4.5 stars, rounded up
The Locked Room by Elly Griffiths is the 14th entry in her Dr. Ruth Galloway series. Ruth is the head of archeology at the University of Norfolk. Her former partner, DCI Harry Nelson, is investigating a locked room murder, which quickly becomes the search for a serial killer, and Ruth becomes involved.
The timeframe of this story also includes the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, and addresses the difficulty faced by law enforcement officers who are hampered by pandemic lockdown restrictions. The characters are well-crafted, the writing is intelligent, and Ms. Griffiths’ prose is a joy to read for this mystery lover.
This is my first Dr. Ruth Galloway read, having received it as an Early Read through Scene of the Crime Facebook group. I am excited to say that while this novel has strong enough legs to stand on its own, I am intrigued by the characters, and will be seeking out the previous volumes in this excellent series!
Highly recommend!

Thank you to Mariner Books/HarperCollins Publishers, Scene of the Crime group, and NetGalley for the ARC. This is my honest review.

Ella Griffiths always pleases. The only problem I had with this book was that the perpetrator was not introduced until the last part of the book - a definite weakness in the writing. However, Ruth Galloway and company always make for a suspenseful and really good read.

Another fantastic entry in the Ruth Galloway series! I was a bit apprehensive reading a book set in the pandemic, but this beautifully captured those early strange days. It was, as always, a pleasure to be with Ruth & co., and the mystery was unusual and ultimately satisfying.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early read of The Locked Room.by Elly Griffiths.

The Ruth Galloway series is one of my favorites, and I am always glad to pick up the new one (even knowing it will be a long year until the next one!). This is the first book I have read that was set during the pandemic. I have read other titles that skirt the edges of it, but nothing that was truly set during it. Griffiths does a great job conveying what those early days felt like, not just in the UK but around the world - the uncertainty, the fear, the lack of information, and the sense of being paused in time.

Ruth is involved in two mysteries. One is very personal - when cleaning out her mother's things, she finds an old photograph of her cottage (which her mother always professed to hate) labeled "Dawn 1963". The other involves her new neighbor, who goes missing. Nelson makes an appearance as well, of course, ignoring the lockdown in order to see Ruth and their daughter Kate. He and his staff are investigating a string of suicides, while also dealing with the realities, both the mundane and the life-threatening, of being essential personnel.
While the personal mystery moves Ruth's character forward, the actual mystery of the missing neighbor felt very low stakes in comparison to the advent of the pandemic. And perhaps because of this, The Locked Room felt like a pause for the series as well. That said, while this may not be my favorite of the series, I am still hooked on it and look forward to Ruth's next adventure.

This is the fourteenth book in the series, and actually my first book read by this author. I found this to be an enjoyable read, I am sure it may have been a much better read for me if I had read previous books in the series. I did figure out the murderer before the end, I would recommend this book to others.

I received an ARC from NetGalley and Mariner book, in exchange for a fair and honest review.

This 14th Ruth Galloway book is set in 2020 just as the Covid pandemic is beginning, which lightly contrasts with the archeological aspect of the book set during the Black Plague. Women are dying, then as now but, while the modern mystery keeps the reader wondering, the book is very, very strongly character-driven as we feel the confusion of those early days of the pandemic when no one really understood what was going on. The sense of isolation, the need for connection, the fright as friends and family members became ill and were hidden behind the closed doors of hospitals...it's all there.

Ruth, archeologist and single mother of Kate, reconnects with Nelson, Kate's father and a police detective, in this book. It is their relationship which drives the focus of the book. There are several linked plot lines that include a new neighbor for Ruth who intriguingly has a photo of Ruth's mother, several deaths of women through suspicious suicides, one of Ruth's students who is stalking her, a kidnapped woman kept in the eponymous locked room, and Covid striking very close to home. In this latest, Griffiths plays fair as she always does, bringing the plots together in ways that are twisty enough to be interesting but not out of the blue.

This book would work for those who haven't been following the series as a reminder of what it felt like as we first encountered Covid, but it will be a much richer experience for those who have already developed a relationship with Ruth and Nelson. The writing about the old Medieval architecture in Norfolk is very atmospheric, and a treat in and of itself. The mystery is fully resolved in this book, making it a possibility for a standalone. But having read the final sentences of THE LOCKED ROOM, I am anxiously awaiting #15 in the series.

Thanks to NetGalley and Elly Griffiths for this ARC.

