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jlmb's review against another edition
4.0
It was hard to not want to start singing The Smith's song Hand in Glove every time I picked up the book, haha. Enjoyable mystery. Love the Inspector Alleyn series. The early 1960's setting was fun.
innerweststreetlibrarian's review against another edition
3.0
Ngaio Marsh is an incorrigible snob, and not even remotely shy about it. This story could have been written about any time in the early 20th century, the only thing that gave its real age away was a tiny reference to the "telly". I honestly had no clear idea of where it was going or why, even right up until the very end. She certainly writes a good mystery!
robinwalter's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
sarah_i_jackson's review against another edition
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
plainbob's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
smcleish's review against another edition
2.0
Originally published on my blog here in February 1999.
This is another Marsh novel which is very much in the rather unfortunate shadow of Agatha Christie. The cast of characters, upper class, Home Counties village dwellers, could come out of a number of Christie's novels, and there is not much of Marsh's personality in this book.
The plot itself is not particularly interesting; Mr Harold Carteret's dead body is found under a large, heavy pipe in a ditch being dug by workmen, following a party held by his ex-wife before and during which he quarreled with just about everyone in the village. Naturally, the question of who killed him is quickly and easily solved by Chief Inspector Alleyn.
The characters are very exaggerated. They include Pyke Period, incredibly camp - though no insinuations about his private life are made, this being 1959 and the crime novel, even then, an old-fashioned genre in the way it treated such things. He is not so unbelievable as the trio made up of Constance Cartell, an incredibly stupid middle-aged hearty spinster, her adopted niece Mary Ralston or "Moppet", and the young crook Leonard Leiss. He and Moppet together form an illustration of the thirties' idea of "a bad lot", male and female of the species. The two of them are very unpleasant, but this is matched by the unbelievable doting fondness of Constance for Moppet, her unwillingness to believe that she might ever have done something wrong.
For some reason, it is almost always the case, when Marsh uses an upper class background for her stories, that her cast consists of caricatures.
This is another Marsh novel which is very much in the rather unfortunate shadow of Agatha Christie. The cast of characters, upper class, Home Counties village dwellers, could come out of a number of Christie's novels, and there is not much of Marsh's personality in this book.
The plot itself is not particularly interesting; Mr Harold Carteret's dead body is found under a large, heavy pipe in a ditch being dug by workmen, following a party held by his ex-wife before and during which he quarreled with just about everyone in the village. Naturally, the question of who killed him is quickly and easily solved by Chief Inspector Alleyn.
The characters are very exaggerated. They include Pyke Period, incredibly camp - though no insinuations about his private life are made, this being 1959 and the crime novel, even then, an old-fashioned genre in the way it treated such things. He is not so unbelievable as the trio made up of Constance Cartell, an incredibly stupid middle-aged hearty spinster, her adopted niece Mary Ralston or "Moppet", and the young crook Leonard Leiss. He and Moppet together form an illustration of the thirties' idea of "a bad lot", male and female of the species. The two of them are very unpleasant, but this is matched by the unbelievable doting fondness of Constance for Moppet, her unwillingness to believe that she might ever have done something wrong.
For some reason, it is almost always the case, when Marsh uses an upper class background for her stories, that her cast consists of caricatures.
piscespaperbacks's review against another edition
2.0
2.5 stars. It had a veeeery slow start. By the time the investigation started the book was already almost half over. I will say, once the clues started coming together it was quite enjoyable, but I personally didn't like almost any of the characters and didn't find the detective himself to be that sympathetic. I have another one of Ngiao Marsh's books on my bookshelf and I'm definitely going to read it, but it wasn't quite the mystery fix that I was looking for
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