“A Death at the Dionysus Club”

Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold

It’s been long enough since I read the first book in this series that I remembered basically nothing about the magic system, but I picked it up again well enough over the course of the book.1 Probably would’ve helped to recall how the protagonists’ relationship got started, as well, but I think this one did reasonably well at exploring it that I felt caught up again by the end.

It is, once again, a Holmes-ian story, but in this case I think it has less to do with characters falling into the archetypes and more to do with just being a Victorian-era murder mystery featuring people working with but not for Scotland Yard. I did want to shake the protagonists a bit, because they continually ignored the incredibly obvious suspect—to the point that the should’ve-been-a-suspect, himself, called them out on it.

Overall, though, I found it to be a remarkably fun romp. A good little hint of horror in places, because “the killer is using magic” adds a nice “you can’t see them coming” aspect at times. Worth the read; check it out.2

Long enough ago that I was still doing subtitles on these posts! ↩

This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