The Antique Hunter's Death on the Red Sea is a well written mystery of the classic form, and the second Antique Hunter book by C.L. Miller. Released 18th Feb 2025 by Simon & Schuster on their Atria imprint, it's 304 pages and is available in hardcover, paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references throughout.
This is a well rounded cozy mystery. Aunt Carol and Freya are again on the track of missing/stolen antiques and carrying on Arthur's work. It's got a classic limited-suspect pool, and lots of unscrupulous, greedy collectors (who do tend to blend together a bit).
The author imbues the story with a great deal of background info on arts and antiquities, and is clearly well versed in the subject, which adds a nice bit of verisimilitude and interest to the storytelling. The nuts and bolts of the plot are well constructed, and although readers who are fans of the form will likely have much of the reveal worked out before the denouement, the author manages to toss a few nice twists in at the end, à la Christie.
The story is told in multiple PoV chapters, with main character Freya's chapters in first person, and the other characters' PoV in 3rd person. A challenging form, but the author manages it well and the whole is readable and engaging.
Three and a half stars. It would make a good choice for public library acquisition, as well as for mystery book club selection, and for fans of classic British mystery.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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