From Cradle to Grave

Royal Spyness, Book 19

By: Rhys Bowen

Narrated by: Gemma Dawson

Lady Georgiana “Georgie” Rannoch is just like any other new mother, balancing responsibilities of being 34th in line for the British throne and solving the shocking deaths of several young men, in this new Royal Spyness novel from the queen of historical mystery, Rhys Bowen.

Georgie may be figuring out what it means to be a new mother but she does know one thing for sure: she absolutely despises the strict nanny who was foisted upon her by her meddlesome sister-in-law. In search of a new nanny, Georgie travels to London to see her old friend ZouZou only to find her about to depart for a funeral, after the unexpected death of a young man in her social circle. It quickly becomes clear there’s more than one mysterious death around town, when another friend reveals he’s also just returned from the funeral of a school friend, who seemingly died in a boating accident. But when word arrives that the son of family friend has also died tragically and unexpectedly, Georgie is certain it can’t be a coincidence. Yet the victims don’t seem to have any connection to one another.

ZouZou shares Georgie’s suspicions that the deaths were not an accident and begs Georgie to solve the case. As Georgie delves deeper, she can’t help worrying that her own husband, Darcy, may be next. It seems likely there is a serial killer at work and Darcy fits the bill to be their next victim. Will Georgie solve the murders before it’s too late for Darcy, and manage to find the perfect nanny all at the same time?

©2025 Janet Quin-Harkin (P)2025 Audible, Inc.

Continued silly fun story but disappointing performance

These books are my guilty pleasure but the new narrator, while good in many ways, did terrible with accents- slipping in and out and seemingly mixing up characters.

Ugh! The narrator…

Oh man. I love this series so much and I could hardly listen to this recent one. Did she even listen to the previous books? She really could have come closer with so many of the character. Or maybe she can’t…? I’m so sad.

Was this book ghost-written?

As background: I'm a big fan of this series; I subscribe to the author's e-mail list. I have bought all the audiobooks, including the prequel, and have listened to them multiple times with great pleasure. Each story has had a good story arc, keeping the reader's attention, and relieving the gruesomeness of murders with humor, including ongoing foibles of some characters like Georgie's mother.

This book is different. The first two-thirds really is a novel about the difficulties of finding domestic help--especially nannies. If you're an affluent young parent with small children, frustrated with an au pair or nanny, this book's for you. If you aren't, you may (as I did) find most of the book intensely boring. While the mystery does come up in dibs and dabs during this part of the book, the story doesn't focus on it until the last third.

The mystery itself is unconvincing. No spoilers here, so I can't say more.

The characters also are subtly different. The most-changed is Zou Zou. I previous books, she's distinctly European rather than English; very sophisticated and continental, urbane, sly, understated and very sexy. Here, she comes across as a typical upper-class horsey Englishwoman, even using British slang like a native. This brings up the subject of the narrator; as others have noted, she reads this book badly, and her portrayal of Zou Zou is the worst. The late Katherine Kellgren and her successor Jasmine Blackborow, both gave Zou Zou a deep, warm, throaty voice, in keeping with her seductive nature, and with--of course--a Polish accent, since she's a Polish princess. Gemma Dawson gives her a Mayfair British accent and a brisk, bracing voice that wouldn't be especially alluring to anyone looking for a date.

But other characters suffer too. The narrator really muffs Belinda; she's lost that coy, little-girl sing-song she always spoke with before, and her personality seems considerably changed, much more mundane, so that now she's teaching a maid to make tea. Darcy has lost his mischievous charm. Georgie's grandfather uses the verb "bugger" when talking with Georgie, something surely he would not have done.

Those are just examples to give a sense why listening to this book made me wonder who actually wrote it, and left me feeling I had been plunged into an "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" experience where alien beings have taken over the identities of familiar characters. This is not character development but a form of alienation.

Please, put them back the way they were!

Another Lovely Georgie story

Not the greatest mystery but once it started it took off and end was good. Like the growth of characters and finally Fig got her comeuppance. Hooray for Georgie.
Now all we need is a decent narrator grandfather . Suzu sounds
Like an elderly British matron. No sparkle at all for the wild and wonderful Belinda. Her accents are either terrible or completely wrong.?
Nice to have grandfather back, needs to get out of London.

I don’t like the narrator

I wasn’t able to finish the book because the narration was so distracting, Not enjoyable at all. Very disappointing since I have all the other books in this collection and just can’t get through this one.