Magpie Murders (Susan Ryeland #1)

I thought this was a really fun, really intriguing mystery–or rather, two mysteries in one. This was the first time I had read anything by Anthony Horowitz and it won’t be my last.

We have an old-fashioned, well-written who-done-it manuscript dropped off by a famous writer, only the last chapters are missing. So then we need to find out what happened to the chapters and solve the mystery in the book, but while doing that the main character becomes convinced that the author was murdered.

I thought both mysteries were well-thought out and very clever. I’m not sure why some reviewers disliked it–I thought it was a great read.

Nope. Just no. This book was not for me. I adore mysteries and Golden Age mysteries are awesome. This book has a TON of 4 and 5 star reviews about how awesome it is and how it totally honors the genre.

No, it doesn’t. The only way it honors the genre is the gathering of the suspects at the end of the fictitious book. That was well done. But the rest was a steaming pile of ‘wtf was that’ attempt at a historical detective novel. Now your mileage may very but I was super upset and here’s why.

This book is a mystery within a mystery. There’s the modern day storyline where the editor receives the book only the last few chapters are missing and then there’s the mystery book itself set in 1955. The author of the fictitious book ends up dead and turns out there are hidden little easter eggs within the work that might lead to what happened to the author.

First off, the book, the mystery inside this book is atrocious. It’s FULL and I mean FULL of anachronisms. And this was supposed to be written by a lauded mystery author? HUH? I couldn’t get past it, I’d read a page and BAM anachronism!! This read like bad fan fiction from an American who didn’t understand British culture and history y’all and yet Anthony Horowitz is British? And this was his personal cultural history? I know more British history than a native???

Then we get back to modern times and the editor searching for the missing manuscript pages and digging into her author’s life and history and that went slightly better but I was so frustrated and let down I like Anthony Horowitz I really do but I kept wanting to smack him and his editor with a stack of post-it notes about the anachronisms.

Really disappointed.

If you loved it, good for you! I love things many others don’t and that’s okay. This is going on the ‘super glad I got it on sale but I will never torture myself’ pile.

this review was also posted on Goodreads.

I don’t often stop reading mid-book but the abrupt change of narrator and the onset of almost terminal boredom necessitated a drastic change in my usual reading habits. I can’t believe I paid $11.99 (about $12 dollars too much) for this drivel. 99% of the one star reviews are right on target… if you ignore them and buy this book anyway save yourself the time and effort – read part 7 first.

It is almost impossible to discuss this ingenious combination of puzzles without creating spoilers. Out of necessity, therefore, this review will be brief.

Anthony Horowitzs 2017 book, Magpie Murders, is really like an onion: you peel back one layer to discover another. And there are some other games dropped like golden apples to amuse and distract along the way.

The introduction sets up a tale within a tale format: a Cloverleaf Publishing House editor, Susan Ryeland, lets us know she is reviewing a manuscript for a mystery with the eponymous title. And that the book has changed her life significantly by hinting she is no longer employed at Cloverleaf.

At that point we are plunged into a mid-1950s setting for a traditional English murder mystery, replete with multiple characters and motives, a private detective with his own eccentricities and assistant and lovely detailing of a Cotswold village and environs.

All seems to be progressing along familiar lines until Ms. Ryeland comes back into the narrative with the jarring detail that the last chapter telling who done it has gone missing. This revelation sets off an entirely different sequence of events further complicated by the fact that the mystery author has died under curious circumstances. Hmmm

Stop the presses! We now have two mysteries. It seems that the second one will interfere with resolving the first, especially as there were a lot of reasons for the author to be done dirty. An added tidbit is the authors penchant for puzzles and thin disguises borrowing from those around him for characters, locations and maybe motives used in his works.

And the fun gets romping as various clues and enigmas are exposed. They are entertaining; some may even cause you to laugh out loud. Shocking!

The authors writing is rich in detail and description making the read engaging and comfortable. Horowitz offers some entertaining asides about popular British detective personas such as Morse and the Midsommer Murders folks but strictly as references since the framework of the book is set in todays publishing world.

You may or may not want to match wits with the plotting. I, for one, was quite happy to go along for the ride. Such a pleasure to discover a writer well grounded in the tradition of his genre!

Joy Swift, inventor of murder mystery weekends, once wrote a plot in which you began to suspect that the actors playing the suspects were embroiled in their own murder mystery, quite separate from the one that they were acting out. So it is here. In what might be the ultimate whodunit, Anthony Horowitz, who himself was the first to adapt Midsomer Murders for television, alongside his many, many other achievements in the genre (bringing back Sherlock Holmes, writing some of the best Poirot episodes, creating Foyle’s War etc etc) has given us a detective story that is postmodern, metatextual and all those other words you weren’t expecting to hear when discussing the genre.

To tell you anything at all is probably giving away too much but I think it’s fair to say that it’s one mystery within another – the manuscript of a detective story that marks the final appearance of supersleuth Atticus Pund in a classic fifties plot is really just the beginning. The novel conceals another mystery completely.

The writing is perfect. Although this is the first anyone has heard of Atticus Pund, you don’t have to be too far in before your mind is kidding itself that you’ve read all the (non existent) previous adventures of a detective as prolific as Miss Marple or Father Brown. He is a very sympathetic sleuth and – in one of many marvellous in-jokes and references to Agatha Christie, Midsomer Murders etc – lives in Charterhouse Square, which is where they film Poirot’s ‘Whitehaven Mansions’ home in the TV series. As for his author and those who publish his novels…

No, I’ve said too much already. If you love this sort of thing, you’ll be in Heaven from the moment you pick it up.

Galaxyaudiobook Member Benefit

- Able to comment

- List watched audiobooks

- List favorite audiobooks

- Bookmark will only available for Galaxyaudiobook member