This is the second book in which Molly the Maid turns detective when there are ‘goings on’ in the hotel. Molly has been promoted to Head Maid, she wears a badge to prove it, and is now responsible for teaching others how to clean. We are most definitely in cozy crime country with these books. Molly, who has difficulties ‘reading’ people, notices things that others wouldn’t and so that makes her an ideal detective although it has to be said, she also misses things.

An author dies at a conference in the hotel just as he is about to reveal a big secret and it turns out that he was poisoned. And just as in the first book, maids are often thought to be guilty. This time it is Lily, Molly’s Maid-in-Training, that is under observation.

The book shifts between now and then to explore Molly’s childhood and how it relates to the current crime. The chapters where this happens are prefaced with the word ‘Before’ making it quite clear and I suppose this was a device used now that the voice of Gran who Molly relied on so heavily to read the world has gone.

This book isn’t as good as The Maid although still enjoyable. It’s not easy to write that second book.