Discussion:
Notes on Current Author: Natalie discovered that there is very little biographical information about Charles Todd available. Reviews on the Amazon Web site turned out to be the best source of information. They revealed that he lives in Maryland. He does have his own Web site, but it was not very revealing. The lack of information was confounded when she found out that "Todd" is actually a mother and son team. Test of Wills is the fourth in as many years in Todd's series starring the character, Ian Rutledge of Scotland Yard. All of them take place in 1919. The most recent book in the series is Watchers of Time.
Book Review: Although this book won an Edgar for the Best First Mystery of the Year when it was published, the group had mixed reactions to it. Some members of the group agreed that it had an interesting set of village characters, and their possible motivations for murder were intriguing. Others didn't
The members liked the premise of the voice of Hamish as a foil to Rutledge. Similar shell-shocked veterans of WWI have been used by Sayers through Lord Peter Wimsey and in Anne Perry's character William Monk. This book also depicts the erosion of the class system and the changing lives of women in the post WWI period. Only Leonard had read any of the other books in the series, and it was hard to compare this title to Todd's other works. Many members of the group were not happy with the ending , feeling that the murderer "sort of came out of nowhere."