England Expects by Sara Sheridan was published in 2014 and it’s the third in the author’s Mirabelle Bevan series. The setting is mainly Brighton during a summer heatwave in 1953.

Joey Gillingham has just arrived in Brighton on an early train from London, he’s a sports journalist and is in the town to report on a series of boxing matches, but he’s also keen on horse-racing. The people who inhabit those sporting worlds can be ruthless, and it seems that Joey has upset someone as he is murdered in the prologue!

Obviously Mirabelle is interested in the case when she reads of it in the local newspaper, and she and her side-kick Vesta become involved in a very dangerous investigation. I can’t really say they are aided by Superintendent McGregor, because the boot is really on the other foot, and although I found the plot which involves Freemasons to be rather unlikely I did enjoy being in the company of Mirabelle, Vesta and their friends.

In general Sara Sheridan does a fairly good job of capturing the atmosphere of the early 1950s, however she doesn’t always get it right. At one point Mirabelle and Vesta have to travel by train to Cambridge, changing trains at King’s Cross London where they buy bottled beer from a packed station bar. During the journey they sip the beer!

No, that just would never have happened in 1950s England. Women would never have drunk beer in public and the only thing acceptable would have been cups of tea from a tea trolley. Despite that glaring incongruity I still really liked this book. I think I’m enjoying this series because I like being in the company of the characters – as much as anything else.