Not to be missed first in a series!

It’s 1911 in Scotland and the suffrage movement is going strong. Maud McIntyre, a newly established lady detective and her former ladies’ maid now assistant, Daisy, are fighting the fight by being women in a male-dominated profession. Initially, they meet resistance by a potential male client, but the Duchess of Duddingston soon hands them a case that will challenge their resolve and whet their appetites for more. Author Lydia Travers did an excellent job of creating characters that allowed me to become invested in them. There were times when Maud is so prim and proper that she was off-putting. Then, there were moments where vulnerability shown through and you could understand that she might be a bit defensive because she lives in a male-dominated world where she is fighting to be heard and seen. This character ebb and flow realistically mirrored that which we as readers feel with family and friends. I greatly appreciated this added authenticity to Travers’ work. Travers also uses a deft hand at creating a plot with several instances of rising and falling action. The twists and turns were so surprising that I did not anticipate them until they were upon me. This was surprising since I’m very well read and am usually able to guess plots and outcomes quite easily. No, Travers fooled me, in a good way, and I’m not mad about it! In an effort to maintain these surprises for fellow readers I will not go into detail, but the plotting was so expertly handled that when I completed the book I went on to the Internet to see when book two of the series was to be released—I wanted more! I was fortunate enough to receive an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) of this book in exchange for my honest review. However, I can say with confidence that I am a huge fan of this series and would encourage you to buy the book so you can join me on my new adventure with Maud and Daisy. You really won’t regret it!

Enjoyable Edwardian Mystery!

Edinburgh 1911! Women are demanding the vote! Two women whose sympathies lie with the suffrage movement have opened a detective agency, Maud McIntyre and Daisy Cameron, who had been Maud’s maid for the last seven years. It’s officially their first day of business and a likely candidate turns up, Lord Hamish Urquhart, looking for help with a delicate matter. Only when he realises that a woman was in charge he decided against using their agency. Disgruntled, Maud is fuming against the dismissal from men when another client arrives, the Duchess of Duddingston, who has no objection to employing women enquiry agents. She’s having a weekend house party and as there’s been a spate of jewel thefts lately. She hires Maud and Daisy to keep watch. Oh, and guess who’s a house guest? That’s right, Lord Urquhart. Others on the guest list include Duchess’ daughters attend as does an Earl and his American wife, a pleasant advocate-depute Douglas Laing, and a popular author Esmeralda Taft.
A quiet beginning to the weekend gathers steam and there’s plenty of excitement when an elderly Viscountess is murdered, her diamonds go missing, and her husband arrested for the murder.
Case solved! Back in town a High Court Judge, Lord Miller, hires the agency to look for his missing daughter who’s about to be married. Has she had second thoughts or has something more sinister occurred. No sooner have Maud and Daisy started their investigations than another would be client appears, Lord Urquart.
A fast paced cozy mystery, with two gleeful, determined, and creative lady detectives where nothing is being left to chance, mostly.

A Bookouture ARC via NetGalley.
Many thanks to the author and publisher.
(Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.)

The Scottish Ladies' Detective Agency is the first detective novel by Lydia Travers. I’m afraid my notes on the first half of the book are discouraging. For example, we read “the Earl of Swinton and his American wife” twice. I wondered if we were ever going to be told the poor woman’s name! (Yes, we were; it’s Eleonora.) Daisy, Maud’s assistant, assumes the role of her lady’s maid and relays conversations in the servants’ hall by acting them out, mimicking the other staff. That’s clever, but is too artificial to maintain the reader’s absorption. The motivation for certain actions isn’t clear when you think about what is said, e.g. let’s not tell X because “If she finds out, it will be clear for certain that another knows why I am here.” But so what?!

I also thought the premise of a lady and her former lady’s maid joining forces as equals was also rather derivative of another author’s work.

