On 1st of December, renowned puzzle setter, loner, and Christmas curmudgeon Edie O'Sullivan finds a hand-delivered present on her doorstep. Unwrapping it, she finds a jigsaw box and, inside, six jigsaw pieces. When fitted together, the pieces show part of a crime scene – blood-spattered black and white tiles and part of an outlined body. Included in the parcel is a message: 'Four, maybe more, people will be dead by midnight on Christmas Eve, unless you can put all the pieces together and stop me.' It's signed, Rest In Pieces.
Edie contacts her nephew, DI Sean Brand-O'Sullivan, and together they work to solve the clues. But when a man is found near death with a jigsaw piece in his hand, Sean fears that Edie might be in danger and shuts her out of the investigation. As the body count rises, however, Edie knows that only she has the knowledge to put together the killer's murderous puzzle.
Only by fitting all the pieces together will Edie be able to stop a killer – and finally lay her past to rest.
Alexandra Benedict has two previous Christmas murder mysteries, but they are all stand-alones. That said, she does mention the Murder on the Christmas Express, so the novels are in the same time-line.
I liked Edie. I completely understood her anger and sadness at Christmas. I also can understand why the only person she allows near is her nephew/son Sean. However, I would have thought that the police would have kept Edie close, in light of the jigsaw puzzle pieces being sent to her, and in order to remove her as a suspect.
The mystery was interesting as well. Since it tied so well with Edie and Sean, some of the motive made sense. I also did not figure out the solution, and thus found it well thought out.
As with her precious novels, Benedict includes games that the reader could search for throughout the novel. As I have mentioned before, I do not participate during the first reading, but I might re-read in the future and try them.
Overall, I rate this novel 5 out of 5 stars.
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