Dear Fellow Reader,

Happy June! For the first time in a while, it feels like we had Spring. Gardens were up and going earlier than normal and the lilacs are spent and back to being green bushes. It is always so great to go back to longer days. Remember when you were young and had to go to bed when it was still light out?

Bed in Summer

Robert Louis Stevenson 1850-1894

Last July, I reviewed The Last Drop of Hemlock by Katherine Schellman. (https://cecooney.com/2023/07/10/the-last-drop-of-hemlock-by-katharine-schellman/)

It was the second book in a series that featured Vivian Kelly as the main character. (I still haven’t read the first book.) The books take place in Manhattan in 1925. Vivian works for a seamstress during the day making deliveries and then at night she works in a speakeasy.

In The Last Note of Warning, we meet Vivan as she is delivering a dress to Mrs. Buchanan. She is to deliver the dress and make sure the dress fits perfectly. When she arrives at the house, Mrs. Buchanan is not there so she is told to wait. While waiting she meets Mr. Buchanan. They exchange some pleasantries, and he gets Vivian a cup of coffee. He is then called to meet a guest in his office by a maid. Vivian is tired from her long nights at the Nightengale and while waiting falls asleep. She wakes and knows that she needs to get back to work. She goes in search of someone to say that she is leaving. She finds Mr. Buchanan dead in his study. The police come and she is blamed for his murder. She contacts Leo Green, her beau, to help her since his uncle is the Police Commissioner. The Commissioner tells her she has one week to find the murderer, or she will go to jail for the crime. Vivan goes back to the Nightingale to enlist Honor Huxley’s help. Honor owns the Nightengale and has connections that Vivian thinks can help her. Vivian turns her down and says that this time she can’t help. Vivian is hurt by this refusal, but the clock is ticking and she needs to find out why Mr. Buchanan was murdered and by whom? Was it his new wife? Her gambler son (from a previous marriage)? And who was slowly poisoning Mr. Buchanan? And why weren’t the cops looking for the maid that Vivian said came and got Mr. Buchanan for a meeting?

Nothing was falling into place. Vivian couldn’t run away – the commissioner told her he would go after her sister, Florence if she disappeared. It truly looked like she was going to go to jail.

I enjoyed this book. There are enough twists and turns to keep you trying to figure out how Vivian will be saved. And she has to be, right? I think it is a great addition to your TBR pile. And someday I will read the first book.

Thanks for reading!