1993 mystery, fifth of Granger's novels of Chief Inspector Alan Markby
and non-detective Meredith Mitchell. Meredith's asked to help out her
nervous friend Ursula on an archaeological dig when a bunch of new age
travellers set up nearby, but what Ursula's really concerned about is
whether her obsessive ex (also on the dig) may have murdered his wife…
There are a lot of moving parts in this one, with multiple
motives pulling and pushing in different directions. (And I think even
Granger forgets one of the murders in the summing-up of who did what
when and of how the malefactor(s) will be punished.) There's Dan and
the wife he's been living with in mutual hatred; there are the two
weird old farmers, the religious nutter uncle and the nephew who's not
gone down that path but is still nothing like a normal person; there
may be some dubious types among the travellers, or maybe they're just
suspicious of the police…
Well, of course, it's a detective story, so the police are basically
the good guys, and the author's conservatism shows through slightly
when Granger paints the travellers' reluctance to be interviewed as
unreasonable and obstructive. (There's also a general willingness to
call them "hippies", even from characters whom one might think would
be too young to have remembered actual hippies.)
Things do get off to a very slow start, but I find I don't mind this
when the writing is good—especially when I'm listening to an audio
book with a decent narrator (this was read by Judith Boyd, whom I've
liked before). And the story does get a bit little-England in places,
with Meredith's decision to buy a house in Bamford (thus putting her
in a position to get involved in future mysteries without having to
invent yet another excuse to get her to leave London) treated at times
with almost as much narrative importance as the actual murders.
(Meredith is clearly picking up some genre savvy – she talks about
"next time" she gets involved in an investigation…)
Still, there's some slight sign of progress in the prickly
relationship between Meredith and Alan (and it gets away from the
cliché of "you're great except for thing X which really annoys me").
Not a great book, but more than a mere placeholder series entry.
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