Reading the Detectives discussion

It's time to nominate for our September 2022 group read!

Please only nominate books written and published in the Golden Age period, or a little earlier or later - if in doubt whether a title is eligible, please ask.

As usual, just one nomination per group member, and only one book by any individual writer can be nominated per month. Happy nominating.

I will nominate Death Has Deep Roots: A Second World War Mystery by Michael Gilbert


An eager London crowd awaits the trial of Victoria Lamartine, hotel worker, ex-French Resistance fighter, and the only logical suspect for the murder of her supposed lover, Major Eric Thoseby. Lamartine—who once escaped from the clutches of the Gestapo—is set to meet her end at the gallows.

One final opportunity remains: the defendant calls on solicitor Nap Rumbold to replace the defence counsel,and grants an eight-day reprieve from the proceedings. Without any time to spare, Rumbold boards a ferry across the Channel, tracing the roots of the brutal murder back into the war-torn past.

Expertly combining authentic courtroom drama at the Old Bailey with a perilous quest for evidence across France, Death Has Deep Roots is an unorthodox marvel of the mystery genre.

Another Nap!

This one’s been on my TBR awhile, sounds really intriguing.

I’ll nominate The Port of London Murders by Josephine Bell. Currently $2.99 on Kindle in the U.S.

Wapping. Tugs and barges on the river. A west-end shop that deals apparently in nothing but lingerie. Women who sell their souls for something in a little screw of paper. A doctor in the slums who has mysterious visitors ...

In a mean street of dockland a woman is dead, with every sign of suicide ...

A derelict barge casts part of a cargo ashore, boxes which have double ends: some of these box-ends are empty, others conceal pink chiffon nightdresses ...

The river police are concerned with the smuggling, Detective-Sergeant Chandler with an apparent suicide which he believes to be murder. River and shore police confer. Sergeant Chandler visits his suspects once more. He is never seen again ...

Juggernaut: A Golden Age Mystery

Up and up crept the weight. Its touch was cold and scaly; she shuddered at the contact. At the same dreadful moment she realised what the Thing was.

Esther Rowe, a Canadian, is on holiday in Cannes. She decides to stay on, and seeks nursing employment with the enigmatic and elusive Dr. Gregory Santorius. She finds herself caring for the ageing invalid Sir Charles Clifford, and meets various members of his family, some nice-some less so.

Certain suspicious events seem to indicate that someone wants Sir Charles out of the way-after all, there's a will to be considered. When Sir Charles meets his demise, it appears that the causes of death are natural. Edith isn't so sure-and finds herself caught up in murderous machinations. But will she have an ally to protect her and help her solve this macabre mystery-and escape death herself?

Juggernaut, Alice Campbell's first crime novel, was originally published in 1928, and later made into a film starring Boris Karloff. As in many of her novels, the setting is France. The milieu is rich, cosmopolitan and vividly rendered, the plot intriguing to the very end. This new edition features an introduction by crime fiction historian Curtis Evans.

I nominate Post After Post-Mortem: An Oxfordshire Mystery by E.C.R. Lorac.

The Surrays and their five children form a prolific writing machine, with scores of treatises, reviews and crime thrillers published under their family name. Following a rare convergence of the whole household at their Oxfordshire home, Ruth – middle sister who writes 'books which are just books' – decides to spend some weeks there recovering from the pressures of the writing life while the rest of the brood scatter to the winds again. Their next return is heralded by the tragic news that Ruth has taken her life after an evening at the Surrays' hosting a set of publishers and writers, one of whom is named as Ruth's literary executor in the will she left behind.

Despite some suspicions from the family, the verdict at the inquest is suicide – but when Ruth's brother Richard receives a letter from the deceased which was delayed in the post, he enlists the help of CID Robert Macdonald to investigate what could only be an ingeniously planned murder.

It´s $4/€3,50 on Kindle and also on Audible and Kindle Unlimited.

I see both of the last two nominations on kindle in the US, Lorac for $8 and Juggernaut for $3.

Thanks, Sandy

Four great nominations already. Thanks everyone.

Jill: Death Has Deep Roots: A Second World War Mystery by Michael Gilbert

Susan in NC: The Port of London Murders by Josephine Bell

Susan: Juggernaut: A Golden Age Mystery by Alice Campbell

Michaela: Post After Post-Mortem: An Oxfordshire Mystery by E.C.R. Lorac

Does anyone have any more to add? I'll open the poll tomorrow.

