Mystery at the Villa Bianca by Mabel Esther Allan

Mystery at the Villa Bianca by Mabel Esther Allan

writing as Priscilla Hagon

published 1969

 

 

This is a Young Adult (YA) book before they were invented – aimed at mid-teens, and containing crime and jeopardy but not too shocking.

M.E. Allan was a prolific author, and the much-loved Greyladies Press (“Well-Mannered Books by Ladies Long Gone”) has been helping to revive her books: I have also featured Death Goes Dancing on the blog.

This one was apparently never published in the UK, only in the USA, until Greyladies picked it up recently.

It is short and readable, and intrigued me because it featured a Swiss Finishing School. Our heroine Frances has gone there to work as an Assistant Secretary, though not much older than the pupils, and gets caught up in danger and difficulties. One of the girls died on a school trip, and there are secrets.

Nothing is going to surprise you in this book: Frances meets a nice young man, bravely keeps an eye on suspects, and (I don’t feel this is a spoiler) is lured away by a fake message that wouldn’t fool a 10yo child. There is an exciting climax on a mountain pass.

It is all reminiscent of The Chalet School books, much featured here though, honestly, not as action-packed – where’s the TB and multiple other illnesses? Joey and the triplets, coffee and kuchen? Frances does nearly fall into a precipice, but that would be a very minor incident in a Chalet School book.

Still, it is a short enjoyable read, with a lot of background colour and descriptions of the surrounding area – Frances has to take the girls out on trips the whole time, sometimes into Italy, so plenty of opportunities. And Interlaken and the Jungfrau felt like old friends - I  have visited  neither, but almost believe I have, because they featured in the Chalet School books so much.

The Finishing School sounds dire: one of the mothers says ‘old-fashioned by some standards, but then, well-to-do foreign families like a tight rein kept on their girls.’

Interestingly, Frances, though very conventional in many ways, doesn’t have much time for all the strict rules and nonsense. She thinks the school needs to change to keep up with the times. The girls don’t seem to learn much, but then Allan doesn’t have the fascination with timetables that the Chalet School books had, so we are not really up with their educational accomplishments. I am a little disappointed that a book set in such a school does not feature at least one lesson in flower-arranging.

Another lost opportunity is that Allan tells you that the women are dressed in gay dresses, summer dresses, green and yellow dresses, and - frequently – ‘her prettiest dress’, but no further description given. Except for this one moment:

There was someone in the doorway….in a full-skirted full-length royal blue robe. It shrieked Paris…she certainly didn’t dress like that on her salary.

It’s possible that I read this one so you don’t have to, but on the other hand it made for a fun, light-hearted couple of hours, and a glimpse of times past, and places of interest.

Luckily I had to hand the top picture, which so much has the look of the feisty young heroine in this kind of romantic-thriller-set-in-foreign-places. I used it before here, and am keeping it in mind for, perhaps, a Mary Stewart adventure of the era.