Review: THE BODY IN THE LIBRARY, Agatha Christie

• 
  Originally published 1942
• This edition read as an e-book on my Kindle (Amazon)
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0046H95MC
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ HarperCollins, Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 14, 2010
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 227 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0007422173
• Book 2 of 12 ‏ : ‎ Miss Marple Mysteries

Synopsis (Amazon)

A young woman found murdered
A scandal in the making

When Mrs Bantry wakes to find a body in her library, there’s only one woman to call: her good friend Jane Marple.

But she hasn’t called her old friend for comfort.

The body in her library has been murdered and Miss Marple is so very good at solving murders.

Her investigations uncover a scandal far darker than either of them could have imagined, and this time she may be out of her depth.

Never underestimate Miss Marple 

My Take

I've lost count of how many times I have read and reviewed this novel. I am re-reading it for discussion with my U3A Agatha Christie Reading group. 

This novel was published 12 years later than the previous Marple, MURDER AT THE VICARAGE. That novel had had a mixed reception and Christie's readers were not too sure about Miss Marple. Christie has published prolifically in that time: 30 novels and sets of short stories in that 12 years, both in the Uk and America.

The time frame of the THE BODY IN THE LIBRARY was about 3 years later. Characters who appeared in the previous novel such as Colonel Melchett and the vicar and his wife make a appearance that gives a feeling of continuity. But this time new characters and friends appear: the Bantrys who live at Gossington Hall, and Sir Henry Clitherington retired head of Scotland Yard.

The body of a young woman, strangled, has appeared overnight on the hearth rug of the library at Gossington Hall and while she is actually unknown to the Bantrys, rumours are flying thick and fast in St. Mary Mead, and, as they say, mud sticks. While Dolly Bantry, an avid reader of murder mysteries, is thrilled in a way to have a murder on her doorstep, she also realises the dangers to their status and reputation that this event threatens. 

The identity of the dead girl is quickly established and the investigation is wisely moved by Dolly Bantry away from her home when she and Jane Marple move to the hotel where the girl worked as a dancer. Another body, this time in a local quarry in a burnt out car complicates the case as does the discovery of an old man's infatuation with the dead girl. Quite a complex plot, lots of red herrings. I wonder how many of my U3A group will pick the culprit?

My rating: 4.5

Earlier reviews and here

See all my Agatha Christie book reviews here    

Review: AFTER THE FIRE, Henning Mankell

• 
   This edition read as an e-book on my Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B01MY54W9Q
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Vintage Digital, Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 5, 2017
• Marlaine Delargy (Translator) 
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 401 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1473524903
• Book 2 of 2 ‏ : ‎ Fredrik Welin 

Synopsis ((Amazon)

LONGLISTED FOR THE CWA INTERNATIONAL DAGGER 2018

The final novel from the bestselling author of the Inspector Wallander mysteries

Fredrik Welin is a seventy-year-old retired doctor. Years ago he retreated to the Swedish archipelago, where he lives alone on an island. He swims in the sea every day, cutting a hole in the ice if necessary. He lives a quiet life. Until he wakes up one night to find his house on fire.

Fredrik escapes just in time, wearing two left-footed wellies, as neighbouring islanders arrive to help douse the flames. All that remains in the morning is a stinking ruin and evidence of arson. The house that has been in his family for generations and all his worldly belongings are gone. He cannot think who would do such a thing, or why. Without a suspect, the police begin to think he started the fire himself.

My Take

Coming into this book, I am already familiar with Henning Mankell as the creator of Kurt Wallander but I am not sure that, despite having seen two television series based on those books, I have read many of them.

I am reading this book for discussion with my U3A Crime Fiction Reading Group.

I wasn't aware that this book was the second in a series, but the first was written 8 years earlier. What I have noticed is that  his most recent book was written 3 years prior to this one, and that Mankell died from cancer in 2015 and this one was published posthumously two years after his death.

While I was reading this book, prior to knowing all of the above, I was constantly wondering why Mankell had written it. It is not really crime fiction although at least one crime had been committed. Fredrik Welin's house was burnt down and he escaped death narrowly. Later it seems that there is an arsonist at work, as other houses are also burnt down, The puzzle of who the arsonist is is eventually solved.

