Synopses & Reviews
""Academia (n.): a profession filled with bad food, knee-jerk liberalism, and murder... Being a member of the House of Lords and Mistress of St Marthas College in Cambridge might seem enough to keep anyone busy, but Baroness (Jack) Troutbeck likes new challenges. When a combination of weddings, work, and spookery deprives her of five of her closest allies, she leaps at an invitation to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor on an American campus. With her head full of romantic fantasies inspired by 1950s Hollywood, and accompanied by Horace, her loquacious and disconcerting parrot, this intellectually-rigorous right-winger sets off from England blissfully unaware that academia in the United States is dominated by knee-jerk liberalism, contempt for Western civilization, and the institutionalisation of a form of insane political-correctness. Will the bonne viveuse Baroness Troutbeck be able to cope with the culinary and vinous desert that is New Paddington, Indiana? Can this insensitive and tactless human battering-ram defeat the thought-police who run Freeman State University like a gulag? Does she believe the late Provost was murdered? If so, what should she do about it? And will she manage to persuade Robert Amisswho describes himself bitterly as Watson to her Holmes and Goodwin to her Nero Wolfeto abandon his honeymoon and fly to her side?
Review
""Political correctness run amok provides the motive for murder at a Midwestern university.
Accepting a lucrative offer to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Freeman State University, Baroness ""Jack"" Troutbeck arrives in New Paddington, Ind., with her vocal parrot. An intellectually honest conservative, Jack is appalled to find that the school is run with an iron fist by the crooked, mean-spirited triumvirate of President Dickinson, Provost Helen Fortier-Prichardson, and her vicious assistant, Dr. Ethan Gonzales. Jack's driver Betsy, an earnest, barely literate student, gives her a primer on the trio's tactics, which range from intimidation to grade inflation to enforced enrollment in ridiculous classes. After hiring a Mike Hammer wannabe to look into the state of affairs, Jack is enraged when the investigator and his partner are killed in a bogus accident, and her outspoken comments start a riot. Luckily, she has a gun, provided by the delightful southerner she met on the plane from London, a traveling companion whose lawyer son is soon defending her from every effort to force her out. Refusing to give up on Freeman, Jack persuades Robert Amiss, her Watson, to abandon his bride during their honeymoon and fly to her aid, and finally mobilizes the students to turn things around and help catch a killer.
Edwards (Murder in a Cathedral, 1997, etc.) pens a scathing, often amusing attack on over-the-top PC."" --Kirkus Reviews
Review
"In Dudley Edwards's provocative, humorous 11th Robert Amiss mystery (after 2004's Carnage on the Committee), the outrageous Baroness "Jack" Troutbeck—Mistress of St. Martha's College, Cambridge, and member of the House of Lords—experiences culture shock as a distinguished visiting professor at Freeman State University in New Paddington, Ind. With Horace, her loquacious parrot, perched on her shoulder, the conservative academic arrives in the Midwest to find a campus where political correctness has taken over, threatening to destroy Western Civilization as she knows it. Jack has her suspicions about the previous provost's death, and no trust in the left-wing current provost and the university president. She launches an investigation and convinces her partner-in-sleuthing, Robert Amiss, to cut his honeymoon short and help expose Freeman State's corruption, crime—and shoddy knee-jerk liberalism. Dudley Edwards wittily satirizes political correctness in this fast-paced academic romp. (Apr.)" --Publishers Weekly
Review
"The fun in the eleventh Robert Amiss and Baroness "Jack" Troutbeck novel starts on the very first page and doesn't stop until the very last. When Baroness Troutbeck decides to pay a visit to an Indiana university, little does she anticipate the American obsession with political correctness. Luckily, she is distracted by a murder, and soon she and Amiss (Watson to her Holmes) are doggedly pursuing the killer. But the brutally blunt, brook-no-nonsense Lady Troutbeck can't quite escape the surreal clutches of political correctness. The Amiss/Troutbeck novels are comic mysteries in the cozy style: small casts, small settings, big laughs. Edwards doesn't let a single opportunity to poke fun pass her by, and it's the small moments, such as the Baroness' futile attempts to enjoy a drink after a long flight, or her acid-tongued critique of a hotel breakfast (and let's not forget her interrogation by Homeland Security because of something her parrot said at the airport) that put a broad smile on our face. The story is enjoyable, but it's the way Edwards tells it that makes the tale—and the series—such a resounding success." --Booklist, starred review
Synopsis
Baroness Troutbeck leaps at an invitation to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor on an American campus. With her head full of romantic fantasies inspired by 1950s Hollywood, and accompanied by her parrot, she sets off from England.