Simon Brett, The Body on the Beach
Ann B. Ross, Miss Julia Takes Over
These are both mysteries I picked up at a thrift store for $2 each, and I read them both over the course of 48 hours. I know I’ve never read any of Ann B. Ross’s books before, although I’ve seen other Miss Julia books and thought they looked somewhat interesting. I think I may have read something of Simon Brett’s before, the name certainly sounds familiar, but I’ve never read any of the Fethering mysteries. This was the first in that series. Both books were interesting light reading, nothing too difficult, perfect to read when you don’t want to think too hard. I think the thing that caught my attention was the similarity of the protagonists. Both Carole Seddon and Miss Julia are practical-minded women, not given to flights of fancy, each very determined that everything in her life be the way it’s supposed to be, according to her own interpretation of those unwritten laws societies are governed by. Carole knows, for instance, that in Fethering, it is not acceptable to stop and talk with someone out on a morning walk on the beach, nor is it acceptable to ignore them completely – one must give the “Fethering Nod.”
Throughout each novel, Carole’s and Miss Julia’s sense of decorum is challenged, Carole’s by a new neighbor who coaxes her out of her comfort zone, getting her to go to a pub, drink wine during the day, and visit people she doesn’t know without calling first; and Miss Julia’s by several people around her who drink beer and flirt shamelessly with people they’re not married to and then have the nerve to tell her she needs to take care of her own problems. By the end of each novel, the women have grown in some ways, though neither is ready to completely give up on her way of doing things.
I think the reason that these two books really struck a chord with me is that I feel like the two women at the beginning of the books – I want everything to be just so, and I’ve always been worried about doing something wrong, or even just appearing to do something wrong. Sometimes it makes me feel like I’m older than I am, somehow, that I’m old and set in my ways already, even though I’m only 32. Unfortunately, I’m not going to have some outside force come in and make me change whether I want to or not, it’s something I have to figure out how to do on my own.