But there are other issues too: his relationship with those around him, how he survives now his house has gone, why he stopped practicing as a doctor, his strange relationship with his daughter.

If I was answering my own question, what is on the author's mind?  I would answer that Welin is approaching 70, and he is thinking about life, death, effects of age, love and relationships, and I think Mankell is facing the same issues himself, but we now know that he was dying of cancer.

It is far from Henning Mankell's best book but it certainly make you think. Read more about him on Wikipedia. 

My rating: 4.4

I've also read

THE PYRAMID
THE MAN FROM BEIJING
5.0, THE FIFTH WOMAN
4.5, AN EVENT IN AUTUMN 

Books by Henning Mankell (Fantastic Fiction)

Series

Joel Gustafson
   1. A Bridge to the Stars (1990)
   2. Shadows in Twilight (1991)
   3. When the Snow Fell (1996)
   4. The Journey to the End of the World (1998)

 

Kurt Wallander
   0. The Pyramid (2008)
   1. Faceless Killers (1991)
   2. The Dogs of Riga (1992)
   3. The White Lioness (1993)
   4. The Man Who Smiled (1994)
   5. Sidetracked (1995)
   6. The Fifth Woman (1997)
   7. One Step Behind (1997)
   8. Firewall (1998)
   9. Before the Frost (2004)
   9.5. An Event in Autumn (2014)
   10. The Troubled Man (2011)
   Wallander's First Case (2014)

 

Sofia
   1. Secrets in the Fire (2000)
   2. Playing with Fire (2002)
   3. The Fury in the Fire (2009)
     aka Shadow of the Leopard 

 

Fredrik Welin
   1. Italian Shoes (2009)
   2. After the Fire (2017)

 

Novels

   The Rock Blaster (1973)
   The Return of the Dancing Master (2003)
   Chronicler of the Winds (2006)
   Depths (2006)
   Kennedy's Brain (2007)
   The Eye of the Leopard (2008)
   The Cat Who Liked Rain (2008)
   The Man from Beijing (2010)
   Daniel (2010)
   The Shadow Girls (2012)
     aka Tea-Bag
   A Treacherous Paradise (2013)   

Review: DICE, Claire Baylis

• 
  This edition read as an e-book on Libby supplied by my local library
  
• ISBN:9781761067242
• Publisher: Allen & Unwin, 4 July 2023
• Page Extent:384 
• WINNER OF THE NGAIO MARSH AWARD FOR BEST FIRST CRIME NOVEL
• SHORTLISTED FOR THE NED KELLY AWARD FOR BEST INTERNATIONAL CRIME FICTION 

Synopsis (publisher)

A compelling courtroom drama, Dice is an incredibly timely exploration of how sexual violence is viewed in our society.
...

Four teenage boys invent a sex game based on the toss of a dice. The police charge them with multiple sexual offences against three teenage girls.

Twelve jurors must work out what actually happened.

How does the jury find?

Dice is a stunning courtroom drama told from the perspective of a diverse group of ordinary people - the jury. How will twelve women and men of different ages, backgrounds and beliefs decide whether consent was given or crimes were committed?

In this dazzlingly accomplished and gripping debut novel, the story is told through the eyes of each juror as the trial unfolds and evidence is presented, withheld, fragmented and retold by different witnesses.

Will the verdict deliver justice or punish the innocent? Where does the truth lie?

My Take

A very confronting story, at times difficult to read both in terms of the content and in terms of the way the story is presented. Set in New Zealand. We see the "evidence" from the point of view of each of the jurors, who range widely in terms of age, cultural background and experience. Each of the boys is represented by a different defence lawyer but only two of the boys take the stand. The trial takes three weeks and then the jury considers its verdict for each of the young men on each of four charges against three girls.  

A challenging read in a number of ways. A considerable achievement for the author. 

Coincidentally I attended a talk yesterday where a former Director of Public Prosecutions raised similar issues about sexual violence and mitigation of sentences, and why most women don't report events.

