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Pearl
Nolan owns a successful seafood restaurant in the seaside
town of Whitstable. Once she hoped to join the police force,
but a teenage pregnancy meant that instead she raised her
son Charlie in the town she had grown up in. Now Charlie is
away at college and Pearl needs a new challenge as she approaches
forty, so she opens a detective agency. When her first customer
wants her to investigate a friend she turns him down, but
when the friend is found dead Pearl is determined to find
out who his killer is.
In the US this debut novel might be described as a cozy. It
has all the ingredients: a small and pretty town filled with
independent shops, a woman running a business, a bossy and
unconventional mother, romantic interest with a policeman
and lots of local color. However, this is as much a story
about growing older, coping with regrets and coming to terms
with who you are. At times the mystery part of the story takes
a backseat as Pearl struggles with her son's new independent
life and girlfriend, visits an old friend in a nursing home
and remembers another summer twenty years ago. This is not
a fast read, but a gentle, thought provoking tale that is
more than just a detective story. This is the first entry
in a proposed series.
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