From the Bookshelf of Reading the Detectives…

Black Plumes

Margery Allingham

Start date: March 1, 2016

Finish date: March 31, 2016

Discussion: Group reads

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Group reads

* November 2025 group read - Winner!
By Judy · 20 posts · 32 views

last updated Sep 17, 2025 08:43AM

* Sept 25: Lonesome Road (#3 Miss Silver Mysteries) by Patricia Wentworth
By Susan · 16 posts · 16 views

last updated Sep 19, 2025 01:03PM

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What Members Thought

Mar 14, 2016 Damaskcat rated it liked it

Margery Allingham is an author whose books I would love to enjoy but somehow they don't quite do it for me. I can appreciate she was a good writer and she creates some marvellous characters but somehow I just can't get to grips with her books and this one is no exception.

'Black Plumes' is a standalone novel which centres round the Ivory family and their prestigious art gallery. A spate of malicious incidents results in damage to a valuable painting but this is only the tip of the iceberg of what ...more

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Mar 11, 2016 Leslie rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: british, mysteries

My first non-Campion Allingham!

I am tempted to give this a higher rating because I did get a considerable amount of enjoyment from reading it. However, I did figure out both the who and the how; Allingham did manage to keep me second-guessing my choice but I thought that the guilty person was pretty obvious.

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May 26, 2017 Gillian Kevern rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Most enjoyable Allingham I have read to date. This might be because there was no Campion in it.

Weirdly, despite thinking I hadn't read any Margery Allingham, this was really familiar. I remembered the first half, so I know I've read at least that much of it before. This is the fourth Allingham that I have borrowed thinking it was new only to discover that it was a reread. Unfortunately, I returned the others before I added them to Goodreads. ...more

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Mar 02, 2016 Doris rated it it was ok

Shelves: mystery, z-2016-challenge

Meh. Not much to it, and Phillida is *such* an annoying character.

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May 11, 2020 Hayley rated it it was ok · review of another edition

An interesting mystery though Allingham’s continued, pointed, and mysterious foreshadowing (Enough with the wind already!) did get a little old. One quibble, it was slightly disturbing to see the main heroine’s love interest show his “affection” by doing things that “hurt her.” No, nothing insidious, but I got tired of the thoughtless cad pressing her hand so much it hurt and then telling her kindly not to think about the mystery. Ugh.

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Feb 17, 2016 John Frankham rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: crime-detective

An unusual Margery Allingham in not involving the redoubtable Albert Campion at all, but a fairly peripheral senior policeman from Shetland instead. A murder within the old central London home of three generations of a gallery-owning and exploring family circle. One of the family must be guilty ..... From the point of view of a young woman of the family: she has to grow up quickly as the intrigue threatens her future. A good read.

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