My rating: 5.0

About the author

Claire Baylis was born in England and emigrated to New Zealand at sixteen. Her fiction has appeared in Landfall, Sport, Takahē, Turbine/Kapohau, anthologised in Horizons 4 and has been read on Radio New Zealand. Dice is her first novel to be published. It was written as part of a PhD in creative writing from the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington/Te Herenga Waka and was included on the Dean's List for being of the highest academic excellence. Claire studied law and then lectured in it for twelve years at Victoria University of Wellington/Te Herenga Waka before moving to Rotorua with her family. There she wrote, brought up her three children, worked as an interviewer and researcher for the Trans-Tasman Jury Study and set up a water safety programme targeting low-decile schools.

Review: NO ONE NEAR, Rhys Dylan

• 
  This edition read as an e-book on my Kindle (Amazon)
  
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wyrmwood Books, Publication date ‏ : ‎ November 28, 2023
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 318 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1915185181
• Book 10 of 18 ‏ : ‎ DCI Evan Warlow Crime Thriller  

Synopsis  (Amazon)

What do you do when there is No One Near...

High in the Welsh hills, a honeymoon getaway takes a dark turn when a rotting corpse is discovered in the rental property’s bedroom.

In a dark, cold and damp December, DCI Evan Warlow and his team head out to investigate.

They find a victim who may not be as innocent as he first seems, and a rural community harbouring the worst kind of secrets.

When a second victim is attacked and a third goes missing, Evan knows he’s up against a rogue killer with a Christmas list of his own.

And it’s a deadly one.

Can he unmask the culprit before the season's festivities turn into a bloodbath?

My Take

A NON is a rental property where in theory there is No Owner Near and so complete privacy is ensured. These getaways are remote, secluded, and ideal for a honeymoon, or, that is the idea until a dead body beats you to it. The body of the owner, no less.

A well constructed and credible plot but who is responsible for the first murder is not clear until well into the story. Christmas is approaching and that puts extra pressure on Warlow's team to get on with the investigation.

I very much enjoy the exploration of the characters of the team and their development. The humour is an added bonus. 

The plot does leave one issue unresolved, and I guess it will resurface in a later book.  

My rating: 4.5

I've also read

4.6, THE ENGINE HOUSE - #1

4.5, CAUTION: DEATH AT WORK -#2

4.6, ICE COLD MALICE - #3

4.5, SUFFER THE DEAD - #4

4.6, GRAVELY CONCERNED - #5 

4.5, A MARK OF IMPERFECTION - #6

4.5, BURNT ECHO - #7 

4.6, A BODY OF WATER - #8

4.6, THE BOWMAN - #15 

Review: FATAL SECRETS, Anita Waller

• 
   This edition an e-book on my Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0BLS4SVWB
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Boldwood Books, February 8, 2023
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 290 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1804153192
• Book 1 of 3 ‏ : ‎ The Forrester Detective Agency Mysteries 
  

Synopsis 

The thrilling first instalment in the Forrester Detective Agency Mystery series from the author of #2 bestseller The Family at No. 12

Nothing is more important than family . . .

Matt Forrester has followed in his dad’s footsteps, climbing the police ranks to become a DI. But when he receives an urgent call for help, Matt has to rethink his career. His dad has been murdered, and Matt’s not going to let this case go. It doesn’t help that his current boss is sleeping with his ex-wife.

Hermia Forrester didn’t follow her brother into the police force, instead she works in research at the university. But, she’s not going to let that stop her from helping her brother find out what happened to their dad.

But the siblings soon find themselves surrounded by more danger than they ever imagined. Can they both survive this case or will there be more of their family in the morgue?

My Take

A well plotted story, credible story, believable characters, a police procedural series I intend to follow.

My rating: 4.5

About the author

Anita Waller was born in Sheffield, South Yorkshire in 1946. She married Dave in 1967 and they have three adult children.

In 2021 Waller signed a five book deal with Boldwood Books, followed by a three book deal, and currently has eight published books with them: Flash Point, The Family at No.12, Fatal Secrets (the first in a new series set in Sheffield), The Couple Across the Street, Fatal Lies, (the second in the Forrester series) and The Girls Next Door. The final book in the Forrester series, Fatal Endings, has now been launched and this has been followed by a standalone, The Missing Ones.

Her next book will be available in August 2025, and is entitled The House of Lies. This will be followed by a Christmas novel, aiming for an October launch date.

