Mysteries in Eleusis

by Margaret Doody

Reviewed by Coral

A string of burglaries has struck Athens, one of them resulting in the death of a well-to-do Athenian’s brother-in-law. The case seems to be easily solved, though most people don’t believe the accused to be a murderer.

But this all takes a back seat as Stephanos’ wedding finally approaches. But bad luck seems to be all Stephanos has lately. He is embroiled in multiple lawsuits for broken engagements and stolen land. Not only that, but it seems like someone is actually making attempts on his life?

Can Aristotle and Stephanos get to the bottom of this before Stephanos loses everything?

For a mystery book, the actual case wasn’t really the focus for the majority of the book. The burglary case was upfront early on, but faded out pretty quickly. There would be long stretches of the book following Stephanos’ daily life until some misfortune would happen or another lawsuit would be brought against him, but it still wasn’t a main focus. This was a problem for me, because I have never really liked Stephanos enough to want to read a book where his life is the main plot. If the main plot had been him and Aristotle solving these mysteries, with very little time spent with the domestic day-to-day activities of Stephanos’ life, I might have enjoyed it more.

The ending felt pretty rushed too, with everything being revealed in a “it’s so convenient everyone is here and this is what happened” scene.

I did enjoy seeing how the political intrigue that was happening in Alexander’s army was affecting Aristotle. It makes me wish that Aristotle had been the main character of the series and not Stephanos.

Grade: C