Marble Hall Murders, Anthony Horowitz (Review by Melissa Frye)

Being familiar with the title and the previous BBC adaptation for TV, I decided to take a peek into the world of Susan Ryeland and her latest mystery. While I do believe that one could likely find enjoyment from this novel if they are a fan of Agatha Christie-esque reads, I found less enjoyment than expected. Marble House Murders is the 3rd book in the Susan Ryeland series and is a continuation of the crime adventures of Atticus Pund. Susan is working on the manuscript for Pund’s Last Case, a story about the mystery of Lady Margaret Chalfont’s death to which she later discovers might house clues for Marian Crace’s death. The manuscript is a cliché tale surrounding the will of Lady Chalfont and the inclination that poison was the cause of her death. This portion took ~100 pages or so of the novel which was a bit of a snooze. Ironically, later in the novel, we do learn that Susan had some of this same feedback for the author, Eliot, so my assumption is that this style was by design. I just couldn’t fathom with the flat set of clues how it could increase interest to unravel another mystery. I’d recommend this book for someone who already appreciates the first 2 novels in the series or the Agatha Christie style it is compared to. I do believe this could be a great book if the format was appreciated in previous works.