I've left myself in the interesting position of trying to review, at a distance of several weeks, two country house mysteries, both of them the first in the author's series. The one in question here is the first Roderick Alleyn mystery; the other, "The Crime at Black Dudley" by Margery Allingham, th...
Alleyn looked at him with a curious air of compassion. ‘Not even yet?’ he said. ‘Whose were the prints?’ ‘That I am not going to tell you. Oh, believe me, Bathgate, not out of any desire to figure as the mysterious omnipotent detective. That would be impossibly vulgar. No. I am not telling you be...
The first "Inspector Alleyn" mystery and I´m glad that this isn´t the first one I´ve read by Marsh. Because this book isn´t that good. The plot is a simple one. During a house party a man dies and one of the house guests must be the murderer. Enter Inspector Alleyn ... or someone, who is suppose...
I've been meaning to try Ngaio Marsh's books for a while so when I came across A Man Lay Dead in my hunt for another country house mystery to read, I figured I could kill two birds with one dagger stone, so to speak. In this first book, we're introduced to the star of the series, Detective Inspector...
This is a classic, country house murder mystery, and the first of the Alleyn mysteries. I really think Marsh is at her best writing this sort of English countryside whodunit. A weekend house party leads to a body with a ceremonial dagger thrust in its back. In the house there are blossoming relation...
A Man Lay Dead is a British murder mystery of the classic British murder mystery format. Lots of potential suspects at a weekend party/get-together at some fancy mansion, everything is, "just so ghastly," and all the women are, "so dreadfully frightened." Meh. Nothing special here, really, but it...
A young reporter is enjoying an upper-class British house party when abruptly, someone is found dead! I can't say I enjoyed this. There's an entire subplot concerning a Bolshevic satanic cult (?!) that goes nowhere, and isn't even an effective red herring. This is the first Inspector Alleyn book,...
Marsh introduced her famous detective in this mystery, and you can tell that she wasn't entirely sure what personality to go with. At times he reads like Wimsey playing a silly ass, at other times he is crude or clever in the manner of a Bright Young Thing; he takes the official police hard-line one...
The first of the Alleyn mysteries is a confused and not particularly impressive piece. Exotic daggers, secret societies, unnecessary torture scenes. Alleyn is also all over the place, closer to Campion than the ascetic grandee of later books. Stripped of extra encumbrances, the character of the k...
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