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Mystery In Jacqueline Winspear's Maisie Dobbs

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In the book Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear, female detective Maisie Dobbs is faced with mystery after mystery when she goes undercover to help a client. In the process of helping this client, the answer to the mystery leads to another mystery, which Maisie is determined to find the answer to. Along the way, the book reveals concepts such as PTSD and gender and has many references to World War One

This book is split up into three different sections: Spring 1929, Spring 1910-Spring 1917, and Summer 1929. The first section opens with Maisie Dobbs setting up her detective company with her partner Billy Beale and then goes into the story of her first client and the initial issue involved with it. Her first client is a man named Christopher …show more content…

The first moment of PTSD is when she describes to Celia Davenham her experience as a nurse. Maisie says in a quiet voice that “I was a nurse . . . in France. When I returned from France I nursed again in a secure mental hospital. I understood the wounds . . . Those of the body - and of the soul.” (Winspear 38). The way that Maisie said this - the quiet voice combined with this extreme detail - hints to the fact that she is not able to forget this and is still not completely comfortable talking about it. This could be a sign of anxiety, as she is worried that if she is heard and people start asking her about it, that she will become extremely …show more content…

Maisie is faced with two mysteries that she is able to solve, and along with that, others, including herself, struggle with issues from the past. Along with this, the book also incorporates the element of gender and how people do not necessarily fit the gender “standards” for their biological sex. Overall, Maisie Dobbs is a book that can be related back to the content of “CAP 226: What is Power?” because of the involvement of the characters in World War One, the PTSD that comes about from the war, and the idea of people not seeming like the gender that they should be according to their biological

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