The first book in a new historical series featuring Verity Kent. This is a new author for me and I will read her again. The characters are developed in depth and become friends. The description of you at the house party and you feel the emotions of each individual, especially Verity. I found I couldn't put the book down and need to finish it.
It is 1919, the war is finally over and Verify is slowly recovering from her grief on the death of her husband in the final days of the war. She received an invitation to a house party to celebrate the engagement to be married to a childhood friend of her husband. She accepted it after learning that there is new information her husband complete treason.
When Verity arrives at the house party, she finds the male guests all fought with her husband and there is unexplained tension. She also received a book her husband requested that contains a code letter. Verify had worked for the Secret Service during the war and has training breaking codes. There is a death of one of the men that look like a suicide. A violent storm begins and the group is maroon on the island. The telephones are not working.The twists and turns that this tale makes will spell bound you. I highly recommend this book.

Disclosure: I received a free copy Kensington Books through NetGalley for an honest review. I would like to thank them for this opportunity to read and review the book.The opinions expressed are my own.

Verity Kent is a great character in this new historical mystery series. She was widowed during WWI and is trying to come to terms with her new life. She is surprised to be invited to the engagement party of one of her husband's former fellow officers. She attends the house party, and mystery ensues.

I really enjoyed this one. The mystery aspect of the storyline caught my attention right away and kept me interested. I liked the setting and am looking forward to more in the series.

The story takes place just after WWI at an engagement party in a Castle at Umbersea Island. Verity Kent attends this party after receiving an anonymous letter suggesting that her husband may have committed treason.
At Umbersea she secretly receives a book with a hidden letter written in code. Her hope is to crack the cipher and find out the truth about her husband.
This Side of Murder by Anna Lee Huber definitely kept me in suspense. I was eager to find out who was behind the letter and the crimes being committed on the Island. Just when I believed I knew who the suspect was I was wrong - again.
My only disappointment was the chapter with the seance which had me worrying if the story may go in a different direction than what I was expecting. Fortunately, the chapter was brief and the story was back on track with more mysterious occurrences.
I received this ARC from Kensington Books through NetGalley for an honest review.

Nice mystery but I didn't completely buy the husband's storyline.

Did not finish. I made it 20% through this book and abandoned it. It was very slow moving and had way to many characters. Not enough back story was given on the main character, or her deceased husband. I just didn't care what happened to her, or what had happened to him. I was very disappointed, because this seemed like it could be a good series to catch at the start.

I received an Advanced Reader Copy via netGalley.

Interesting characters to start a new series. Fans of Kerry Greenwood's Phyrne Fisher mysteries will like this book.

A cracking good debut mystery! As a long time Lady Darby fan, I was a little worried about Anna Huber beginning a second series. Was I wrong! Anna takes the classic setting of a manor house, a accusation of treason and makes it into an outstanding mystery! Most everyone invited to the weekend has the motive, means and opportunity to be the culprit. As the bodies are discovered, the stakes continue to get higher to find out whodunit! It kept me guessing until the end. The character development was good, the pacing, which was a little slow in the beginning, pick up until I was racing thru to get to the finish line.

Anna Lee Huber's novel, "This Side of Murder" is a historical mystery that is reminiscent of an Agatha Christie novel. A group of characters is stranded on an island, (think "And Then There Were None"), as the action unfolds. Widow Verity attends an engagement party weekend while trying to find out whether her husband, Sidney, was a traitor during WWI. Not the most believable plot but Verity is a plucky character and one that I rooted for.

Anna Lee Huber is rightfully well known for her Lady Darby mysteries (The Anatomist's Wife and others). This book is the first entry in what I fervently hope will be another long and successful series.


An aside: it takes serious chops to stand in a ring and go a few rounds with Muhammad Ali, or share a stage with Eric Clapton holding a guitar, or have a paint-off duel with Matisse. Not a bit of hyperbole to say this book represents exactly that. Ms. Huber takes the classic Christie setting: remote English country house, on an island, isolated by a storm, cut off from help, tosses in a house party of odd characters absolutely resonating with unresolved history and sets it in the English interwar period.

The writing is solid. The pacing is perfect and the plot moves along at a clip. The research into place and setting are perfect. I truly enjoyed reading this book so very much. The 'rules' of the setting and mystery writing were adhered to and I hadn't worked it all out by the end of the book.

To be perfectly honest, I revere Agatha Christie (and Ngaio Marsh and Dorothy Sayers and all the grand dames of mystery). I think Huber has the potential to stand right up there with them. This book is wonderful with flashes of real brilliance.

Five stars seem too few but five it is.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher.

Thank you Net Galley. This is an interesting new series from Ms. Huber. I have read her earlier novels and enjoyed this one too. I read the book at one go and recommend it highly.

Very enjoyable read, left the ending open but not a cliff hanger which is an enjoyable way to end the read. Looking forward to the next book in the series.

I am a big sucker for a good historical mystery and being a big fan of Charles Todd and Jacqueline Winspeare I am always looking for a good World War 1 era mystery. I had not gotten into the authors previous series but I am glad I gave this book a try!
This book was engaging and full of surprises from the very beginning. The main character was charming and clever. The mystery was well developed and intriguing catching one by surprise for sure and I loved how this book continued to surprise and delight. All in all an outstanding read!