And yet… Despite my impatience with a few points like that (which are mostly minor and emphatically forgivable in an inexperienced author), I wanted to know what happened. My faith was vindicated as I have far fewer critical notes on the second half of the book. Daisy no longer relates events word for word and her dialect speech no longer jars with Maud’s standard speech. Yes, various plotlines get resolved rather too easily and without full explanations of what happened. Yes, more back-story would be appropriate. However, it is Travers’ first mystery novel – we should be a little tolerant.

The shocked butler’s exclamation of “Gordon Bennett!” made me snigger most unbecomingly. Also, Travers work does NOT shadow TE Kinsey’s novels. She definitely has an enjoyable style of her own

I enjoyed this book and am actively seeking out the next book in the series. The Scottish Ladies' Detective Agency is a very good start and the two-chapter excerpt from Book Two, Murder in the Scottish Hills, included here, already demonstrates a more assured style. Get in at the start and get to know this Scottish ladies' detective agency before they are famous.

#TheScottishLadiesDetectiveAgency #NetGalley.

The SCOTTISH LADIES’ DETECTIVE AGENCY by Lydia Travers is a murder mystery set in the Scottish countryside and Edinburgh in 1911. The story features Maud McIntyre and her lady’s maid, Daisy, as they have just opened their detective agency and are hired to solve their first few mysteries as lady detectives. Amongst their cases are a jewel theft and murder, a missing dog, a missing daughter, and some missing letters.

The story itself had a good pace and a satisfying conclusion. There may have been one too many cases for Maud and Daisy to solve, but Lydia Travers did a good job pulling everything together. I look forward to the second book in this series.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Maud and her maid Daisy find more than they expected when they join a house party in the country outside Edinburgh in hopes of identifying a jewel thief. This is fun historical mystery that might remind you of Christie. Know that Daisy speaks in broad Edinburgh patois but also that she's actually the more interesting character than Maud. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A nice start to a new series.

This is a nice easy and cosy read for a Sunday afternoon with a coffee. I’ve always liked historical fiction and thriller. But when the two combined together I’d expect it to be full of twists and gripping moments. I feel like this book could do with a bit more twists instead of a straight guess from halfway through. But it is still a nice story with lots of interesting characters.

Maud and Daisy have set up their detective agency in Edinburgh in 1912.
Successfully (or so they think) solving a murder at a country house they return to the city and have three cases to solve.
But they begin to interlink and our detective duo have to use their considerable initiative and courage to find out what is really going on.
I loved the characters and the plot. Great description of life for different groups in society as well as the role of women.
Great new series.

I really enjoyed this! I loved Maud and Daisy and there interactions. I really liked all of the little mysteries and how everything came together. I would definitely recommend this book and can’t wait for the sequel!

In the tradition of T.E. Kinsey, C.J. Archer, and Verity Bright, this richly detailed novel depicts life in the early 20th-century UK when women didn't have the right to vote or any citizenship status at all. While suffragettes are using deeds not words to make their case, the upper classes are carrying on with their usual shenanigans. The first third of the story drags on and on. It reads like a short story where it takes too long to set up and the thief catching happens too quickly. That part is under 100 pages. It would have been a good novella. Then the story picks up a bit more around page 100 when the real mystery begins. Some of the other stuff that happens in the book is a distraction and could have been pared down a lot. As much as I LOVE the suffragettes, my favorite topic to read about, it wasn't necessary to include EVERYTHING especially the trial of the suffragette accused of assaulting a police officer. Yes it tells us a lot about the characters based on how they feel about women's suffrage but it's a lot of extraneous information. TWO of the mysteries also should have been relegated to a novella or short story and the focus should have been on the missing bride. Taken as a whole, the story felt disjointed. I guessed who the villain was early on but I stayed up late to find out what happened to the bride! I couldn't put the book down. I had to skim/speed read and skip some of the details about Edwardian life to finish before 2 AM!