Having read the Ruth Galloway series for several years, this was a treat to read. Ruth is finally getting around to cleaning out some of her deceased mother's belongings. Finding an intriguing photo, forensic archaeologist Ruth is drawn into yet another mystery. The Covid-19 backstory was an interesting backstory, and we see Nelson deal with having to stay away from Ruth and Kate while realizing the murders he is investigating are closer to home than he would like.

I did not realize that Emily Griffiths The Locked Room was the fourteenth book in the Ruth Galloway series until I was halfway through this book. It certainly read like a stand alone. I found it to be a nice break from historical fiction books that I usually read. I enjoyed Ruth who is an archeologist and is the head of the department at her university. Ruth is asked to consult on a case by members of the police, Nelson, who is the father of Ruth’s daughter Kate, and Judy his assistant, are intriguing characters. The prologue is definitely an attention getter. A woman finds herself in a totally dark room which she thinks is underground. . The author then starts the story by introducing us to the main characters. I thought the author did a great job of setting this story at the beginning of the pandemic. Brought back many memories and feelings for me. I will definitely be looking for other books in this series. My thanks to Mariner Books and NetGalley for an ARC of this book. The opinions in this review are my own.

Ruth Galloway’s mother died several years ago. Her father has now remarried and has asked Ruth to go through the last of her mother’s possessions. In the bottom of a box is a picture of Ruth’s home with Dawn 1963 written on the back. It is quite a puzzle since it is dated before Ruth was even born. She hopes that discovering the history of her cottage will provide answers. It is 2020 and Covid has not taken over the news as yet, but there are indications of how serious it will become. There is a new resident in the cottage next to Ruth’s. Zoe is a nurse and they get to know each other while keeping the required distance. When lockdown begins Ruth feels fortunate to have someone to talk to.

Lockdown has also presented challenges to the police. DI Nelson is called to the scene of what everyone believes is a suicide. Why would someone put a meal into the microwave and kill themselves as it heats? Nelson has his team look into recent suicides and they discover a pattern. Several women who appeared happy with their lives have killed themselves in the past six months. They can all be tied to a diet program that Zoe also attends. Nelson is suspicious of Ruth’s new neighbor and discovers an episode in her past that raises red flags. Ruth is a professor of archaeology and Nelson also suspects one of her students is stalking her. As Nelson’s team investigates the suicides they have little contact with persons of interest and often conduct their interviews by phone and computer. One of the team is also quarantined as her husband fights for his life.

COVID has been with us for over two years and as Elly Griffiths’ series progressed it was something that could not be ignored. She builds it into her story, but does not let it take over. This is the fourteenth book in the Ruth Galloway series and I have been a fan since the first. Her characters come to life on the pages and it is easy to become involved in their lives. I would like to thank NetGalley and Mariner Books for providing this book for my review.

I love the Ruth Galloway series, and the developments of Ruth's story in The Locked Room were both stressful and intriguing. I can’t wait to see how they influence future books. I had a moment of not wanting to read on because I was afraid of how a plot line was going to play out, which very rarely happens to me. My trust in the author got me over that hurdle.

I struggled a little at the beginning of the book, partly because I wasn’t sure I was ready to read a book set in the pandemic, but also because of some stylistic problems that are atypical of Griffith’s work. Those dissipated as the story went on, thankfully. The last quarter of the book had me holding my breath and praying right along with Kate. I can’t say more without spoilers, so hopefully everyone hurries to read this one so we can all chat about it!

Thank you to Mariner Books, Netgalley, and author Elly Griffith for early access to a digital copy of this beautifully plotted book.

My first book by this author and there will absolutely be more. I fell into this book and could not get through it quickly enough. I wanted to find out what was going to happen. I was very comfortable with Ruth from the start. She found a photo of her cottage before she was born while clearing out her mother’s things. With her mother passed, she had no one to ask why and what was the story of this photo. She began looking into the why when Nelson showed up and recognized a neighbor as a women once tried for murder. Nelson is looking into a suicide of a woman with the door locked from the outside. There were several themes going on in this book, including Covid, and all blended very well. Even though it was the 14th in the series, I felt very comfortable with Ruth and Nelson. The writing is wonderful. I will go back and read the others in this series and will explore the other series by the author as well.

This review was originally posted on <a href="https://booksofmyheart.net/2022/06/28/the-locked-room-by-elly-griffiths/" target="_blank"> Books of My Heart</a>
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<i>Review copy was received from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.</i>

The  <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/series/46415-ruth-galloway" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em><strong>Ruth Galloway</strong></em></a> series is an unusual sort of police procedural with archeological and spiritual aspects.  Ruth is a single woman who now has an 11 year old daughter.  She's had some success with books and even television, and is now head of her department.  She is normally called in when bones are found with police cases.

