England » How Mysterious!

M.C. Beaton, As the Pig Turns

Jan 302012

It always surprises me when people say they don’t like Agatha Raisin.

Agatha is M.C. Beaton’s former PR agent who retired to Carsely, in the English Cotswolds, but then her success as an amateur sleuth led her to open her own private detection agency. She’s abrasive, makes the same mistakes in her personal life time and again, and she drives both other characters and her readers nuts.

And, yet, she’s successfully run two different businesses. In As the Pig Turns, Agatha is navigating her agency and its assorted employees through the economic recession — lots of lost pets and divorce cases, nothing very interesting, but they pay the bills.

Poor Agatha has not one but two run-ins with the law, a local officer who tickets her for taking her hands off the wheel when she’s stopped in traffic and again for going 32 miles per hour. Everyone in the village hears her say she’d like to kill the man: “May he roast slowly over a spit in hell.” Of course, the man’s body turns up on the spit at a nearby village’s pig roast, with a pig’s head stitched on. Oh, Agatha. Her bad luck only turns worse when it turns out the dead police officer was connected to some unknown but violent criminal gang.

Series fans will also appreciate the return of Simon Black, some gumption from Mrs. Bloxby, Agatha’s clever use of a bedpan, and Agatha’s interest in her new gardener. In other words, endearing things that Agatha’s detractors would probably point out as flaws.

Perhaps Alice, a new officer on the local police force, provides Agatha’s best defense:

I’ve heard a lot about Mrs. Raisin…. She has had a lot of successes in the past. Everyone says she just blunders into things and gets lucky, but I think she must be clever.

The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries

Uncategorized No Responses »

Jan 272012

I’m always on the lookout for good mysteries on film, so I decided to try my library’s copy of “The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries,” even though it was on VHS. Luckily I still have a VCR that works!

Diana Rigg stars as Mrs. Adela Bradley, a 1920s divorcee whose risque humor and amazing hats do not detract from her ability as a psychoanalyst and sleuth. She’s accompanied by her chauffeur, George, who seems to get into the most awkward situations much to the delight of Adela — and us (in the first one, he poses nude for an all-female art class in order to give Adela more time to search a room). The series is based on a book series by Gladys Mitchell; I’d never read them or even heard of them, so I really can’t compare except to say that one of my Twitter friends believes the TV Adela is too wealthy and glamorous. Not surprising for television!

I watched “Death at the Opera,” which takes place at the finishing school Mrs. Bradley once attended, and “The Rising of the Moon,” in which a traveling circus comes to a small town, bringing murder with it. In both of these episodes, Mrs. Bradley was an outsider who comes into a closed community and manages to solve the mystery by observing people, sneaking around where she shouldn’t be, and getting witnesses to tell her more than they really want to say.

I liked but didn’t love the series, and according to Wikipedia there are only a couple of other episodes, so I probably won’t bother to track them down. However, if you like Diana Rigg, ’20s fashion or BBC mysteries, give it a try. Preferably not on VHS.

Stephanie Barron, Jane and the Canterbury Tale

Uncategorized 4 Responses »

Jan 252012

A few years ago I stumbled onto Stephanie Barron’s Jane Austen mystery series. The first one, Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor, absolutely delighted me. I loved the way that it was set up: Jane’s long-lost journal, complete with annotations from the editor, explaining both Jane’s personal situation and elements of the culture of her time and place — early 19th century England. I got so hooked that I read the whole series, 8 books, up to Jane and the Barque of Frailty.

Oddly enough, I am not a Janeite — one of those fans who’ve read every book and watched every movie or TV miniseries, who can quote lines and remember which characters are from which book. So if you are a Janeite, I can’t really tell you how faithful the series is to history or to the canon. But, if you aren’t a Janeite, I can say that you shouldn’t let that stop you from trying one of these books.

Anyway, reading them all so close together was a mistake. I got kind of bored with the series and thought it had lost a little of its charm. After a time Barron stopped using the “lost journal” device, and though footnotes still appeared they weren’t attributed to anybody, and they lost their literary-insider appeal; and then an important character died. When the next book in the series appeared, Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron, that was just too much for me, so I took that as a sign to stop reading the series, and I skipped it.

When I noticed Jane and the Canterbury Tale (2011) in the new books section of my local library, I decided to give Jane another chance. In this book, Jane is visiting her brother’s family in Kent. They all attend a neighbor’s wedding, a festive occasion until the next morning, when a hunting party locates the dead body of the bride’s first husband (thought to be dead already) — making her a bigamist. Oops.

