Reviews

‘I opened this book with high expectations. They have been admirably fulfilled.  Here we have a stand alone thriller about two lonely people who pursue a relationship of monthly weekends together in remote spots.  Suddenly one of these two fails to get to the rendezvous-vous and the other realises how very limited her knowledge of her  companion is . . . Gradually the reader pieces together some of the facts as an atmosphere of rising tension envelops everything. The intelligent way Jay, Lisa and others plan their actions is enjoyable and the suspense of the tale is palpable.’

- MYSTERY PEOPLE

Crime for Christmas: Five favourite festive reads

Crime for Christmas: Five Festive Reads: here they are in order of publication Dorothy L Sayers, The Nine Tailors (1934). Ok, so not Christmas exactly, but close enough. It is a snowy New Year’s Eve when Lord Peter Wimsey runs his car into a ditch near the village of Fenchurch St Paul. I regularly reread […]

Death Among the Dons

A couple of years ago, I gave a talk at Alibis in the Archives at the Gladstone Library and promised to post it on my blog. What with a house move and other distractions, it slipped my mind. But here is a edited version of it – or some of it. It is rather long, […]

Why I don’t want to be in a Ngaio Marsh

Why I don’t want to be in a Ngaio Marsh

I have finished my Ngaio Marsh binge. I have not read all of them – nor do I intend to – but I have read a lot, around twenty. And a couple of things stand out. One is that by the end of my marathon read, I had a pretty good idea who the culprit […]

Sheer bliss: Prunella Scales and Wives and Daughters

I haven’t been sleeping well these last six months or so – and I won’t need to tell readers of my blog why that is. I don’t usually have a problem getting to sleep, but I often find myself awake at four or five am. That is when audiobooks are such a godsend. I prefer books […]

Eight novels set in cathedrals or churches

Time for another list! My good blogfriend, Moira at http://clothesinbooks.blogspot.co.uk/and I are sharing our choice of eight books set in churches or cathedrals. I don’t claim that mine are the best books, but they are all books I’ve loved and read more than once. My first would have to be Trollope’s Barsetshire novels: all six, beginning with The Warden (1855) […]

Meltdown . . .

. . . in more ways than one. The snow has more or less gone now. There was another small snowfall yesterday, but it hasn’t amounted to much – yet. More snow is forecast. We still have that feeling that our plans are provisional and I am wondering if we are going to miss the […]