Private investigator Maisie Dobbs receives her first assignment from the British Secret Service in A Lesson in Secrets, the eighth book in Jacqueline Winspear’s award-winning mystery series. Sent to pose as a junior lecturer at a private college in Cambridge, she will monitor any activities “not in the interests of His Majesty’s government.” When the college’s pacifist founder is murdered, Maisie … Maisie finds herself in the midst of sinister web of murder, scandal, and conspiracy, activities that point towards members of the ascendant Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei—the Nazi Party—on Britain’s shores. An instant classic, and sure to captivate long-time Maisie Dobbs fans as well as readers of Agatha Christie, Elizabeth George, and Alexander McCall Smith, A Lesson in Secrets is “a powerful and complex novel, one that will linger in memory as a testament to her talent and her humanity” (Richmond Times-Dispatch).
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I have jumped in the middle of this series – this being book 8 of 13. That said, I didn’t feel as if I was missing something. The main characters are so appealing you want to read forward to find out how things play out in the over-arching story line as well as the mysteries to had.
The whole Maisie Dobbs series is great – start from the beginning (“Maisie Dobbs”) because they really do run one to the other and depend on character-building. Jacqueline Winspear gets better with every book
I enjoy English mysteries and this one “fit the bill.” Maisy Dobbs is a modern woman of the 1930s who solves crime. In this book, she’s asked by MI6 to go underground at a university as a lecturer with the purpose of digging into rum goings-on. A leisurely read.
I would hands-down recommend any of Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs books. They are my all-time favorite historical fiction detective novels. Very well researched. Terrific prose. Terrific characters and dialogue. And if you want an extra treat, listen to the audio book with all its wonderful accents.
Since I read them out of order, this is my last new-to-me Maisie Dobbs book 🙁 . . . I will listen to books 1-3, even though I have already read them. Then I will wait a year for the new Maisie book!
Great series
all the books in this series are wonderful
Love Jacqueline Winspear’s writing and cast if characters. This may be one of the best in the Maisie Dobbs series.
It will stand alone but you may want to start at the beginning if the serues
I love all the maisie Dobbs books!
Thoroughly enjoyed the story, other than the mystery it also seems to set up or predict ?Maisy’s next adventure.
I have become tired of Maisie’s posturing. She has all these tricks to help her solve any mystery. Maisie can either meditate, or she can just touch something and know what happened. Life should be so easy.
Most of the time, even though I don’t specifically like Maisie, hers books are at least interesting. This one not so much.
Maisie is …
I love this series!
This series is exceptional
I’ve enjoyed all of the Masie Dobb series. Read from the beginning, she has become an enjoyable and good friend!!!
Great characters and historical settings!
Loved it — I’m a great fan of the Maisie Dobbs series.
Winspear does it again with another excellent mystery starring heroine Maisie Dobbs. Great writing, interesting characters, complicated plots, all set against the eve of World War II. Top flight author.
This is the first book in this series I have read. I definitely will read the others.
You just can’t go wrong with Maisie Dobbs!
Not as interesting as others in this series; perhaps too much historical information, rather than historical “place” setting.