Jane’s brother, Edward, is the magistrate, and he counts on her to help him investigate. Though, pushing 40, she’s now the spinster aunt, she’s sharp witted and nosy enough to ask questions that are indelicate, if not down right rude. She examines dead bodies, questions young dandies, pries among the servants and refuses to allow manners to deter her.

And let’s not forget that this is all potential fodder for her next book… the one with Emma. But I forget what that one’s called. Heehee!

The Oxford Murders (DVD)

Uncategorized 2 Responses »

Jan 132012

It’s Friday the 13th, and though I don’t watch horror films, even those based on today’s date, I can recommend a good murder mystery for you to watch.

Guillermo Martinez’s book The Oxford Murders doesn’t seem like a likely candidate for movie making. It’s the story of a serial killer who leaves behind a series of mathematical symbols and the Oxford professor and grad student who try to stop him. Let’s face it: philosophy and mathematics aren’t exactly visual, or dramatic. But as soon as I realized it had been made into a film, I put my hands on a copy and watched it as soon as I could.

And it works pretty well. The lead roles in “The Oxford Murders” (2008) are played by John Hurt as Arthur Seldom (definitely well cast) and Elijah Wood as Martin — I was sorry that the filmmakers changed Martin from an Argentine to an American graduate student, but Wood was believable in the role.

The movie lacks the charm of the book’s South American storytelling style (the director is Spaniard Alex de la Iglesia — who holds a degree in philosophy from a Spanish university), but it’s a pretty good mystery and another chance for mystery lovers to look at the always lovely Oxford.

S.J. Watson, Before I Go to Sleep

Uncategorized 4 Responses »

Jan 092012

Last summer when “everyone” was talking about S.J. Watson’s Before I Go to Sleep, I checked it out from the library but returned it unread, because I somehow never got around to it. Then, when “everyone” listed it on their favorites for 2011 lists, I decided to give it another go.

Good call.

I read the whole book in one day, leaving my daughter to fend for herself (luckily all those new Christmas toys came into play, pun intended) while I devoured page after page. It really is as good as “everyone” says.

If you haven’t heard about Before I Go to Sleep yet, it’s S.J. Watson’s debut thriller about a woman with an unusual form of amnesia. Christine suffered a terrible accident, and for years now she has woken up each day thinking she’s a child or young woman, only to realize that she’s in her 40s, married to a man she can’t remember, and that all of the intervening years are lost. Her husband, Ben, keeps her at home with him, and patiently explains each morning who she is, who he is, what happened to her, and how she should manage her day.

But Dr. Ed Nash changes all of that. He helps Christine start a journal so that she can record what she learns all day, reread it the next day and build upon her knowledge instead of starting over every morning. He prods her memory with pictures and visits to places she had once known, and reminds her to write down what she remembers so that she can access it the next day. And he calls her every morning to tell her that she keeps a journal in her closet so she can read it to remember who she is. Gradually, she begins to remember more and retain it longer, and this leads her to see that her long-suffering husband Ben may not be all that he appears to be. In fact, he’s lying to her. Soon she’s also wondering if she can trust Dr. Nash, or even herself.

The story is set in England, but honestly it could take place anywhere. Because Christine’s disability leaves her at home all day, it’s mostly about relationships with family and friends. All of the clues are inside Christine’s head, trapped in her memories, which are still there but which she can’t seem to access. The mysteries of what happened to her in the past and what’s happening to her now unwind in her journal, which we get to read as she writes it.

I think what held me back from reading Before I Go to Sleep in the first place was the “Cause and Effect” episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation (yeah, I’m that geeky), in which the Enterprise gets caught in a time loop and you have to watch the same day repeat almost exactly, oh, three or four times before the crew figures out what’s happening. It gets old. Watson avoids this problem, however, through the journal, which Christine can read rather than making us sit through the same explanations over and over again. So if boring repetition is your concern about this book, don’t give that a second thought (heh).

I thought I had this one figured out, but the ending was not what I expected. Given that Christine hardly ever goes anywhere or does anything, you know there must be something special about this book to make it so un-put-downable. Sum total: Good mystery, compelling character and situation, good writing. My advice is that you shouldn’t start this during a work week or you’ll never get anything done!

Susan Hill, The Betrayal of Trust

Uncategorized 2 Responses »

Jan 032012

I can highly recommend Susan Hill’s The Betrayal of Trust to fans of the Simon Serrailler series or to anyone who likes crime fiction that goes beyond being “just” a mystery.