PS, I won't be nominating as I want to read all the nominations so far!

Me too. They all look excellent.

Me too - I still have waiting to be nominated (and read), but I'll wait for a month when I don't want to read the other nominations.

Thanks Rosina, we'll look forward to that nomination.

The poll is now open - please cast your votes. (I need to take another look at them all before making my choice!)

https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

I too need to ponder a bit, but Michael Gilbert has never disappointed. I often think of his book set in a prisoner of war camp.

Definitely looks the favourite, Sandy. Looks great, I enjoyed the previous book we read too.

Susan wrote: "Definitely looks the favourite, Sandy. Looks great, I enjoyed the previous book we read too."

I loved “Smallbone Deceased”!

Whoops! I totally missed the nominations ... again!

I don’t think the poll has closed yet, Jan. Dive on in and see!

Yes, you missed nominations, Jan, but there is still time for everyone to vote:
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

No, I voted for an apparent loser. I just missed that nominations were going on.

Sorry, guilty again of hasty (mis)reading!

The poll has now finished and our September group read will be Death Has Deep Roots: A Second World War Mystery by Michael Gilbert.

Full results:
Death Has Deep Roots: A Second World War Mystery 10 votes, 50.0%
Post After Post-Mortem: An Oxfordshire Mystery 7 votes, 35.0%
The Port of London Murders 3 votes, 15.0%
Juggernaut: A Golden Age Mystery 0 votes, 0.0%

Thank you, Judy. I have updated the list of books.

As we come into the summer we need to think about next years challenge. If anyone has any ideas, please feel free to suggest them, either here or in the main discussion thread.

I don’t know about everyone else, but my go-to source for polling suggestions is the British Library Crime Classics series. It has been going for years, so used paperback editions and ebooks and audiobooks should be widely available of at least some older reissues, and of course if you find a cheaper edition of the same title, that works as well. I just type “British Library Crime Classics” in the search bar, and a list comes up. At least we’d know it’s likely in the right time period! And I like the introductions by Martin Edwards, gives me a bit of background on the author, sets the scene for the book (I know, sometimes contains spoilers, so go cautiously!)

I thought this would give us a wider scope for exploring new GA authors, since it looks like “the big four”, Christie, Allingham, Sayers and Marsh have been done, so sticking to a particular author or character might be limiting - not sure other authors wrote enough to fill a year!

P.S. Just checked the bookshelf, looks like Sayers was 2016, Miss Marple 2017, both before my time in the group - we could combine the two, alternating Lord Peter with Miss Marple. That should fill a year.

Thanks for the suggestion, Susan. British Library Crime Classics is certainly a possible. We did start with Sayers, but perhaps if we re-did challenges, we could do them as buddies, for those who participated earlier? What does anyone else think?

I'd be happy to do Sayers in any context. BLCC sounds a good idea to me, too. (I'm not really sufficiently well versed in British GA crime to make my own suggestion.)

We do have a few buddy series on the go already. Maybe as Catherine Aird has so many books in the Inspector Sloan series we could carry on through her's next year. Another author could be Ruth Ruth Rendell, as we did P.D. James. Other than that we could go for an American author, Carolyn Wells. Patricia Wentworth, Ethel Lina White. I'm sure others have some suggestions.

Authors are not an issue, but finding ones that fit a 12 month theme often are. I haven't read much Ruth Rendell, so that appeals.

If we're allowed more modern authors, may I put in a word for Caroline Graham? She created the Midsomer Murders, but her books are *far* better than the TV series, which hardly follows them at all. They are well written, excellently characterised, witty and gripping, IMO.

Susan wrote: "Authors are not an issue, but finding ones that fit a 12 month theme often are. I haven't read much Ruth Rendell, so that appeals."

She would take us through 2 years like Marsh did

I love all her books, Sid. We read them all as buddies though, so you can probably find the threads. I don't think there are 12 though, only about 8 books. See the difficulty we mods face!

Susan wrote: "I love all her books, Sid. We read them all as buddies though, so you can probably find the threads. I don't think there are 12 though, only about 8 books. See the difficulty we mods face!"

Ah. Sorry. Insufficient research. My mistake.

Not at all, Sid. I think we have done a LOT of series as buddy reads. Frankly, it's the only way I ever read a complete series...