Allen & Unwin gifted me an ARC of “Death in Daylesford” by Kerry Greenwood to reconnect with a long-standing crime buster with a pearl-handled pistol. The sass and sensualness of Phyrne Fisher hits you immediately: she is full of colour and vividness, in comparison to Dot, her quaint beige companion. Their short holiday in the ‘spa’ town of Daylesford draws them into investigating the disappearances of local women, while Phryne’s adopted children in Melbourne undertake some mystery solving of their own, with the discovery of Ruth’s school mate floating in the river. The detail is dripping in sheen and lustre, and there is a lot of effort to knit the characters and the scenes together to provide the feel of Melbourne in the 1900s. Kerry Greenwood certainly has a knack of weaving together a tight murder-mystery and colour it with all the element of Phryne Fisher’s life – her glitz and glamour, her generosity to others, her origins in poverty. Not to mention the richness of history of the 1920s, I am amazed at the amount of detail that sits within every page, and it was perfect to curl up with and plough through.