Smoke and Mirrors- Book #2 Magic Men series - Elly Griffiths - Awesome Read !

The Stephens & Mephisto Mystery series is just great- of course in my own odd way I read book 2 first, but I also downloaded book one as back up. DI Stephens is a likeable competent character not terribly unlike Ruth Galloway (smart and a non conformist). The back story of their WWII record that brought this dissimilar group together is good to read. Book #1 helps there, but they do bring up explanatory vignettes as you go along.

The Christmas season in Brighton brings a very sad murder of two young teens, and Max Mephisto and DI Edgar Stephens( wartime friends) are again together to solve the case. Police Officer Emma Holmes is a terrific character in this one too, she and Bob who are DI Edgar's sergeants play prominent roles in this, for reasons of contrast. The characters are so well done and Ruby is now playing a prominent role;I need to finish book #1 to understand how that transpired.

Christmas comes to Brighton, the police department and the pantomime theater crowd are provided with a happy end to another missing child story.Edgar's sister Lucy and his nephews will feature in his Christmas celebrations, and Max has a glimmer in his eye also.

A second fine series for wonderful and talented author Elly Griffiths.