Death in Berlin by M M Kaye is one of six unconnected mystery novels written as Kaye travelled and lived in the fading British empire. If you can accept the social attitudes of a text for the time it was written, then these books have charm. They are Sunday afternoon movie stories.

In Death in Berlin Miranda Brand is spending a month’s holiday with her closest family, an older cousin and his wife, in their new army posting at Berlin. For her, it has the disconcerting effect of recalling the forgotten time as a very young child lost in the dislocation and violence of the early years of WWII.

There are diamonds and treachery and a cold sense of the post war years. A nice contrast to the touch of romance and happy ending.