick this one up.

We immediately make the acquaintance of Isabeau Agarwal, a huntress on the trail of a deadly monster known as a Doppelvyrm, a beast that longs to be human, killing it’s victims and then perfectly replicating them whilst retaining their memories making it almost impossible to catch.  Isabeau has tracked this monster to Spindle Manor, a stopover that travellers use before making the final journey to Lamplight City (if the monster reaches the City there will be dire consequences and death on a ridiculous scale).  Within the Manor are ten guests and Izzie needs to uncover which one of them is the monster before the morning arrives.  Unfortunately, the death of one of these guests complicates the issue giving her two mysteries to solve and a good deal of hindrances along the way.

What I really liked about this.

There is such a lot of story packed into this relatively small package.  As I said above it does have the tendency to become a bit chaotic at times but overall it has this almost wonderfully ‘hammed up’ style that I really enjoyed.  Locked room mysteries can be so entertaining and Spindle Manor is no exception.  We have our guests, we have all the lies and secrets and so many possible suspects.  Adding to the dilemma is Izzy’s need to uncover who is the monster in disguise and this is hampered by a string of occurences that has everyone running from one side of the manor to the other, as well as going top to bottom, in the search for answers.

The writing is lovely and I found myself laughing out loud on occasion.  The pacing is quick although I will mention that there’s a lot to take on board as the story begins – mainly due to the fact that we are introduced to so many characters in such a short period.  I didn’t find this an issue to be honest, there has to be some set up after all and the rest of the world building blended easily into the story as matters progressed.

I liked the characters, particularly Izzie and her coachdriver/sidekick/partner Evie.  This was a winning partnership that looks set to continue through the series.

The imagination was also top notch.  I wouldn’t say the world building is given a great deal of attention, but, some of the ideas, such as the living doll (a person who has died and been brought back to life but has their mouth stitched shut to stop their soul from escaping), the creature in the attic (which I won’t elaborate on here but let you find out for yourself) and the angry spirit of a former guest.  I would say that I would have liked to know more about the ‘Nobles’ and I was very keen to find out about one particular incident in the book which hasn’t yet been explained but I’m sure will come up again in the series.

The only real criticism I had was that the actual mystery and the investigation felt a little thin on the ground – more time seemed to be spent charging about the Manor checking out new leads which usually led to something monstrous.  And, well, there is that chaotic feel which might not be everyone’s cup of tea, although I found it amusing and intriguing.

Overall, I had a good time with Spindle Manor and I would definitely like to continue this series.

I received a copy from the author, for which my thanks.

My rating is 8.5 of 10