The Winds of Change by Martha Grimes

Description

Bibliographic Details

• Author: Martha Grimes
• Title: The Winds of Change (A Richard Jury Mystery)
• Publisher: ‎ Viking Books
• Publication Date: August 19, 2004
• Language: ‎ English
• Format: Hardcover – 407 pages
• ISBN-10: ‎ 0670033278
• ISBN-13: ‎ 978-0670033270
• Item Weight: ‎ 1.6 pounds
• Dimensions: ‎ 6.5 x 1.3 x 9.5 inches
• Book Condition: Used – Very Good (may show some minimal markings / discoloration on page edges)
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good

Synopsis:

As he leans over the body of an unidentified five-year-old girl shot in the back on a shabby London street, Superintendent Richard Jury knows he'll be facing one of the saddest investigations of his life. His colleague DI Johnny Blakeley, head of the pedophile unit of NSY, thinks he knows where this child came from – an iniquitous house on that same street, owned by well-known financier Viktor Baumann and fronted by a woman named Murchison. Blakeley has been trying to wreck their operation for a long time.

While examining the body of an unidentified woman murdered in the gardens of Declan Scott's estate, Angel Gate, Brian Macalvie, commander of the Devon and Cornwall police, realizes he's been here before. Three years prior, Declan's stepdaughter, four-year-old Flora, was abducted while she and her mother Mary were visiting the Lost Gardens of Heligan. Shortly after that, Mary Scott herself died, and Declan was devastated by the loss of his child and his wife.

"He really doesn't need a body in his garden," says Macalvie.

Joined by the intrepid Melrose Plant, now a gardener at Angel Gate, Jury and Macalvie rake over the present and the past in a pub near Launceston called the Winds of Change. With one of their most serpentine investigations under way, all signs point to the guilt of Viktor Baumann, Mary Scott's first husband and Flora's father. But when no one in this case is exactly who he seems, how can Jury be sure?

About the Author:

Martha Grimes (born May 2, 1931) is an American writer of detective fiction. She is best known for a series featuring Richard Jury, a Scotland Yard inspector, and Melrose Plant, an aristocrat turned amateur sleuth.

Grimes was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to William Dermit Grimes, Pittsburgh's city solicitor, and June Dunnington, who owned the Mountain Lake Hotel in Western Maryland, where Martha and her brother spent much of their childhood. Grimes earned her B.A. and M.A. at the University of Maryland and did postgraduate work at the University of Iowa. She has taught at the University of Iowa, Frostburg State University, and Montgomery College (Takoma Park).

In 1983, Grimes received the Nero Wolfe Award for best mystery of the year for The Anodyne Necklace. In 2012, Grimes was named Grand Master by the Edgar Awards Mystery Writers of America.

Grimes initially became known for her series of novels featuring Richard Jury, an inspector with Scotland Yard, and his friend Melrose Plant, a British aristocrat who has given up his titles. Each of the Jury mysteries is named after a pub.

Her Emma Graham quartet of novels beginning with Hotel Paradise is set in an atmospheric aging lake resort in western Maryland, and delves into mysteries of past secrets and human nature. The background of the series draws from the experiences that she enjoyed while spending summers at her mother's hotel in Mountain Lake Park, Maryland. One of the characters, Mr. Britten, is drawn on Britten Leo Martin Sr., who then ran Martin's Store, which he owned with his father and brother. Martin's Store is accessible by a short walkway from the Mountain Lake Hotel, the site of the former hotel, which was torn down in 1967.

The two Andi Oliver novels center on a young drifter with amnesia, making her way in the northern U.S. Midwest armed with a strong sense of right and wrong and great compassion. Grimes has donated a large portion of her profits from these novels to animal-protection organizations.

Grimes lives in Bethesda, Maryland and is a vegetarian.