A great read with many homages to the
As a devotee of her Dr. Ruth Galloway series, I thoroughly enjoyed this second instalment in Elly Griffiths' D.S. Harbinder Kaur series. As in its series predecessor, The Stranger Diaries, Harbinder features as one of an ensemble cast of characters, with a major part of the storyline told from the perspective of non-police characters. We do learn more about Harbinder's personal and professional life in this book though, and she is a delightful, complex and engaging character.
The book opens with sprightly 90-year-old Peggy Smith observing and documenting the goings-on outside her Shoreham-by-Sea (southern coast of England) bay window. Later that evening, Peggy is found dead, still sitting in her chair, by her agency carer, Ukrainian-born Natalka Kolisnyk. Natalka isn't satisfied that Peggy's death was natural, despite her advanced age, and contacts local police, speaking to D.S. Harbinder Kaur to report her suspicions. It transpires that Peggy was a "murder consultant", and had assisted numerous successful crime writers by devising ingenious methods of murder, garnering her numerous dedications and acknowledgements. Kaur is initially dubious about Natalka's story, but becomes intrigued as additional unusual details emerge and another suspicious death occurs.
From here, the book takes the form of two interconnected storylines, following both Kaur's official police investigation and the activity of Natalka, who teams up with two unlikely confederates to uncover the truth - Benedict Cole, a diffident former monk turned seaside barista and Edwin Fitzgerald, a snappily-dressed octogenarian, who was Peggy's neighbour. Together, and parallel to Kaur's investigation, they probe the details of Peggy's life in and around Shoreham, before setting off on a road trip adventure to the Aberdeen Crime Writers' Festival in Scotland.
This is the second book I've read that has used a crime writing festival as a setting (the other being The Royal Baths Murder by J.R. Ellis, which took place at a thinly-veiled facsimile of the Theakston's Old Peculier festival in Harrogate), and I love that both authors have drawn on their own experience as a crime writer at large in depicting the curious mix of excitement, networking opportunities, resentment and one-upmanship that these events entail.
The Postscript Murders takes a lighter approach to crime than Elly Griffiths' well-established and excellent Ruth Galloway Series, although in a literary sense it sits above the majority of books in the "cosy mystery" genre. As always with Griffiths, her characters are complex and well-developed over the course of the novel. I particularly loved the quirkiness of the "amateur detective" trio in The Postscript Murders and the relationships that blossomed between them. The plot is enthralling, taking many twists and turns and containing many surprise developments for the reader to savour. The conclusion is fitting and satisfying, tying up many (but not all) loose ends that the story has thrown up. Via the late Peggy's dedication to and encyclopaedic knowledge of the crime genre, Griffiths makes a fitting homage, both to the great writers of the "golden age" and to modern writers pushing the boundaries into new and exciting sub-genres of crime fiction. I'm really looking forward to reading future outings for D.S. Harbinder Kaur.
Highly recommended, both to existing readers of Elly Griffiths' Ruth Galloway Series and to those yet to discover her excellent crime-mystery books.
My thanks to Elly Griffiths, publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review this wonderful title.
Sarah, 13/03/2021