Kate's daughter is growing up and knows who her father is and her half siblings.  The situation is odd and none of them discuss it.  But Nelson and Ruth still spend time together, mostly discreetly since she lives in a remote area.  Every time it seems Nelson will make any changes, things are easier to leave status quo.  Ruth doesn't expect him to leave his wife and that is sad but realistic.  I'm surprised Kate and Ruth are so comfortable with it.

<strong>The Locked Room</strong> is set in the beginning of Covid and the restrictions of it.  People are more isolated and it is hard to question them or do the usual police interviews.  There are what is considered suicides of several late middle-aged woman.  The team isn't sure they are suicides and try to find connections as the deaths seem similar.

Ruth is clearing up her mum's things as her father is remarried and they plan to do some redecorating.  She finds an old photo of her cottage from before she was born.  She also has a new neighbor, who is a nurse and they become friendly.  Ruth has some students who are on campus because of the lockdown and have no where else to go but then they disappear.  Then her neighbor goes missing.  The team is searching for them.  Judy is working the investigations even with Cathbad in the hospital with COVID.

Everything comes to a head, when Judy figures it out, as Tanya and Ruth are finding the missing.  The cases are solved but the book ends with a small cliffhanger.

This is not the first in the series Elly Griffiths about archeologist Ruth Galloway. Can you start with it? Yes, but beware--you will want to run back and read al that came before to find out how the main characters reached this point in their relationships.
To both the newbie and the faithful follower of this series I have one thing to say--Don't Miss This One!!!!Griffiths gets better and better each time she opens up her computer to write. It is hard for me to realize that Ruth and her daughter Katy and the other characters are not real. Dialogue is spot on--for each and every relationship. And the descriptions of the marshland--evocative of both mystery and ethereal beauty, sometimes simultaneously-- are seamlessly woven into the book and always support some aspect of the mystery.
A locked room and the pandemic feature prominently in this book. Locked room mysteries seem to be in vogue right now, but Griffiths has put her own spin on it. that gives it a spark of originality. While many authors have skirted around the pandemic, Griffiths, with all the panache of an archeologist, deftly ties it to earlier plagues and moves along, noting as it impacts plot, various issues with masks, hesitation to believe it, etc,
I find that this series is always one of the highlights of my reading year. I'm afraid to say much more because I want to talk about the who did it, the how done it, and more of this one, but I don't want to give anything away. I will only say that I was surprised. This should go on the list of anyone who likes cleverly plotted mysteries with a side of strong interpersonal relationships, and in this novel, the author dares to put a man character in peril which has the effect of renewing our interest in him. Hoping my cousin reads it soon--she and I form a cross-country Griffiths fan club.

While sorting through some of her mother’s papers, anthropology professor Ruth Galloway finds a picture of her own cottage with “Dawn 1963” written on the back. What could it mean? Meanwhile the Covid 19 pandemic is just beginning and Ruth is trying to cope with zoom classes, keeping her daughter Kate occupied at home, Cathbad in intensive care, and a recent string of murder/suicides close to home. Oh, did I mention her mysterious new neighbor and a student stalker? Yes, we’re left hanging with a teaser again, too.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This Ruth Galloway installments drops the reader in the middle of the Pandemic and we get a close up look of how a single mother juggles lockdown, home schooling of her daughter, managing her architectural students via zoom classes and tutorials, a dear friend who falls victim to covid, all those other not so fun things that so many have experienced and endured for 2 plus years. There is a lot going on on this story, the unraveling of a family mystery, the re-ignition of Ruth’s relationship with DCI Nelson, a few questionable students who may be up to nefarious activities or they may just be lost and looking for help, several mentions of the plague, a few too many unexplained suicides, a new neighbor with a past and several ambiguous references to “The Grey Lady”. A whole lot going on.

The problem with the Ruth Galloway series is how well they are conceived and written. It is so hard once you open the book to put it aside until you have finished. Not a complaint as I happily look forward to the next installment. Thank you Mariner HarperCollins for a copy.

