“Of Deadly Descent” is the sequel to the LDS genealogy mystery, “Cankered Roots.” When last we saw Alex Campbell, she had just solved the mystery of her father’s murder, and uncovered a whole new mess of problems. There’s now an estate that needs to be settled, and in order to do that, she must travel to Oxford to hunt down some long lost relatives. Well, they sure are long lost – she’s not even sure they’re her relatives!
An elderly woman in a small French village give her a tip-off that she might find what she sought in Oxford. The handsome grandson of the informant then shows up in Oxford, right across the street from where Alex is staying, and she spies him waiting to cross on the opposite corner. Just then, the woman standing next to him falls forward and into the path of a passing bus, and is killed instantly. She turns out to be Phillipa Cuendet, one of the very people she was hoping to see during her stay, a possible cousin. What are the chances that the day she arrives in town on a mission to find the rightful home for millions of dollars, a murder would occur right across the street from her hotel? Alex gets to work on it immediately and meets up with the other family members, finding them a confusing and passionate bunch of people. She’s convinced that one of them killed Phillippa, but who?
She must be getting close, because she has a close call of her own as a car tries to run her down in an alley. Briggie, otherwise known as Brighamina Poulson, Alex’s business partner, tries to get her to be a little more careful, especially where that Frenchman is concerned. He’s a suspicious one and that’s a fact, but when he himself ends up murdered, Alex doesn’t know where to look next.
Filled with twists and turns, this is an exciting read. I did find some of the genealogy a little confusing, but I chalked that up to my own mental blocks and just enjoyed the story on its own merits.
(This book was published in 1996 by Deseret Book.)
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