I like Maud and Daisy well enough. They have a backstory that is just tossed at the reader which should be a prequel novella. Maud is sometimes naïve and crazy. She thinks because she easily discovered one jewel thief she can solve crimes! She gets herself into tough situations but she's intelligent enough to know when to back down and to know what she can and can not handle. Daisy is tougher being from the lower classes. She speaks with a Scottish accent which is a little annoying when it's spelled out. She needs a glossary because I didn't always understand what she was saying. Daisy is more brash and rash than Maud. She's cheeky but can handle herself when she rubs someone the wrong way or when a man tries to get cheeky with her. I think Lord Urquhart is supposed to be Maud's love interest. At first he comes across as sexist and arrogant but then Maud reads about him in the tabloids and runs into him at the house party only to discover he's kind of a playboy. Unsurprising since King Edward VII has only recently died! Fundamentally I think Lord U, Hamish, is a good guy. He may be a rake right now but I think he's intrigued by Maud and admires her intelligence and her guts in going after what she wants. She's confused by his attentions but Daisy knows what's what!

The Duchess of Duddingston is a wealthy widow with two marriageable daughters. She hints that she has Lord U earmarked for one of her daughters. Lady D is arrogant and snobby at times but she truly wants and needs Maud's help. She accepts Maud is experienced and observant. Lady D only stands in Maud's way when it comes to searching everyone's rooms. She insists on searching her own and her daughters' rooms by herself which makes me a little suspicious. Her eldest daughter, Lady Cynthia, is a piece of work. She's more snobby and rude than her mother. She is uninterested in the plight of the poor, helping servants get healthcare and anything except whatever it is empty headed young ladies are into. Husband hunting I suppose. Lady Violet seems to be treated like an afterthought. Unlike Cynthia, she isn't conventionally pretty and she seems like a schoolgirl from her appearance. She gives away a hint that she dreams of romance and has a man in mind for her future husband. I hope she's not competing with her sister because something tells me Cynthia would be ruthless and nasty to her sister if they both liked the same man.

Miss Esme Taft, author of tawdry romance novels, is one of the guests. Like Lady Cynthia, she's horrible. She thinks she's an Edwardian rock star or because she writes about the medieval period, she thinks it's still like back then and she's a lady and everyone else peasants. She's rude to Daisy but her dismissal of the maid allows Daisy to discover Miss Tate's secrets. In spite of being a successful novelist with nice clothes, she also seems to be poor for some reason. Do her expensive tastes exceed her income? Do her nice things come from money from stolen jewels? She's even changed her appearance even though her original coloring is more fashionable. I find her suspicious and think she's the prime suspect for thief. That might be too obvious though.

The Earl of Swinton and his Countess seem like a lovely couple. She may be a Buccaneer but they seem to be in love or at least fond of each other. With her money, they have no need to steal. Colonel Morrison is an old, boring war hero living on past glory. He's invited everywhere and has been on the guest list where other jewels have been stolen. He brings along a guard dog no one seems to have any idea is there. That makes me think he's hiding something. He puts up a big fuss about Maud searching his room. Between him and his dog, Maud seems to think he's challenged her to prove his guilt. Viscount and Viscountess Drummond are a nice elderly couple. They may not be as wealthy as the hostess or some of the other guests. There's hints money is short and Maud discovers a secret of her that may prove that the Viscountess is the thief. At least until she's murdered! I don't think her husband did it. He's too old, confused and upset by her death.

Mr. Laing seems nice. He's quiet and seems to be interested in Maud. He was one of the first on the scene after the murder and Maud doesn't think he could have done it and gone back to his room so quickly. Yet when she gets to know him better, she revises her opinion of him. Away from other people, alone in his own home, he can be free to be himself and what Maud sees is not pleasing. He is a nasty, selfish, social climbing weasel with an anti-suffrage mind. He's rude and I do not like him. Did he drive his bride away or did she run off on her own? I'd run too if I were engaged to Mr. Laing.

Belowstairs there's a tough butler, Mr. Thompson, who is very proper. The housekeeper too is also tough and proper but not unkind. Daisy takes a shine to the housemaids, especially wee Ada and offers to help. She does not like Mackenzie, the cheeky footman. I don't think any of them are suspects though. For a brief moment, it seems they have their man in a "vagrant" who stops by but it can't be the homeless person. It just never is just like it's never the servants! Sergeant McKay, the local constable sent to discover the murderer is wet behind the ears and not too bright. He'll never figure it out on his own.