For my first Elly Griffiths book and cheers to her #14 in the Ruth Galloway Mysteries, I must say I can see why she is an award winning author! Just Wow!! It will not be my last! This takes on a Gothic mystery vibe with the enchanting lands of Norfolk Cottages, Tombland, Norwich Cathedral and Augustine Steward's House and the haunting of The Grey Lady. The Grey Lady was a victim of a plague in the Middle Ages during a time period if you had a plague your house was sealed shut and the family eventually starved to death. Bringing us back to our current COVID outbreak, this book takes us back to the beginning when questionable doubt surfaced.

A lot of the COVID restrictions were revisited in the book with the magnitude of social distancing, schools closed and reopened under Distance Learning, masks mandate and unfortunately the loss of loved ones. The courage and compassion is significant in our revisiting of 2020. It gives us a look at the beginning, during and hopefully the ending of COVID.

During this lock-down, Ruth Galloway, a professor at the University at Norfolk in the Archaeology Dept studies the remains found outside the borders of a church graveyard. Either ostracized from the main area due to suicide or a plague victim in a "plague pit". At the same time, an elderly lady was found locked in her bedroom from an apparent suicide. When several women in the area were accounted for as suicides, Ruth and her partner Nelson with the Serious Crimes Unit piece the puzzle together that they are victims of a serial killer. Nelson is also the father of her daughter Kate and they take on a special relationship even though he is married.

Before the lock down, Ruth's mother passed away and while she was cleaning out her house, she found a portrait of the cottage she currently lives in. On the back of the photo was written Dawn, 1963.
This seems irrelevant except for the fact her mother hated her cottage. Why would she have it? I enjoyed the mystery of this photo.

It was an overload of characters, but when I gained an understanding of each one playing their part, it resonated well. I enjoyed this so much. The searching and piecing the puzzle together always works for me. I love a mysterious additive that sidelines the main story. I'm excited about the next one since it left off with a relationship in the air.

Thank you NetGalley and Mariner Books for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thanks Netgalley for allowing me to read this book. Ruth is going through her deceased mothers stuff when she sees a picture of a cottage. She is hoping to visit the cottage to get some information. The police are intrigued by several deaths that look like suicide this book kept me guessing until the end.

It's 2020 and Ruth, whose mother has been dead for 6 years, is finally clearing her things at her father's request when she finds an old photo of her cottage in Norfolk labeled Dawn 1963. A mystery to be sure but not so much as the one Nelson is struggling with - the suicides (or are they) of women who seemed to have everything positive in their lives. And it's 2020 and COVID is not only looming, it's here. Griffiths has seamlessly incorporated COVID into the plot of this excellent entry in the series including a scenario that is both frightening and realistic. Ruth's got a new skeleton to work with, found in Tombland, Norwich, which fascinates her students and reinvigorates the old "Grey Lady" story of a ghost wandering around the area. She's also got a new neighbor and a restless 12 year old daughter Kate. Nelson's investigation is fascinating. No spoilers from me on this one. I'm always caught up in the story not only for the mysteries- which are great- but for the characters, to whom I'm quite attached, as well. This is no exception. Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. It's a terrific read, probably best appreciated by those who have followed Ruth and Nelson, and there's so much possibility ahead for the next one. I can't wait.

My Highly Caffeinated Thought: A wonderfully constructed mystery using the early realities of COVID to shape how the characters interact and the case unravels.

THE LOCKED ROOM is now part of the new wave of books grounding the fictional characters in our current realities. Griffiths expertly weaves together the emotions and uncertainty surrounding those within this book while still maintaining interest in an investigation of an apparent suicide.

What I loved so much about this book is that the author’s voice, which I adored in the Harbinder Kaur Series, was still maintained in this. Though there are different characters and settings, the pace, as well as the intrigue, was there. Having never read any of the books previously in Ruth Galloway’s journey, there were moments where I would have loved more background. However, this did not stop me from enjoying the book. Blending the investigation and the collection of side stories kept my interest and propelled the narrative forward.

Honestly, meeting Ruth, her daughter, and this full cast was so enjoyable. The reality each faces is compelling and honest. Ruth is a smart, complex character who came across as real. The flaws seen in the actions as well as the characters themselves only made me identify with them more.

Visiting this world for just one book seems to be not enough time for this reader. I cannot wait to jump in from the beginning and see what cases this amateur sleuth got herself wrapped up in.

I adore Ruth Galloway - if she was not a fictive character, I would like to be her friend. This is the 14th book in the series, and, yes, some things are becoming a little repetitive (Will Nelson EVER choose between his pretty wife and Ruth?), but I will read every book Elly Griffiths write about Ruth Galloway!