This is the sixth book in the series, and I skipped over the fifth (but will review it eventually). The good thing about that is that I can assure you that the book stands alone, while also assuring you that the series reads better if you read it in order.

The Betrayal of Trust (2012) begins with the discovery of a young woman’s bones, uncovered when Lafferton is flooded; the skeleton soon proves to be that of Harriet Lowther — the tennis playing, musically talented, self-possessed teenage daughter of a pharmaceuticals magnate and his wife, who never stopped hoping to find their missing daughter. Chief Superintendent Serrailler is faced with solving a case now 16 years old, older in fact, than Harriet ever lived.

In the meantime, several other plot lines explore the right for the sick and elderly to take their own lives. Jocelyn, a patient of Cat Deerbon, is diagnosed with a dreadful disease and wants her daughter to accompany her to a suicide clinic in Switzerland; Lenny tries to find a suitable home for her longtime partner Olive, who seems to be either sedated or angrily lashing out and physically attacking her carers; Cat and Judith, Simon’s new stepmother, learn the truth about something their mother did; Simon’s new love interest is caught up in her husband’s terminal illness; and Lafferton’s medical community tries to figure out how to save the hospice that serves the community’s terminally ill. You know that somehow all of these storylines will converge, but they add another dimension to the story which would otherwise be a basic cold case investigation.

Simon’s new love, Rachel Wyatt, is a bit of a surprise, and is the part you’d least appreciate if you read this as a standalone. In the past, Serrailler has been a loner who likes women but loves only his sister and his mother. In The Betrayal of Trust, Simon falls in love at first sight and will do just about anything to see Rachel, who’s fallen for him, too — something completely new for the man was previously best characterized by his cold indifference to Diana and interest in only women he can’t have. And then there’s the suggestion that another bad guy has moved to the cathedral town….

Can’t wait for #7.

Heads You Lose

Uncategorized 2 Responses »

Dec 302011

I did it! I finished the Vintage Mystery Challenge. But I was disappointed in my last choice, Christianna Brand’s Heads You Lose (1941).

I picked it because I was so enamored by the movie “Green For Danger,” based on Brand’s book (read Margot Kinberg’s analysis) and featuring the same detective, Inspector Cockrill. In Heads You Lose, the mystery involves the murder of Miss Grace Moreland, a somewhat bothersome unmarried woman who wants to spend more time at Pigeonsford, home of the handsome and kindly local squire, Stephen Pendock. One one such visit, she’s heard to say, “I wouldn’t be seen dead in a ditch in a hat like that”; and then she’s found dead in a ditch wearing young Francesa Hart’s new hat. Only six people heard that statement, and one of them must’ve been the killer. Or could there have been a seventh person? Cockrill heads up the case.

In the movie, Cockrill was played as a bit of a buffoon, although competent enough as an investigator; in this book, he’s described as “having a heart of gold beneath his irascible exterior; but there were those who said bitterly that the heart was so infinitesimal and you had to dig so deep down to get to it, that it was hardly worth the trouble.” Yet he’s not really as bad as all that. Indeed, he was colorless, nothing like the character in the movie.

That’s not to say that there aren’t touches of humor here, just that they involve other characters. The maid, Gladys, for example. Like Miss Moreland, she has a bit of a crush on Pendock, and at several points we get to read her inner thoughts. After mentioning that she’d taken a cup of milk to an elderly woman, for instance: “‘The girl’s sweet smile and kindly thought quite won the heart of the proud, rich man,’ thought Gladys, showing all her teeth for the benefit of Pendock.” And later, when the investigation has gotten old: “‘Innercent Girl Questioned by Brutal Police,’ thought Gladys drearily.” Ha!

So I enjoyed reading this book, right up until the end. I don’t want to give it all away, so I hope this isn’t too cryptic. Basically, the reader is privy to a certain character’s thoughts, and we are later supposed to believe that that character was unaware that s/he was the killer. And then the other characters speculate on exactly what was running through that person’s mind, which would seem to say they understood the person fairly well, yet no one suspected that s/he could be the killer.

Margot’s spotlight post suggests that Green For Danger was Christianna Brand’s best book, so maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised that this one simply wasn’t as good. Would that ending make you mad, too?

Book #4 in the Vintage Mystery Challenge

The Red House Mystery

Uncategorized 7 Responses »

Dec 212011

I have always loved Winnie the Pooh, so much so that I decorated my daughter’s nursery in Pooh Bear. I think I’ve read all of the books and seen the TV shows and recently even took her to the new Winnie the Pooh movie.

But I had no idea that A. A. Milne had also written a mystery novel.

