A Most Agreeable Murder is a quick but episodic parody of Austenian/Regency tropes. It combines a number of different storytelling methods (such as book excerpts and newspaper clippings) to tell the tale of a group of people who gather at a house party in a remote English town. Murder, obviously, ensues. The book is a little too light to make an impression even for a parody, but it manages to at least amuse – if not be outright funny.

Beatrice Steele is So Not Like Other Regency Women. She cannot dance or sew samplers or do all the other things Women Who Are Not Like Other Regency Girls cannot do. The true-crime obsessed singleton has contented herself with living with her small family. But in her home of Swampshire – where all must be proper or else – she conceals her Not Like Other Regency Women-ness to try to nab a man who will bless the family with honor and fortune.

During a ball at the Ashbrook Esate, Edmund Croaksworth (yes, really) presents himself. Edmund is handsome, and provides Beatrice and her family a potential way to avoid losing the whole estate to Martin Grub, an evil cousin. In true Austenian style, Mrs. Steele wants one of her daughters to marry up and become Edmund’s bride. But then Edmund is murdered, right on the dance floor! Can the handsome and mysterious Vivek Drake, a disgraced detective looking for a shot at redemption, help Beatrice clear her name, accept her as she is, and prevent the Steeles from having to move to (gasp!) France?

A Most Agreeable Murder has its charms and is an occasionally very pert and knowing parody of Regency tropes. But I’m shocked that this is the historical mystery parody that has managed to spark up a studio bidding way for its movie rights, because the humor is scattershot at best. It’s incredibly ordinary, and there are tons of groan worthy jokes at its center. As if the names above didn’t inform you, we’re very much in sub-Seltzer and Friedberg territory, and this is the kind of stuff that needs the guiding hand of a Mel Brooks-type to bring it to its full potential. Swampshire is literally a swamp. Etcetera. It cannot and does not let up off the goofiness button.

I didn’t particularly take to Beatrice but I did like Drake. The romance does tweak a lot of Regency conventions, but it also has enough of a realistic grounding to make readers actually care about the central relationship and – well, a few of its characters. That and the twisty, surprisingly and genuinely complex mystery are why the book lands in the C range for me. Beatrice’s fairly funny family pulled me out of the narrative’s doldrums pretty often.

I haven’t even touched on the book’s random supernatural elements, or the way…well, you’ll see. An Almost Agreeable Murder is a lot to take in, and readers should be prepared for a lot of cheese and a lot of goofiness. If you take your Regency romance seriously, you likely won’t have a good time with this one.