“Murder on Astor Place” by Victoria Thompson – The Midwife Sleuth

In Murder on Astor Place by Victoria Thompson, we are introduced to a midwife by the name of Sarah Brandt, who has, with time, become estranged with her rich and powerful family. However, one day she is forced to reconnect with them as a young girl, Alicia VanDamm, is murdered in Sarah’s boarding house.

As it turns out, Alicia’s family is also quite prominent, and her next of kin do not want an investigation for fear of some kind of scandal. It seems, for a while at least, that Sarah is the only one who wants justice for Alicia, but soon after being taken off the case, Sergeant Frank Malloy asks for Sarah’s help, and together they attempt to bring the one responsible to justice.

One of the greatest things about this story, I found at least, is the setting. Everything is so accurately and vividly described that you can practically feel yourself being there. The world of old New York may be something lost to time that we will never get to experience personally, but from what I could feel, this book comes pretty close to transporting you there.

The characters themselves are also quite interesting, at least in the sense that Victoria Thompson did not try to modernize them or anything. It felt as if she wanted to keep everything as it was in that time period, and though she falters at times (of course, I do not blame her), on the overall, the characters simply feel like they fit in with that world.

The cast is of all colors here, with there being charming, hate-inducing, mysterious, loud and quiet characters. The chemistry between the protagonists is especially fun to watch develop.

As for the story itself, I have to say that it reminded me of some old-time detective novel. It’s not exactly something outstanding or truly groundbreaking, but it keeps you interested and entertained throughout the entire duration.

The events advance at a relatively brisk pace and most of the twists aren’t exactly easy to predict, with the ending being quite enthralling, wrapping everything up nicely. All in all, I believe that fans of mystery novels will have a lot of fun reading this book.

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Victoria Thompson Personal site Victoria Thompson is an American author who had the distinction of, so far, being nominated for the Edgar Award, and her latest novel (at the time of writing this), Murder on Fifth Avenue, was nominated for the Agatha Award. She is without a doubt best-known for her crime series, Gaslight Mystery, one where every novel's title (not exaggerating in the slightest) begins with the words “Murder in”.