Vow Of Penance (U) - Hardcover

Black, Veronica

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0708933262 ISBN 13: 9780708933268

Publisher: Ulverscroft, 1995

Synopsis

On the Cornish moor where Sister Joan lives with other Sisters of the Daughters of Compassion, a shadowy figure is stalking the night, slashing trees. When Father Malone's housekeeper is found dead, suicide is the verdict - but Sister Joan and her old friend, Detective Sergeant Mill, think otherwise. When Sister Joan is sent to the presbytery to work as temporary housekeeper, the stage is set for a race against time to find the truth before the stalker turns the season of penance into a season of blood.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews:

The latest sleuthing adventures of bouncy young Sister Joan, a nun in a Cornwall convent. As in A Vow of Obedience (p. 247), Sister Joan has a professional assist from Detective Sergeant Mill, and, again, eerie appearances and most unpleasant death abound within and without the convent. As Sister Joan is just beginning to wrestle with her dislike of grim Sister Jerome, who arrives like a storm cloud from the order's London house, there's a puzzling call from the bustling housekeeper for the two local priests: aloof Father Stephen and newly ordained, glowering Father Timothy. Then the housekeeper is found dead. Before the murderer is brought to justice, there will be three grisly murders, and a bloody ax will appear on the convent's chapel altar. Among the other mysteries: What could explain the random slashing of trees? And why is the housekeeper's purse so important? Sister Joan explains it all for you--with the help of Sergeant Mill. The identity of the murderer may be no surprise to seasoned mystery hands, but this popular series offers peaceful convent decorum, with a giddy streak of gore and a likeable sleuth. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

The fifth entry in Black's series centering on Sister Joan, of Cornwall's Convent of the Order of the Daughters of Compassion, is less deftly plotted and deeply textured than the previous four Vow mysteries. The suicide of the housekeeper at the rectory of the local parish occurs just after the pastor begins an extended vacation. The arrival of his replacement, a sternly scrupulous new priest, coincides with the appearance at the convent of a dour, earnest new nun. Sister Joan, sent to town temporarily to fill in for the housekeeper, surreptitiously investigates the suicide, which she believes was murder. The discovery of the mutilated corpse of an unidentified young man, followed quickly by two more unexpected deaths, leads Sister Joan to another crime 20 years past. Black's otherwise sharp and modern-minded heroine misses a connection that readers will make easily in a tale whose red-herring characters are too easily distinguished from the guilty ones.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Ulverscroft
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0708933262
• ISBN 13: 9780708933268
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 352