About the Book
A nightmare is haunting Daisy Harker.
Night after night she walks a strange cemetery in her dreams, until she comes to a grave that stops her in her tracks. It’s Daisy’s own, and according to the dates on the gravestone she’s been dead for four years.
What can this nightmare mean, and why is Daisy’s husband so insistent that she forget it? Driven to desperation, she hires a private investigator to reconstruct the day of her dream death. But as she pieces her past together, her present begins to fall apart…
Format: Paperback (320 pages) Publisher: Pushkin Vertigo
Publication date: 4th July 2019 Genre: Crime
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My Review
I was introduced to the crime novels of Margaret Millar when Pushkin Press kindly sent me copies of three new editions of her books issued by their Pushkin Vertigo imprint. I read the first two of them, The Listening Walls and Vanish in an Instant in 2019 and 2021 respectively (links from each title will take you to me review) but this one has been gathering dust – literally – on my bookshelf until now. A determination to finally read it was the motivation to put it on my list for the 20 Books of Summer 2023 reading challenge.
Like her other novels, A Stranger in my Grave is tightly-plotted and based on an intriguing premise: Daisy’s recurring dream about a gravestone with her name inscribed on it along with the date of her death. But she is very much alive. Dismissed by her husband and mother as nothing more than a strange nightmare, Daisy cannot rest until she has discovered the meaning behind the dream. A chance encounter brings her into contact with bondsman and private investigator Stevens Pinata. Grudgingly he agrees to help Daisy try to piece together the events of her ‘deathday’. It sets off a chain of events that means Daisy has to rethink everything she thought she knew and reveals some long-buried secrets.
There’s a strong theme of parentage that runs through the book. For example, Pinata is a foundling given his name by the religious institution that took him in. Whereas Daisy is unable to have children, a source of disappointment to her and her husband, Jim. Similarly, racial identity plays a part in the plot.
I really liked Pinata as a character perhaps because, alongside the reader, he’s trying to piece together the bits of the puzzle. And the occasional allusions to some things about his life make him a sympathetic figure. Unlike most of the other characters, he comes across as trustworthy although sometimes his instincts let him down and, as the author warns us, he has failed to see he’s being taken in or has missed something important.
Margaret Millar has been described as ‘a genius of plot twists’ and in the other two books I’ve read I could see the evidence for that accolade. Unfortunately, in this case, less so. Although A Stranger in My Grave is a taut, well-crafted mystery and there a number of surprises along the way I was disappointed in the motive when it was eventually divulged and although there is the final page reveal that is the author’s trademark, I had already worked it out.
I received a review copy courtesy of Pushkin Press.
In three words: Clever, assured, intriguing
About the Author
Margaret Millar (1915-1994) was the author of 27 books and a masterful pioneer of psychological mysteries and thrillers. Born in Kitchener, Ontario, she spent most of her life in Santa Barbara, California, with her husband Ken Millar, who is better known by his nom de plume of Ross Macdonald. Her 1956 novel Beast in View won the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel. In 1965 Millar was the recipient of the Los Angeles Times Woman of the Year Award and in 1983 the Mystery Writers of America awarded her the Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement. Millar’s cutting wit and superb plotting have left her an enduring legacy as one of the most important crime writers of both her own and subsequent generations. (Photo: Goodreads author page)
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