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A Grave Mistake (Roderick Alleyn, #30)

Ngaio Marsh

Start date: June 13, 2020

Finish date: July 11, 2020

Discussion: Archive: Ngaio Marsh Buddy Reads

Why we're reading this: Continuing our Inspector Alleyn buddy reads.
[close] Continuing our Inspector Alleyn buddy reads.

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Archive: Ngaio Marsh Buddy Reads

A Man Lay Dead
By Susan · 77 posts · 91 views

last updated Apr 11, 2021 04:44AM

A Grave Mistake - SPOILER Thread
By Susan · 12 posts · 29 views

last updated Nov 17, 2020 12:10PM

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What Members Thought

Jun 18, 2020 Susan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I am saddened as I reach the final books of this series, as Ngaio Marsh had a second wind as she reached her final Roderick Alleyn books. Published in 1978, this mystery has a great cast of characters, a good plot and some great humour between Alleyn and Sergeant ‘Foxkins.’

In the lovely village of Upper Quinton, wealthy Sybil Foster lives in a beautiful house, coveted by millionaire, Nicholas Markos. Sybil confides in her friend, Verity, that Markos junior, the young Gideon Markos, has paying mo I am saddened as I reach the final books of this series, as Ngaio Marsh had a second wind as she reached her final Roderick Alleyn books. Published in 1978, this mystery has a great cast of characters, a good plot and some great humour between Alleyn and Sergeant ‘Foxkins.’

In the lovely village of Upper Quinton, wealthy Sybil Foster lives in a beautiful house, coveted by millionaire, Nicholas Markos. Sybil confides in her friend, Verity, that Markos junior, the young Gideon Markos, has paying more attention to her daughter, Prunella, than she is happy with. Sybil is something of a complainer and a hypochondriac; she tends to fuss and to want sympathy. She is pleased when she manages to find a new gardener, the aptly names Bruce Gardener, who has returned to live with his widowed sister. However, when she discovers that her step son, the snooping and sponging, Claude Carter, is coming for a visit, she is again thrown into despair.

At a dinner party with Nicholas Markos, Verity comes face to face with Dr Basil Sham, who she had known well many years ago and had hoped not to see again. This novel is full of wonderfully suspicious characters – of which Sham is certainly one. Discovering that the charming and sympathetic Sham is working at Greengages, a health spa, Sybil Foster departs for a cure and is quickly – as is the way with such crime novels – killed off.

The reader is left with a whole host of suspects with wonderful motives, which include an unpopular will, a missing stamp and hidden secrets for Alleyn and Fox to unearth. This definitely was written in the 1970’s, though. At one point, Sham and a nurse have a raging row in front of Alleyn, both the worse for drink. Yet Alleyn, who is a senior member of the police force, wryly watches them both drive off slowly in their cars… This is a good addition to the series and Marsh showed no sign of reaching the end of her writing powers, as she neared the end of a series which started so many years before, in the early 1930’s.

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9 likes · Like · see review

Aug 14, 2016 Teri-K rated it liked it

Shelves: mystery, mystery-golden-age

A good story but not one of her best, as I have to quarrel with a couple of points in it. And since Marsh's books are usually very solid this disappointed me. The problems are - (view spoiler) S ...more

4 likes · Like · see review

May 19, 2011 Abbey rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: myst-cosies, myst-set-andor-auth-uk, favorites, vintage, reviewed, series, myst-police, own, myst-fems-project

1978, Inspector Alleyn, small village and upper crust-y society; cosy police procedural, classic. Story wonderful, narration poor.

When a spoiled and self-indulgent middle-aged woman suddenly dies at a posh “rest hotel”, the initial verdict appears to be suicide. But her many friends swear it was most unlike her, and Alleyn and Fox aren’t comfortable with the case either.

Nifty little time-capsule of a story that although set in early 1970s seemed to fit far better in the early 1950s, with its t ...more

1 like · Like · see review