Shot in Southwold

Rosie Gilchrist #4

by Suzette A. Hill

1960. Lady Fawcett is eager to vet her daughter Amy’s current beau, aspiring film director Bartholomew Hackle who is shooting his first major project in Southwold. While Amy is unable to accompany her mother, Rosy Gilchrist is strong-armed into tagging along.
On the set of The Languid Labyrinth nobody really knows what is going on – least of all Felix Smythe whose bit part is constantly changing thanks to Hackle, much to Felix’s chagrin. But the unambiguous death by gun-shot of a female cast member brings a drama to proceedings lacking in the film itself, and Lady Fawcett, Rosy and Felix are once again at the centre of a murder mystery in which further victims may face the cut.

Genres: Mystery

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2017

About the author

Suzette A. Hill was born in Eastbourne, Sussex, in 1941. She is a graduate of Nottingham and Newcastle-upon-Tyne Universities. Hill taught English literature all her professional life. At age sixty-four and retired, she tried her hand at a short story - just to see what writing fiction felt like, and to her surprise a quintet of humorous novels (Reverend Francis Oughterard series) was the result.

Reviews

[Helen Meads]

I bought this book from a charity shop and it’s going straight back to another one. I’m not altogether sure why I persisted to the finish, but I did. Maybe it was the vain hope that it would improve. It’s to crime fiction what Mills&Boon is to romantic fiction. The characters are caricatures and the dialogue and narrative is wooden.

The writing is clunky, the milieu feels like Enid Blyton jolly hockey sticks. If it’s meant to be parody or comedy, it doesn’t work. There is no real plot and all the reveals are explained, and without much in the way of trails of clues, let alone decent red herrings. There’s no suspense.

I can’t imagine how Hill got published. The author brief says she worked ‘in public school and adult education’, which I initially assumed was americanism for state sector, but it seems it was somewhere called ‘Reading College’ in the private sector; the book is laced with snobbery and class assumptions.

The cover attributes ‘charming, astringent and witty’ to The Guardian, but a search by Google and of The Guardian online produced no review result. Perhaps it wasn’t The Guardian, national newspaper. The book certainly isn’t worthy of one of those epithets, never mind all three.

I really wouldn’t bother.

[Emma Goldman · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nice send up of the avant garde film industry, with a cast of amateurs and far-from-innocents, a director and writer making it up as they go along, and murder disrupting the whole proceedings. Yet again, the local police are out of their depth when various people withhold evidence, all for 'the best of reasons' (their own personal reasons of course). Some version of justice manages to occur, but definitely in spite of most of the characters.

[Sarah Hills · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another interesting crime from this author. This is the third one I have read that involves Rosy Gilchrist and I'm getting to know the characters a lot more. As this is just under 300 pages long it's an easy read in a day and there is enough intrigue to keep you occupied.
The author does think of interesting plots and this one was just as interesting as her previous ones.
In the background we have a crew filming a bit of an avante guarde film but I would never have guessed what the reasons for the murders were.
I have enjoyed this book, nothing too grisly but enough to keep you interested throughout.

[Anne Tanner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite a pleasant romp, harmless enough and quite fun. My interest was particularly in the book’s setting, Southwold. It seemed like a travelogue for the place, every landmark mentioned, but nothing really described. Maybe that was done in the earlier Southwold books.
I would read others.

[Joy Stephenson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Second in a cosy crime series. It might have been better if I'd read the first in the series as events in that story are referred back to in this one. It was a bit slow paced and needed a twist or two in the plot, as well as more viable suspects (most of the characters appear to be on-going through the series so it obviously wasn't them.)

[Brigitte Launay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed the book, made me chuckle a few times.
Quite a straight forward plot but I liked the characters. It was quirky, easy to read. The ending was far fetched and easy to work out but still an old fashioned, enjoyable story.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another whimsical mystery from Suzette Hill, not featuring Maurice & Bouncer unfortunately. I have read the first 2 in this series, but not the third, though that doesn't matter to the plot of this one.

[Alison D · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just could not get into this story at all. Set I believe in 1920's? Found the way characters spoke difficult to imagine. Struggled for a while but didn't inspire me to continue to read, so have put it down......not for me methinks

[Jane · Rating 2 out of 5]

Too spritely for its own good

[Rose A · Rating 3 out of 5]

Always enjoyable to return to Rosy & co. I enjoyed it but felt the ending where the murderer just explains everything very conveniently rather contrived.

[Emily Rush · Rating 2 out of 5]

The 2nd star was purely for the fact I worked out the plot. Otherwise, 10/10 would not recommend...

[Jacaranda21 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Umm, not rushing to read any others. OK, but struggled to stay engaged or like many of the characters. Narrative felt disjointed.

[Tiina · Rating 2 out of 5]

A lot of things happened in this book, which was a sort of murder mystery, with no-one really solving it. A few characters knew what had happened, and of course the reader, but not the police. That left me with an unsatisfied feeling.

Otherwise, an easy read and kind of fun, despite the murders.