In the dedication of The Red House Mystery (1922), to his father, Milne writes,

Like all really nice people, you have a weakness for detective stories, and feel there are not enough of them. So, after all that you have done for me, the least that I can do is write you one.

Not surprisingly, then, the story is told with great affection for the genre, and it’s much more intellectual challenge than suspense or gore. The book is set at the English country home of Mark Ablett, whose house guests have all gone to play golf while he meets with his troublesome brother Robert, who’s been in Australia for the last 15 years.

By chance, Antony Gillingham comes up the drive, just after Robert has been shot dead and Mark gone missing. He’d come to visit his friend Bill Beverley, one of the golf-playing guests, and ended up being a witness to the discovery of Robert’s body. Because he has to stay for the inquest, he decides to play Holmes to Bill’s Watson, and investigate the murder. They quickly realize that Ablett’s cousin, Matthew Cayley, knows more about what happened than he’s telling the police.

It’s a light story, particularly in the humorous exchanges between Gillingham and Beverley, yet the locked room story is complicated and the solution relies as much on deduction as investigation. Given the choice, I would still rather read about Pooh, but this is a notable contribution to classic crime fiction.

Book #2 in the Vintage Mystery Reading Challenge

The Spy Who Came In from the Cold

Uncategorized 3 Responses »

Dec 152011

Apparently everyone knows how great John Le Carré is at writing spy novels. My husband owns an old copy of The Spy Who Came In from the Cold, for example, and I keep reading updates about “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy,” the new movie based on Le Carré’s novel of the same name. So, it was an easy pick to complete the Edgar Awards Reading Challenge this year.

I guess I expected Le Carré’s book to be similar to a Ludlum thriller, starting off with a bang and never stopping again (sometimes, not even when the book ends because there will be a sequel). But The Spy Who Came In from the Cold was different. It begins with British spy Alec Leamus waiting for an East German informant to cross the border in Berlin, but that man is shot, thus effectively ending Leamus’ career in Germany — he has no decent spies left to run there.

Leamus then returns to England where’s he put out to pasture. There are suggestions that this is all a cover, but nonetheless there are long passages about how far his life has spiraled out of control as he takes up work at a library, has a strange and complicated relationship with a woman he works with, drinks too much, and ends up in prison. Finally, after 75 pages, Leamus is recruited by a Russian and leaves England to tell everything he knows about British operations to the Eastern bloc.

Le Carré depicts the life of a spy as lonely, empty, and bordering on meaningless — Leamus can’t even explain the philosophy Brits live by, denying that it’s Christian and suggesting perhaps it’s simply anti-communist. He has no friends or loved ones, no hobbies or interests, doesn’t even really like food. But he does begin to care for Liz, his fellow librarian, and that’s where his operation falls apart.

I don’t want to reveal the story, although it’s probably well known by now, so suffice it to say that Leamus, and the other intelligence officers — both British and East German — never know who they can trust, what operation is being carried out, or who the good guys are. It makes for fun reading, but a pretty wretched life.

Book #2 in the Edgar Awards Reading Challenge

Mysterious Nonfiction: Thunderstruck

Uncategorized No Responses »

Dec 132011

My last book for the Audio Book Challenge is Erik Larson’s Thunderstruck, which tells the story of the development of wireless telegraphy intertwined with the true story of the disappearance of an American actress living in London, Belle Elmore.

Elmore was a vaudeville stage performer, not very talented, who with her husband the quack medicine purveyor moved to England to pursue a career. Although to all outward appearances Belle Elmore and Hawley Crippen had an ideal marriage, in truth they were both miserable and her husband soon took up with his secretary; lovers of crime fiction won’t struggle to guess what happens next. But Belle’s disappearance wasn’t the end of the story: instead, Larson describes how the new transatlantic telegraph figured into the chase — not only leading to the capture of a criminal but also cementing public faith in wireless as a viable means of communication. Narrator Bob Balaban does a nice job bringing life to what is sometimes dry scientific information.

In fact, I was a bit hesitant about this book because I really couldn’t see myself getting fired up reading about the thrill of radio waves, and Guglielmo Marconi figures as prominently — or more — in the story as Dr. Crippen. However, I read The Devil in the White City some years ago, so I knew that Larson weaves a good narrative and would be more concerned with the social and cultural effects of science than the nuts and bolts. Actually, it’s almost odd how little I learned about wireless after listening to however many hours about it — so don’t let a lack of interest in the history of science stop you from listening to Thunderstruck.

Book #12 in the Audio Book Challenge

Older Entries Newer Entries