Back in Edinburgh, we meet judge Lord Miller, a doting father worried about his daughter Diana who has gone missing. Diana is due to marry shortly and her father insists he isn't forcing her and she seemed excited and happy. Maud picks up on certain clues that Lord Miller isn't being entirely truthful. He may want himself to appear as a doting father but like most upper class fathers, he may want his daughter to make an advantageous marriage for political reasons rather than a love match. Diana's friend Angela Grant claims she doesn't know anything about Diana's disappearance and she's worried about her friend. Diana seems young and a little silly. Maud's methods of getting information from her are rather unethical but it works because Maud had already used her observational skills. Ovinus Davies, the photographer, violates client privilege by prattling on to Maud about Diana's sittings and who she came with. That doesn't usually happen in these sorts of novels, not without a bribe. He must be a newbie. Madame Escoffier, the dressmaker, knows more about what goes on in Society than anyone but also knows how to be discreet. She wants her money though she has every motive to want Diana found.

Sebastian Ferguson is a horrible excuse for a human being. He's a right wing nut job MP who doesn't believe in women's rights and does believe in corporal punishment for even minor offenses. Who on earth would marry him? He's away a lot on business and his young wife is doing her best to be a Real Housewife of Edinburgh 1911. Stella is young, bored and restless. She wants to resume her affair with Lord U and doesn't care about her husband or his reputation. She may be petty and vindictive too. She's a spoiled young miss but there's no reason for her to be punished by being married to the worst man in the novel.

Lady Argyll spoils her Peke, Max. Max barks too much and she can't train him to stop. She allows it and that's how she knows he's missing. I believe she loves her dog but she doesn't seem too distraught. If it were my dog, I'd be asking Maud and Daisy every day if they had a lead and what I could do to find my baby!

While I didn't LOVE this book, I would be open to reading another one if the author can dial it back a bit and not include EVERY idea and EVERYTHING that was going on in 1911 in one book.

What a wonderful journey!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. Accompanying Maud and Daisy on their adventures was wonderful.

I must say that my favorite character is Daisy, her personality is fantastic.

Although the mystery is relatively easy to solve, the story keeps you intrigued about what will be the next step of our protagonist.

It's quite refreshing.

I would say that it took me a while to understand some things since english is not my native language and I'm almost sure it has a lot of scottish slang😩 (I'm not complaining, just that as a spanish speaker it cost me a little more to read). However, it reads without problems.

I signed up on Lydia's website to get news about her releases because I want to keep reading her.

"A bee buzzed past and from somewhere in the distance came the clickety-clack of a mowing machine. The sounds of a country summer. Maud inhaled the roses' soothing, sweet perfume...and felt all was right with the world."

A book about a female private detective, set in 1911, with a jewel thief that strikes during country house weekend parties where a limited amount of suspects are all under one roof? SIGN ME UP!

This started out strongly and I was jazzed to read it. I like how the author depicted the difficulty of being a female detective - Maud's first client discovers "M. McIntyre" is a woman and quickly leaves. I also enjoyed Maud and Daisy's relationship, in that Miss Cameron used to be her ladies maid and now is her assistant.

The pacing of the book is slightly off, and I didn't realize until I was about 60% of the way through that the book resolves at 90% (10% is a section of book 2 in the series). But still, the house party was the best part, meeting all the characters/suspects. Because of how the stolen necklace is thrown from a window, Maud and the Duchess (her client) think they know whodunnit and then Maud and Daisy go back to business. This is all before 40% of the book. But Maud's feeling of catching the wrong culprit just continues to gnaw at her, especially as she takes on a couple more cases that might be related.

Once Maud and Daisy are back in the city, the pace got very slow for me. It felt almost like two different books to me, and though I appreciate how the different cases are related (there's a missing dog and a runaway fiance along with the country house jewel thief), there were some places where things felt stalled. Like Maud goes to visit her dad in the country, which was charming and I appreciated learning more about her family but it didn't really advance the plot. Then she visits a court case where a suffragette is being tried for assault and we learn about the case but this really isn't information that is helpful (and though the suffrage movement is relevant to another aspect, the court trial isn't adding anything to what we already know).

