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Summary: Reader from Australia
Review: I loved this book - can't understand a couple of reviewers who didn't. Maybe the coincidence with the identical looking women was a bit far-fetched, but what of it? I think Martha Grimes has a great sense of humour - she had me chuckling my way through the book! And I absolutely adore Melrose Plant - except I wish he still had his titles, especially when most of the people around him still use them! I just wish Jury would stop falling for women who end up dead a chapter later. Also, what's the go with Vivian? Is she secretly in love with Melrose or Jury or am I reading too much into it? Anyway, I hope Martha Grimes keeps writing this series - I absolutely loved this book and I'll be waiting anxiously for further ones.
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Summary: Absolutely absurd
Review: I'm a great fan of Ms. Grimes' Jury mysteries, but in "The Stargazey," she seems to have gone off the end of the pier (no pun intended). To throw an international assassin/art thief into the company of Jury, Melrose et. al. is a little like Miss Marple finding her way into a Tom Clancy techno-thriller. The juxtaposition is jarring to say the least, and Grimes never convincingly pulls it off. In addition she blatantly copies the London and Broadway play "Art," as well as Dorothy L. Sayers' "The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club." Homage or rip-off? In addition, I personally am getting a little tired of finding a little girl and a cat in every single Jury mystery. When does a trademark become a tiresome repitition? I think about now. On the whole, the book is as nonsensical and strained as the title itself.
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Summary: Not One of the Best
Review: I'm in love with Grimes' cast of characters, but maybe not as in love with them as Grimes is. An appearance by every one of them in this latest Jury novel was gratuitous at best. Carol-Anne, Mrs. Wasserman, Racer, Fiona, Agatha, and most especially the cameo appearance of Vivian ("Melrose, what have they done to you!" exit left) seemed contrived. Also, we all know by now that Melrose has relinquished his many titles, so do we need to be told in every chapter? Especially since he doesn't seem averse to using them in this story. Ah, the story. Just a little far out, isn't it? Sounds like a twist on a real old story...Will Jury come out of his funk and find true love? Will Vivian recover from the Italian disease and come back to be the proper Britisher she really is? Maybe Grimes knows what she's doing after all, 'cause the answers to those questions will compel me to read the next book!
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Summary: my favourite jury novel
Review: If you're a fan of previous Jury novels, you are going to love the Stargazey! the Creme de la Creme of the series show up and add the eccentric delight we all crave of Grimes: Vivian, Diane Demorney, Marshall Trueblood, Agatha... they're all back and in fine Long Piddletonian form.
The plot itself is intriguing enough from page 1. Dashing Richard Jury spots a lovely woman on a bus. This wouldn't usually get the ball rolling for a set of murders, but this is Grimes and ANYTHING can happen!
Another fascinating facet of this tale is the insight into London's Art scene and a particularly repulsive set of paintings by Ralph Rees called "Siberian Snow" ( Melrose Plant's initiation to these works is indeed laugh-out-loud !)
With murders to solve and Lord Ardry in tow, Jury finds himself in a pseudo-romantic/homicidal/engimatic world that never appears to be as it seems. And there are, of course,many a worthy Jury/Plant rendezvous, this time at Borings: Melrose's Gentlemen's club. As soon as the Earl of Caverness can brush the dust off of his old entitled card he is an asset to the mystery and to Jury, schmoozing it up with elderly actresses and ten year old girls, buying ice cream and treating Bea Slocum to "Steak and Chips"; all the while being as charming and magnetic as a crossword-solving earl is allowed to be !Loved this one !
Want to read again!
