A Woolf mystery. . .

The White Garden: A Novel of Virginia Woolf by Stephanie Barron has been my bus reading for the last few days. I haven't read any of her Jane Austen mysteries, but was willing to give this a go, especially since I've been to Sissinghurst and seen the famous White Garden - and would love to return.

It was a pleasant enough read. Jo Bellamy is a garden designer who is commissoned to replicate the White Garden for a wealthy client - who also has romantic designs on her. She is intrigued by the history of Sissinghurst when she discovers that her grandfather Jock - who recently committed suicide - worked briefly as a gardener for the Nicholsons during the Second World War. When she visits the estate, Jo discovers - and borrows - half a notebook with Jock's name on it, but not his handwriting, found amongst the garden archives in a toolshed. The notebook is in the form of a diary, and she suspects it could be written by Virginia Woolf. Thus begins a madcap quest through Sotheby's, Oxford, Cambridge and Rodmell, to discover how and why, especially since the first entry takes place the day after Woolf walked into the River Ouse. Barron uses the three weeks between when Virginia left her farewell notes for Leonard and Vanessa, and when her body was found, to posit an entirely different set of events. Could Virginia, for example, have been murdered instead?

The mystery - which involves espionage, the Apostles and the Cambridge spies - is what kept me reading, despite some rather silly characters and romantic subplots, and too many British versus American cliches. I think any librarian, archivist or academic will also be groaning to see how easily Barron's characters can bring coffee into famous libraries, talk their way into historic homes out of hours, or be left alone long enough with important documents to easily steal them. Still, as far as commercial fiction goes, this was entertaining enough.