She is now in her late-seventies, happily writing most days and would dearly love to plan a novel, but has accepted that isn’t the way of her mind. Every novel starts with a sentence and she waits to see where that sentence and her characters will take her. If writer's block intrudes, be sure there will be a death.

In her life away from the computer in the corner of her kitchen, she is a Sheffield Wednesday supporter with blue blood in her veins!

Her genre is murder - necessary murder. 

Review: THE TENANT, Frieda McFadden

• 
  This edition read as an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0DQFK5WVD
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Hollywood Upstairs Press, May 6, 2025
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 370 pages 

Synopsis (Amazon)

Blake Porter is riding high, until he's not. Fired abruptly from his job as a VP of marketing and unable to make the mortgage payments on the new brownstone that he shares with his fiancee, he's desperate to make ends meet.

Enter Whitney. Beautiful, charming, down-to-earth, and looking for a room to rent. She's exactly what Blake's looking for. Or is she?

Because something isn't quite right. The neighbors start treating Blake differently. The smell of decay permeates his home, no matter how hard he scrubs. Strange noises jar him awake in the middle of the night. And soon Blake fears someone knows his darkest secrets...

Danger lives right at home, and by the time Blake realizes it, it'll be far too late. The trap is already set. 

My Take

Taking in a tenant to offset the need for money to pay the mortgage seems a no-brainer but then things begin to go wrong and not entirely the things you might expect.

A fairly gentle easy read, a book with a little humour, but then a rather staggering twist in the last pages. My first book by this author but probably not my last.

My rating: 4.5

About the author
#1 New York Times, Amazon Charts, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Sunday Times, and Publisher's Weekly bestselling author Freida McFadden is a physician who has penned multiple bestselling psychological thrillers and medical humor novels. Freida’s work has been selected as one of Amazon Editors’ best books of the year, she is the winner of the International Thriller Writers Award for best paperback, and she is a Goodreads Choice Award winner. Her novels have been translated into 40 languages.

​ Freida lives with her family and cat in a centuries-old three-story home overlooking the ocean, with staircases that creak and moan with each step, and nobody could hear you if you scream. Unless you scream really loudly, maybe.

To hear Freida talk about herself more in the third person, check out her website freidamcfadden 

Review: I WILL FIND THE KEY, Alex Ahndoril

• 
  This title read as an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0DXY1FG5D
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Zaffre, November 7, 2024
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 252 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1804187302 

Synopsis (Amazon)

A man walks into a private investigator's office, holds up a photograph and says: 'I want you to find out if I killed this man.'

Private investigator Julia Stark receives an unannounced visit at the office. The man at the door is one of the owners of a successful family business. The day before, he was present at a board meeting and dinner at his estate in the northwestern part of Sweden. The following morning, he finds a photograph in his phone of a bloody man, tied up with a bag over his head.

Due to alcohol-related amnesia, the man has no idea where the picture comes from and wants to hire Stark Detective Agency to clear his name before the police get involved. Julia asks her ex-husband Sidney Mendelson to take time off from the City Police and assist her in the investigation. There is still a glimmer of hope left in Julia that this might be her chance to win him back.

Welcomed as guests at the opulent estate, Julia and Sidney begin to search for the truth while dining and socializing with each of the family members that could theoretically be involved in the murder.

She's solved every mystery.
But none like this . . .

My Take

Julia Stark, Swedish private investigator, apparently has a history of investigative success, but also has a case of PTSD resulting from a nasty accident.  

Per Gunter (PG) Mott comes to see her with a photo on his phone which be believes might indicate he has murdered someone during an alcoholic fugue, and that the photo is proof. He is the head of a very successful Swedish timber family. Julia and her ex-husband begin investigating Per Gunter and his very dysfunctional family.   

It is hard to see what some areas of Julia's investigation of the family has to do with the problem she is trying to solve, but we get used to the fact that in this story not everything is shared with the reader.

Eventually the mystery is resolved but it is an odd story. 

My rating: 4.4

About the author

the new pseudonym for the No.1 international bestselling author, Lars Kepler.  The novel seems to me to have been originally written in German and translated into English.

