Note: Thank you to NetGalley, Bookouture, and author Helena Dixon for the advanced reader copy of this book. This review will also be posted on NetGalley. What follows is my unbiased review of the book.

Murder on the Cornish Coast is the nineteenth book in Helena Dixon’s Miss Underhay mystery series. I only discovered the series recently and have read three books in it now. The books stand on their own fine. There’s some history alluded to, but she fills in enough that I’m not lost, even this far in.

In Murder on the Cornish Coast, it’s 1937, and Kitty and her husband Matt are hired by Lady Cordelia Hedges, who believes someone is trying to kill her. Several months before, she was attacked and her father was killed. Due to a head injury, she has no memory of the event. Since coming home, someone has tried to push her down the stairs, and she found ground glass in her medication. Lady Cordelia desperately wants to remember so she can point the finger at whoever killed her father. She believes someone wants to kill her before her memory can return.

Lady Cordelia came up with the idea of going back to the family home in St. Mawes, where the attack occurred. She’s hoping that being there again will jar something loose in her brain. She’s also invited everyone who was there the night of the attack, thinking that one of them is the killer. She asks Kitty and Matt to be there as well.

This sets up a good cozy mystery in the style of Agatha Christie. All of the suspects are gathered together under one roof and observed as events take place. All of the characters seem to have a possible motive. Kitty and Matt interact with all of them and seem to be no closer to finding out who is behind the attack when there’s another murder. Was the killer trying to silence Lady Cordelia and caught someone else by mistake? Or was the newly deceased the target for some unknown reason?

I had a number of theories about what was happening, and none of them were right. Dixon crafted a clever mystery that kept me guessing all the way through. I like that Kitty is a capable and smart woman at a time when they weren’t really expected to be. She can be glamorous as well, but also has no problem getting dirty. Just don’t mess with Bertie, her dog!

Lady Cordelia’s family and friends are well-crafted. They all have possible motives, and suspicion clouds everyone’s interactions. Each has a different personality, while at the same time, they seem to be hiding something. This is especially true of Lady Cordelia’s stepsister, Rachel. There seems to be a rivalry between the two women, with Rachel jealous of Cordelia and wanting what she has. It makes for an interesting dynamic in the house, particularly when it comes to Cordelia’s fiancé, Nathan.

Although this case preoccupied them, Kitty and Matt are also following up on Matt’s earlier sighting of a fellow soldier from the war he thought was dead. This seems to be an ongoing mystery in the series, which is something new. This one isn’t resolved in the book, but they do make some headway figuring out what’s going on and its implications. I liked how Kitty and Matt consider all of the consequences of their actions before plunging in.

Eventually, I will go back and read the other stories in this series that I haven’t read yet. It’s been very enjoyable and well written with interesting characters. Dixon creates marvelous settings and describes them well, so that I could picture walking along the quay among the cottages with the “big house” up on the hill. If you’re looking for a cozy mystery series you can pick up and put down easily, I recommend it. Murder on the Cornish Coast keeps the central characters fresh and interesting while also delivering a great mystery.

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