I don't read a lot of historical fiction and it's been ages since I've read any of Agatha Christie's work. But I instantly fell in love with the character of Verity Kent. Author Anna Lee Huber really brings the character alive as well as post-World-War-I England.

Still struggling to cope with the death of her husband, Verity Kent accepts an invitation to an island on the southern England coast to celebrate the engagement for one of her late husband's military comrades. But the celebration is short-lived when Verity begins to receive cryptic messages about her husband and guests turn up dead. Verity draws on her experience in the Secret Service to unravel a plot of treason, conspiracy, and murder.

The book is beautifully written with a wonderful mix of characters and plenty of plot twists. Verity is bold, smart and resourceful.

Umbersea Island, the setting of the story, is a fictionalized version of Brownsea Island. Huber did a wonderful job bringing this location to life, complete with the castle, church, and the abandoned potters village, all of which play a role in the story.

If you're looking for a classic Christie-era mystery that will keep you guessing till the very end, you won't go wrong with THIS SIDE OF MURDER.

I loooooved this book. Anna Lee Huber is so talented, and I love that she's branching out into different areas of the historical mystery genre. This is her best writing so far, with characters and scene descriptions that leap off the page and feel cinematic in nature. The suspense of the characters' isolation and resulting paranoia -- similar to And Then There Were None -- plus the many shocking twists, make the story so hard to put down.

Verity Kent, a war widow and former British Secret Service agent during World War I, begins receiving cryptic anonymous messages hinting that her deceased husband was not the war hero she thought him to be. The messages prompt her to accept an invitation to an engagement party for her husband's best friend and his bride to be which is taking place on a remote island estate in the English Channel. Verity quickly realizes that the party is not what it seems and the guests -- all former soldiers and officers from her husband's unit or otherwise connected to the relatives of those soldiers -- are hiding secrets about what really happened during the war. As the guests start suffering fatal "accidents" and ominous messages from beyond the grave are found on their bodies, Verity is in a race to uncover the truth of what really happened to the unit before it's too late.

Verity is a complex blend of supreme capability, intellect and vulnerability. She's used to keeping calm and carrying on, but can't help feeling adrift now that she's lost her husband of only a few years, as well as her formerly active life as a code-breaker and agent during the war. The constant reminders of her husband at the party, and the slow unraveling of anecdotes from the guests that make her question her own memories of him, add to her feeling of uncertainty.

I'd be remiss not to also mention Max, who managed to push Sebastian Gage out of top place for my favorite of Huber's heros. Book 1 is only scraping the surface of his story, but he's already made a very favorable impression :-)

Thank you to Kensington Books and Netgalley for providing an ARC for review!

I discovered this author with her Lady Darby mysteries, which are my absolute favorite. Huber is a master at mysteries. This one has loads of intrigue and you guess till the end.

I absolutely loved This Side of Murder. Verity Kent is relatable and logical without being quirky or silly, like some investigative women are portrayed. The book takes a little while to get going and I had a hard time following who all of the characters are in the beginning but quickly figured it out. Intense, entertaining, and hard to put down!

It was OK, but did not seem at all realistic or terribly accurate. An interesting time period and some important topics concerning WWI, but nothing like the depth of Jacqueline Winspear's early Maisie Dobbs series or Charles Todd's Ian Rutledge or Bess Crawford series.

This Side of Murder is a great historical murder mystery set in one of my favorite time periods, the beginning of 20th century just after WW1 ended. It has a cast of interesting characters lead by our main heroine Verity, who is a war widow and a former Secret Service operative. Verity is smart, resourceful, and very likeable. The setting of This Side of Murder is very atmospheric. As I was reading I was getting Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None" vibes: an isolated island, a storm, a party with a strange mix of people who start dropping dead one by one. I found the first part of the book a little slow but as I got to the middle there was a major twist/revelation that I didn’t see coming, and from then on I couldn't put the book down. The ending was satisfying but I still have major feels and questions about it and cannot wait for the second book to find out what's next in store for Verity and co

Thank you allowing me to read an early copy of this for an honest review! This book is a mixture of an interesting time period, the perfect setting for a mystery, full of surprises, and good historical fiction! I love the main character, Verity. This is a great first book of a series that I hope continues for a while!

The Lady Darby Series set in 1830-31 Scotland has been pure delight. The Verity Kent Series begins in 1919 England. Verity, as expected, is a very different heroine than Lady Darby. Verity a likeable character with intelligence, heart and grit. The time period is an interesting one. It's set just after the end of WWI.

Beyond Verity, there was one other interesting character. For the most part though, I wasn't terribly interested in the cast of characters. There was quite a large focus on alcohol in the early part of the novel. I understand soldiers, wives and girlfriends had been through so much and found relief in alcohol and drugs, however, the emphasis on this piece of the story was rather heavy in the early part of the novel. This focus did lessen substantially. There was then a section on seance, tarot cards, etc. While other readers may not have blinked about the focus on alcohol and occult, it stood out as not adding to the novel for this reader.

The mystery itself was o.k. With my limited interest in the characters, this took away from the appeal of the mystery.

I am looking forward to the next novel in the Lady Darby series.