1996 mystery, sixth in the Robert Amiss series. "Jack" Troutbeck,
newly Baroness Troutbeck, enlists Amiss to help organise opposition in
the Lords to an anti-hunting bill. But even she didn't expect it to be
murderous.
It's entirely clear which side Dudley Edwards' sympathies are on:
everyone opposed to hunting in this book is either a fool or a knave.
Fortunately we spend more time with the pro-hunting faction, and here
there's a bit more room for characterisation, with various people on
the "right" side for different reasons and with different levels of
public acceptability, and some of them even allowed to be bad.
Jack comes off quite well here: thoughtless, but mostly in the sense
of expecting other people to put up with the same long hours and lack
of rest she does, rather than deliberately cruel. Amiss, who's
presumably not the author's favourite any more with Jack on stage, has
become rather more of a wimp, and while most of the narration is
centred on him one does at times start to wonder why.
‘Of course, it was the old passport,' said the baroness. ‘That nasty
new red plastic thing that we've been dished out since we joined the
wretched European Union wouldn't deflect a missile from a
pea-shooter – another powerful argument against that frightful
institution.'
‘I'll say for you Jack,' said Amiss, ‘that there is nothing, but
nothing, that doesn't fuel your prejudices.'
She beamed.
The plot is a little outrageous, and certain connections never quite
get made (gur zheqref ner qbar jvgu zvyvgnel-glcr uneqjner, ohg gur
zheqrere qbrfa'g unir nal zvyvgnel rkcrevrapr), but as with several
other mystery authors I've read the puzzle is mostly an excuse for the
people anyway.
Series recommended by Gus.
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