RogerBW's Blog

Falling Star, Patricia Moyes 02 March 2021

1964 mystery, fifth in the series about Chief Inspector Henry Tibbett. When the film's leading man stumbles across the platform and dies under the wheels of an Underground train, it's clearly an accident. But then the continuity girl falls to her death from her flat…

A change from the Tibbett pattern, here: the book is narrated in the first person by one of the principals of the film company – "Pudge" the money man, despised by the "artists" who are the rest of the board, and as a fat man feeling that he can only be pompous or comic, and choosing the former. He's tedious and irksome even (perhaps especially) when he has a point. (And of course Moyes will have read That Book by Christie, and may be choosing to use Pudge's elision of things that make him look bad to make him the murderer too; he soon fixes his recorded suspicions upon one person in particular.)

The actual technicalities of the deaths are frankly baroque. Vs gur ntrvat yrnqvat zna qbrfa'g jnag nalbar gb xabj uvf fvtug vf tbvat, naq pna jrne pbagnpg yrafrf va bgure ebyrf, jul qbrfa'g ur whfg jrne gurz urer gbb, engure guna (sbe guvf bar ebyr va juvpu ur unf gb jrne tynffrf) abg jrnevat gur yrafrf ohg trggvat n frpbaq frg bs cebc fcrpgnpyrf znqr hc va uvf cerfpevcgvba? Naq pbhyq n pnaqyrjnk frny ernyyl ubyq n jvaqbj pybfrq ntnvafg gur jrvtug bs na hapbafpvbhf obql hagvy gur fgbir jnezrq hc gur xvgpura naq znqr vg zryg, jvgubhg oheavat gur obql gung vf ba gur yrqtr orgjrra fgbir naq jvaqbj?

But this isn't really a book about cunning ways of committing a nearly-unsolvable murder; it's much more an observation of the people, all of whom are of course horrible. But while that's a common problem especially in post-war mysteries Moyes manages to keep this reader's interest in spite of that, in spite even of the tediously clichéd Italian leading lady.

"I defy you," I said, "to mention anything which could harm Fiametta. She's written newspaper articles about how she was arrested for stealing in Naples when she was thirteen, and seduced by her uncle when she was fourteen, and set up in a love nest by this film director when she was sixteen. The only hold Margery might possibly have had over her would have been a threat to expose that in fact she was perfectly respectable and had been reared in a convent."

It shouldn't work, but it does. The more I read of Moyes the more impressed I am.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

Previous in series: Murder a la Mode | Series: Henry Tibbett | Next in series: Johnny Under Ground

Comments on this post are now closed. If you have particular grounds for adding a late comment, comment on a more recent post quoting the URL of this one.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech aviation base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2022 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1