Liz B. (contrarywise) reviewed on 7/12/2012 + 30 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 2

Not a mystery, but a crime story, and one of Innes' very best. There is less of the learned comments of the professor and more of character and story and humor. Colonel Petticate, when his wife dies suddenly on their boat, decides to say she is abroad, and continue her series of best selling romance novels. In taking his first step into crime, he sets out on a path which will bring him one horrible shock after another. Although he is an unpleasant little man, he is not so unpleasant that you can't identify with him, at the same time feeling he deserves everything he gets. The book includes a fascinating vignette of Oxford upper-class bohemianism which Innes must have drawn from life. Not a page lags, vivid characters appear throughout. Five stars.

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