Harriet Klausner's Review Archive
If Lovejoy had to choose between an antique and a beautiful caring woman, he would choose the former, as he loves to collect old-fashion items. Legalities or a cash shortfall fail to stop Lovejoy from the pleasure of obtaining an antique.
Dosh Callaghan hires Lovejoy to find out who substituted a shipment of padpas (precious gems) for tsavorite (a semi-precious but worthless stone). Lovejoy travels to London where he goes to visit his cronies Colette and Arthur Goldhorn, owners of a King's Road antique store. However, he learns that Arthur died and Dieter Gluck owns the store and the Goldhorn ancestral home.
Colette lives on the streets as a bag lady working for her former lover Gluck. Lovejoy decides to right the wrong perpetrated by Gluck. He assembles a squad of eccentric characters to help him with his crazy scheme to sting a con artist. However, a joker appears when Lovejoy meets Colette's son Mortimer who bears a resemblance to Lovejoy and has the same gift of knowing a fake from a genuine article.
The twenty-first Lovejoy mystery remains as droll, witty, and entertaining as the previous score of novels. Although the street slang spoken by some of the characters initially distracts from the story line, the audience quickly adjusts and feels they are wandering along the back streets of London. The hero knows his antiques and educates the reader even if it is from the wrong side of the law. Lovejoy remains a likable chap who still schemes and plots in a Sergeant Bilko (TV show not the movie) sort of amiable way.