The Body in the Piazza: A Faith Fairchild Mystery, by Katherine Hall Page
Published by HarperCollins on April 30, 2013
First reviewed on Cozy Little Book Journal on April 4, 2013
I didn't quite "get" this book. I haven't read any in the Faith Fairchild series so I'm not sure exactly what I expected, but it wasn't this. Faith Fairchild is the wife of a minister who travels (extensively, by the looks of some of the other titles), this time to Rome. Although it seems like Faith and her husband Tom are happily married, almost as soon as they arrive Faith engages in a flirtatious and--to my mind--wildly inappropriate relationship with a British stranger named Freddy Ives (mild spoiler: he's the "body" in the piazza). The beginning of the book read like a cross between The Man Who Knew Too Much with Jimmy Stewart and Doris Day and Bitter Moon with Hugh Grant and Kristin Scott Thomas. But Faith and Freddy never actually kissed or anything, so I was left wondering if I was misreading it. Was I more prudish than the author of a series about a minister's wife? It was weird.
Weirder still is the fact that after Freddy is murdered, Faith initially vows to solve the crime (as one would expect in a "Faith Fairchild Mystery") but then leaves to go on some sort of cooking retreat with her husband for a huge portion of the book. It does all tie in at the end, but I was confused by the change of pace. All sense of urgency was gone as Faith spent days and days perfecting her homemade pasta. I actually found myself skipping ahead to make sure they really did get back to talking about Freddy eventually.
Ultimately it was the lack of urgency that made the book fall apart for me. The author note at the end talks about her own to trip to Italy which was the basis of the book (even the author's note was long and rambling and didn't connect to anything). It seems obvious that this book was a "love letter to Italy" as the author says, but with a murder mystery thrown clumsily in so she could call it a mystery. Mostly it's just a collection of "stuff that happened" with little connective tissue and no stakes. It should have been called Eat, Pray, Murder.
This series must have appeal to many readers (there are certainly enough titles in the series to suggest it is successful) but I doubt I'll give Katherine Hall Page another go.
Disclaimer: I received a digital galley of this book free from Edelweiss (Above the Tree Line). I was asked to write an honest review, though not necessarily a favourable one. The opinions expressed are strictly my own.
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