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Summary: A winner by the mistress of mystery
Review: In London, Richard Jury, being bored, rides a double decker bus to pass time. Things become a bit interesting when a woman enters, leaves, and reenters the bus. When she finally gets off for the last time, a whimsical Richard decides to follow her for the hell of it. He tracks behind her until she enters Fulham Palace. The next day, Richard learns that a woman, fitting the description of his fellow passenger frrm the day before, has been found murdered at Fulham. He wonders if he could have done something different, like following her onto the grounds of the palace, in order to have saved her life. Feeling a bit guilty, he begins to investigate, with the help of his eccentric friends, what happened to this woman. <PThe story line is convoluted and the conclusion of some the sub-plots unacceptable. So why is THE STARGAZEY a fun to read mystery? This is simple. Like all the Jury novels that preceded this one, this who-done-it is loaded with warm, endearing eccentric beings who bring to life a London rarely depicted in fiction. Though not for anyone who loves a straight forward mystery, this novel will be enjoyed by those readers who want to take a whimsical trip to the nearest pub for this wintry brew. Harriet Klausner
Rating: 
Summary: Happy to be back with Jury and Plant
Review: It is always a great pleasure to be back in Grimes' fictional world, peopled with her familiar quirky characters. The reader was able to follow along with Jury's deductions through the writing and plot devices. I felt that the final solution had a few too many coincidences; so, 4 stars. And I rather wish that Melrose and Richard would have some sort of resolution of their various romantic ambiguities. It is agonizing watching them go on year after year with NO progress. Just a little progress, hmm, please...
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Summary: Who are all these characters?
Review: Martha Grimes has come up with a complicated plot that involves art theft and murder. The story begins in St, Petersburg, Russia, and the reader starts out knowing more than the detectives, who take an awfully long time to figure out that is where all the threads lead. Of course, the various guesses, leads, and red herrings all make for entertaining reading...as do the various comments on the art world. However, the book suffers from an overabundance of characters. Grimes has brought forward a great many characters from the previous 14 books which "star" Superintendent Richard Jury. There are also many references to previous cases and incidents, many of which readers may not be able to recall clearly, if--like me-they have read the books over the span of many years. One wishes for more memory joggers-maybe even footnotes! This seems to be a hazard in mystery series, and some authors are better than others at capturing readers who enter the series somewhere other than at the beginning. I think anyone who picks up this book without having read the ones that came before may feel like he or she is just "not in the club."
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Summary: Good Grimes
Review: Martha Grimes is a very good writer who has created some marvelous stock characters. Her books veer effortlessly from the sensitively realistic into the humorously absurd. I enjoyed the book immensely, and I think its one of the better in the series (even if she sometimes is better in a strictly literary sense in her non-Jury books).
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Summary: The Delight is in the Details
Review: Martha Grimes weaves a foggy London day out of simple words. Description and the subtle development of mood are her forte. Many reviewers have sketched a quick synopsis of the plot in The Stargazey, but the plot is not the thing here. Instead, look at the way she tantalizes you to read on with little teasers. Did Melrose fan the sheets with Bea Slocum? What would Carole Anne and Richard moved onto if the neighbor hadn't come home? These delights are interspersed with comic vignettes of Long Piddleton and the Cripps family and how about that Vivian coming unglued? It seems to me that the fun of Martha Grimes and the Richard Jury mysteries is the character development colored in over time with small details. Like fondly retold family stories, each book builds on these relationships. Nibble on a book or feast on the entire series. Bon Appetit!
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Summary: Intersting mix of characters
Review: Rarely are there completely amoral characters in Martha Grimes' novels. The character of "Dana," if that is what we are to call her, comes close here--a woman who has exhausted the thrill of risk for monetary gain in her life and can only get a thrill from inventing new ways to take risks. (This is mixed with a spoken longing to just lead a normal, British life, which is not completely an act, I think.) Richrad Jury is still looking for a soulmate in this novel, and instead runs into a character who is as unable to commit as he is. In this novel Jury seems to be presented with a variety of alternatives for his life: continuing his solitary life, letting "Kate McBride" in, or letting Carole-ann in. All of these alternatives are eductive in some way. Melrose Plant also seems to be trying out alternative lives in this book--he stays at Borings, a hilariously funny traditional men's club, and also succumbs to the dubious attractions of the Cripps' establishment. Along the way we see new aspects to Bea Slocum, a character who seems to bring out the best in Melrose, and Diane Demornay, who comes along at the right moment to save the day. This is a good example of Grimes' later Richard Jury novels, which certainly have complex, interesting plots, but actually are more psychological studies of her main characters. I like this later work a great deal.
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