Oh - and there were some instances where the book slips into first person narrative. Like at one point Maud meets with the Duchess and she comes back to "returning her gaze to me" - maybe the book was originally not told in third person? It happened in a few places and maybe that will be fixed in a published edition.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book!

The Scottish Ladies' Detective Agency is a lovely mystery novel where Maud McIntyre and her former maid, Daisy Cameron, have just opened a detective bureau. Maud and Daisy investigate a few cases in this book.

I've never read historical fiction before and I found it pleasant to read about what life was like in 1911 in Edinburgh. The story was fun to read, and it felt very cosy. Overall, I enjoyed it a lot.

Thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for the eARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

"That women did not have the right to vote was a disgrace. On her census form, Maud had been very tempted to write, "No persons here - only women', but it wasn't a good idea for a private detective to have a criminal record."

This was a very enjoyable mystery with winks to Sherlock Holmes and Watson and was also similar in tone to the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency.

It is a historical cozy mystery set in 1911 in Edinburg, Scotland during the time of the suffragette movement. Maud and her "right hand woman", Daisy set out to make their mark in the male dominated field of private investigations.
I really enjoyed the relationship between the two women and the respect with which they treated each other and the subjects of their investigations.
Thanks to Netgalley for a chance to read it in exchange for my honest thoughts.

Edinburgh, 1911: Maud McIntyre together with her ex-lady's maid Daisy Cameron open up a Detective Agency and quite soon one might add they have their first case: the Duddingston one. But what happens when a simple theft case on Duddingston includes a murder? How is that case linked with other cases happening in town?

Even though I'm not a big fan of detective novels, this one was a pleasant to read. It was refreshing to see a more young woman detective, and with a woman partner to solve crimes. Since the first chapter, Maud shuts down the patriarchy and severe levels of mansplaining, which were expected given the time, but it was still annoying to see. Both Maud and Daisy reminded me wa that being a woman, does not mean I can't do certain things, but I can do anything. At a ceratin part of the book actually, Maud is walking on the Scottish streets, and she's looking at the statues, which were all of men and she asked herself "Where were the statues of women?", and I felt that to my soul.

Other quite positive traits of this book were the ample sense of humor and the use of sarcasm, which was probably the second or third time the use of such sarcasm from a woman at a book, and I need more of those brilliant heroines! The writing of Scottish Highlands gave me a certain ambiance and created within me an urge to look upon the Scotiish countryside during summer. It was also historically accurate regarding the suffragette movement, and it gave to the readers an eye to what behaviour these women had by the men, in terms of social contacts and even in court.

I absolutely loved this book and I'm looking forward to reading the second book of this series "Murder in the Scottish Hills"! Thank you NetGalley for the copy of the book in exchange for an honest review! The book is coming out on April 27th, don't miss it!

Maud and Daisy are an engaging detecting duo and enjoyed the opening book in Lydia Travers' new series. It's a little slow to start but really picks up pace halfway through. There are a few leaps in logic and discernment, and more co-incidences than one book needs, but the plot and characters came off the page well. The author has clearly researched Edinburgh in the early years of the twentieth century well. Perhaps she's a bit heavy-handed in the way she drops her research into the book, but better that than some of the horrific attempts at depicting the period and my city! Just one query though (I can't help myself), why does Daisy, an Edinburgh lass, insist on talking about quines, who really belong to the north-east?

Maude Montgomery starts her own detective agency with her ladies’ maid turned assistant, Daisy. After a slight struggle in the beginning, Maude gets her first client, a Duchess, who wants Maude to come to her party and try to prevent a jewel theft from happening after a string of thefts have happened at other society parties. Failing that, she wants Maude to solve the case if a theft does occur. Shortly after, Maude gains a couple more cases and quickly finds out things are more connected than she imagined.

