The Shroud Maker by Kate Ellis
Publisher: Piatkus Publishing
Genre: Contemporary, Historical, Mystery/Suspense/Thriller
Rating: 3 stars
Reviewed by Fern

A year on from the mysterious disappearance of Jenny Bercival, DI Wesley Peterson is called in when the body of a strangled woman is found floating out to sea in South Devon.

The discovery mars the festivities of the Palkin Festival, held each year to celebrate the life of John Palkin, a fourteenth-century Mayor of Tradmouth who made his fortune from trade and piracy. It seems like death and mystery have returned to haunt the town.

When archaeologist Neil Watson makes a grim discovery on the site of Palkin’s warehouse, it looks as if history might have inspired a killer. It is only by delving into the past that Wesley can come close to uncovering the truth . . .

One year after Jenny Bercival disappeared, a young woman is found strangled and floating out to sea in South Devon. Young and beautiful, the woman was dressed in mediaeval dress like so many others celebrating the Palkin Festival – an annual event held at this time. There are many similarities between Jenny and this young dead woman and Wesley, and his team can’t help but wonder if this had been Jenny’s fate the previous year – only her body had been taken out to sea for good. Can Wesley sort out what’s going on?

Yet another good addition to this series, I was pleased that the historical and archaeology of this book was very well woven into the main plotline of the mediaeval festival going on while the killings occurred. Quite a few plots and sub-plots wove around together, including a number of the usual cast of secondary characters. I enjoyed there being some forward motion with the DCI and his grown children, as well as DS Rachel and her planned nuptials. And as always, I enjoyed Wesley and Neil working back and forth together, each finding small nuggets that the other could use to further their own investigations.

This book is well contained and while I feel readers who pick this up not knowing any of the characters might have to catch up a little on how everyone is linked together the actual plots are very well encapsulated within this story and should be very easy to follow. I do admit to getting a bit annoyed with Rachel’s character – she’s had a low-key crush on Wesley pretty much since the first book and it’s no secret to anyone who has read almost any of this series, but for quite some time now it’s been virtually non-existent and I felt it a bit annoying that the author flared it back to life somewhat after such a long dormancy, especially considering how close to her own wedding Rachel is right now. It felt a little cliched to me and a little bit like a low blow. This part was extremely brief and minor – but I couldn’t help but cringe a little when it did happen.

That said I was fairly pleased both with the unique twist to the main murder plotline that happened right at the end – that did take me by surprise, and I found it quite refreshing – and I was also pleased the murders weren’t as clear-cut and simple as I had expected them to be either. So, the murder plots themselves were exceptionally well handled I thought and this more than made up for the cliched “getting cold feet” and boozy embarrassing moment that occurred with Rachel.

A solid British police procedural murder mystery with a good amount of historical archaeology.