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Scottish Rite, A Maggie Devereaux Mystery #1 (2011)

by Stephen Penner(Favorite Author)

3.54 of 5 Votes: 5

languge

English

genre

Mystery & Thriller

publisher

Riing of Fire Publishing

series

Maggie Devereaux

review 1: I am obsessed with all things Scotland. There, I said it. I picked up this book obviously because of the location, but found it interesting and engaging. I really enjoyed the descriptions of places like Aberdeen, and some of the nearby trips the characters take. Having never been to Scotland, I can't compare, but I thought the level of detail was great. Loved the part about the stone circles. Was it the best book ever in the history of the world? No. Could the writing have been tighter? Of course. Would I have enjoyed more character development? Absolutely. In the end though, I finished this book fairly fast, and I am not a fast reader, so that at least indicates I enjoyed it and will likely pick up the next in the series.
review 2: Mystery, Paranor... moremal, RomanceThis is one of the best paranormal mysteries that I have read in a long time and some of the novelty of the story is that the author used many Gaelic words with the interpretation immediately following, which gave the story a truly feel of Scotland. Margaret (Maggie) Devereaux, a young American woman working on her Ph.D. in Celtic languages enrolled in the University of Aberdeen in Scotland to finalize her requirements. Her recently deceased grandmother, Kate NicInnes Ingram, encouraged her to do this and gave her five Gaelic books. She taught Maggie to read and speak it and she gave her a pendant identifying the clan she came from. Kate also bequeathed her estate to Maggie, which allowed her to study full time. Upon moving to Aberdeen, she lived with her cousins Alex and Lucy MacTarry. She met a nice, intelligent, handsome Scot, lain, who worked for the MacTarrys in their store.At the university, she met another American girl, Kelly Anderson and two nice young women of Scotland, Ellen Walker and Fionna FitzSimmons. In the course of her studies, she went to the large public library of Aberdeen, which housed many Gaelic books in old Gaelic, middle Gaelic and more modern Gaelic. In the basement of this library where the light was so dim, she could scarcely read the titles, she found a truly old book with leather covers so encrusted with dirt and slime, she could scarcely handle it. It took her three days to translate the title because it was old Gaelic and to her amazement, she discovered it was a book of dark spells. Three young women were murdered and the way their bodies were left, it appeared to be ritual murders. And this was the crux of the story. Who was performing the murders? Were they ritual? And for what purpose? Maggie used her talents and education to bring the murderer to light.The story was complex, characters colorful and fascinating, and the story became a page turner for me. The inclusion in the novel of many places in Scotland with their descriptions and the addition of the Gaelic verbage, made this novel more entertaining and intriguing than many mysteries with or without the paranormal. I recommend it. less

Download links for: Scottish Rite, a Maggie Devereaux Mystery #1

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