This was a cute read and I would be interested to see what happens in the next book. I just wish I had liked it as much as I hoped I would. My main complaint is that I don’t think we got enough backstory on anything. Why was the detective agency such a dream of Maude’s? Why is Daisy so loyal to her and willing to run the agency with her? Maude’s interest in Sherlock Holmes is mentioned, but it didn’t feel like enough. I wanted to know more about the characters and what motivated them.

Guessing the villain was pretty easy early on. After that, it was mainly reading on to see when and how Maude would reveal them to everyone else. Which, the way she did it, felt dramatic and unsafe. I don’t know–I love cozy mysteries and Scotland and strong women…I wanted to love this one. I just don’t think everything worked together well enough for me to feel satisfied at the end of it.

2.5-3 stars
Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book. All thoughts are my own.

Maud signed up to catch a jewel thief, but she gets more than she bargained for. When the victim of a robbery is murdered, Maud needs to bag a killer.

Maud is a lady and comes from money, but she's ambitious and wants to make a life for herself. Sitting around and finding a husband isn't her idea of living a life of purpose. She decides to leave her pampered life behind to open a private investigation firm and takes her former maid, Daisy, with her.

But in their day and age, business and ambition were typically left to men. Due to this, at first it's looking like their new business is going to get off to a rough start, but soon the cases start coming in. Their first client is a duchess hosting a weekend affair, concerned about the jewels of her wealthy guests getting pinched. After all, there have been a spite of robberies in the area recently. But when a guest's diamond necklace is stolen, that's not the only crime that was committed. The owner of the necklace was murdered.

This puts Maud and Daisy in over their heads, but they still manage to keep calm and get the job done. And while there's an arrest, it doesn't settle. There has to be more to what happened, but it's not until Maud and Daisy pick up a couple more cases, that the pieces start to go together.

I found this book to be a good introduction to a new series. The pairing of Maud and her assistant, Daisy, worked well but as the series advances, I'd like to hear more from Daisy. With that said, this book was an enjoyable, light read, and I'm interested to see where the series will go.

Thank you to Bookouture and NetGalley for an advanced reading copy.

This is a lovely first book in a new cozy historical series. In 1911 Edinburgh, Scotland, well-to-do Maud McIntyre has opened her own detective agency. She’s assisted by her former lady’s maid, Daisy Cameron. Their first case finally appears, and it involves robberies at stately homes. With the Duchess of Duddingston hosting a party, she wants insurance that nothing untoward will occur and the detectives go undercover. When both robbery and murder occur, Maud and Daisy are on the case.
The author cleverly weaves multiple cases through the book so that, as Maud and Daisy finish one case, another appears which might or might not tie to some of the others in the book. She also details history, including the sufferagist movement in Scotland and England in 1911 as well as the upcoming coronation of King George V.
I look forward to the next in the series.

Edinburgh 1911 Maud McIntyre and her business partner ( and her ex ladies maid) Daisy Cameron join forces to open Scotlands first ladies detective agency.

In an era where ladies are fighting for their right to be heard and not just seen the pair must prove the doubters wrong and overcome the prejudices that plague them.

Maud and Daisy are a match made in heaven they complement each other perfectly, the author has given them wonderful personality traits.

A delightful historical cosy mystery full of wit, wisdom and humour.

This was a very promising start to a new series.

Set in Edinburgh in 1911, the story revolves around Maud McIntyre and ex lady's maid, now business partner, Daisy Cameron. Together they have set up the Scottish Ladies Detective Agency and at the start of the book they are anxiously waiting for customers.

Their first client sees them attending a weekend house party, where Daisy has to be her lady's maid again for a while. They are looking out for a jewel thief, but things become more serious when murder occurs. The Agency also gets busier with several more cases to solve.

The book is nicely written and it was very pleasing that the two main characters are both smart and sensible. The author was good at introducing occasional Scottish dialect into Daisy's speech so that it set the scene without being overdone. It was also often humorous.

An enjoyable read and I will certainly look out for the next book.