Review: CAN'T RUN, CAN'T HIDE, Yrsa Sigurdadottir

• 
  This edition an e-book on Kindle (Amazon)
  
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CTFDWB1R
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Hodder & Stoughton, November 7, 2024
•  Print length ‏ : ‎ 429 pages
•  ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1399722858
•  Part of series ‏ : ‎ The Black Ice - #1
• Translated by Victoria Cribb 

Synopsis (Amazon)

On a cold winter evening in a secluded fjord in Iceland, a neighbour visits the house of a family that has not been seen in a week. No one comes to the door when he knocks. 

After breaking down the back door, his worst fears are realised. Their home is now an horrific crime scene.

Policeman Týr and forensic pathologist Iðunn are called to the house to investigate. As the case advances, harrowing secrets about the family are revealed. Along with a young policeman Karó, the investigative team quickly realise that the case forces them to face their own suppressed past and opens a Pandora's box to much darker crimes.
Can't Run, Can't Hide is a masterclass in tension from one of the world's finest crime writers.

My Take

This was a truly creepy read. Told in essentially two time frames, and the author is set on the path of working out what preceded the crime, and then who the perpetrator was, and why.

Soldis is a young trainee teacher who has come to work as an au pair in a remote house in Western Iceland. She discovers that she is the third in a line of au pairs, and that the previous two were apparently dismissed.

Within days she realises that someone is entering the house, taking or relocating items and then the scary activity becomes worse, so much so that Soldis decides she will also leave as soon as possible.

In the long run the perpetrator came as a surprise to me, although I could claim to have been on the right track.

My rating: 4.8 

I've also read

• 4.8, SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME
• 5.0, THE SILENCE OF THE SEA 
• 4.8, WHY DID YOU LIE? 
• 4.9, THE PREY 
• 4.5, THE DAY IS DARK 

Review: DEATH IN BRITTANY, Christophe Villain

• 
  This edition an e-book from Amazon on Kindle
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0FF9WLRPN 
  
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ June 23, 2025
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 298 pages
• Book 1 of 8 ‏ : ‎ Sandrine Perrot - The Brittany Mystery Series  
• Translated by Terry Laster 

Synopsis (Amazon)

Sandrine Perrot's investigation takes her from the picturesque fishing towns to the rural hinterland of Brittany's Emerald Coast.

Police Lieutenant Sandrine Perrot is on leave from her post in Paris and has settled in Cancale, the oyster capital of Brittany. She is temporarily assigned to the Saint-Malo police station for this case. The body of an unidentified woman is discovered on the Brittany coast path along the bay of Mont-Saint-Michel.

With her new assistant, Adel Azarou, she takes on the investigation, which leads them to a cold case from Paris, but also deep into the tragic history of a venerable hotelier family.

This novel is a revised new translation of ‘Emerald Coast Murder’.

My Take

This appears to be a new publishing of a novel originally published in 2023. Essentially I think the plot must be the same.

Sandrine has left her post in Paris and is ostensibly on leave but is called in because there has been a murder victim discovered on a nearby coastal path. Sandrine appears to have left Paris under some sort of cloud and the person whom she has had some sort of altercation with turns up in Brittany and interferes with the investigation she is being asked to conduct. I thought here the author has tried to create too much mystery.

Too many times in this novel the author swaps the narration from third person to first person and vice versa. I'm not sure that that wasn't an error in translation. There are also instances where a verb is in the wrong tense. It also seemed to me that the author had a change of mind about the plot. The original mystery of who the dead woman is, and why she is in Brittany, is all explained and then the plot changes.

In the long run there is a sort of resolution at the end but I found the culprit a most unlikely selection - too old for what she is supposed to have done.

I will read the second in the series but I certainly hope it is not such hard work. 

My rating: 4.1

About the author

website

I am an author with a penchant for travelling to France, good food and exciting crime stories.
As a teenager, I regularly spent my holidays in our twin town in the south of France. After graduating, I worked for several years in Paris and along the Atlantic coast, from Calais to Biarritz. Since then, I have loved travelling and, above all, the excellent and varied cuisine that the country has to offer.
I write crime novels about France under the pseudonym Christophe Villain. 

So is Christophe Villain actually a German author? I'd like there to be a little less cloak and dagger about his real identity.