The school dynamics, the literary allusions, and the intriguing DS Kaur make The Stranger Diaries an incredibly readable novel that keeps you curious and guessing up to the last page. The killer’s motives felt underdeveloped and I didn’t hit my forehead and announce to my wife, “Of course! I should’ve seen it!” However, it did make sense, and the rest of the novel worked. I was surprised by the ending, but not in a way that felt altogether satisfying. The Stranger Diaries finds a happy middle ground. In others, the details are so well buried that the conclusion seems to come out of nowhere, and the detective seems like only a genius because the author made it so. As a literature teacher specialising in the Gothic writer RM Holland, she teaches a short course on it every year. In some mystery novels, the twists and turns feel predictable, the killer obvious. (I just added the second book on Goodreads.) It’s no surprise to me that Kaur has garnered her own series. She is funny, insightful, and interesting whereas Clare is fairly straight-forward and, at times, stereotypical.

Holland’s short story “The Stranger,” and her diary all play key roles in the mystery-DS Kaur really stole the show for me. While the novel is told primarily from Clare’s POV-her family and dating life, relationship to the victim, work on R. While I am not a woman, and teach in America, not the UK, there was still plenty for me to relate to.Īfter a colleague is murdered, Clare’s life becomes entangled with the investigation headed by Harbinder Kaur, a detective sergeant who must hide her sexuality from her Sikh, immigrant family. For one, Clare Cassidy is an high school English teacher obsessed with a mystery writer, and it’s always nice to see oneself in print. This was a particular favorite of mine from this year.

The stranger rm holland