From the Bookshelf of Reading the Detectives…

Behold, Here's Poison (Inspectors Hannasyde & Hemingway, #2)

Georgette Heyer

Start date: March 15, 2022

Finish date: April 8, 2022

Discussion: Buddy reads

Why we're reading this: Next in our buddy read series of Heyer mysteries
[close] Next in our buddy read series of Heyer mysteries

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What Members Thought

Feb 15, 2010 Susan in NC rated it really liked it

Shelves: tbr-with-gr-groups, my-library, want-to-reread, reread

2022: still four stars for me, entertaining golden age mystery, with Heyer’s usual witty dialogue and quirky characters - none very likable, but very entertaining! Read for the Reading the Detectives group buddy read in March.

2017: Still held up as four stars for me for sheer enjoyment, thanks to Heyer's ingenious murder method and the murderer (I forgot both from my last read!), her sharp, witty dialogue and her quirky cast of characters - none of whom are terribly likable, except the police an ...more

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Jun 14, 2011 Abbey rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: myst-set-andor-auth-uk, reviewed, vintage, myst-fems-project, series, suspense-thriller

1936, #2 Inspector Hannasyde, rural England; odd family in an odd, old house, with peculiar servants; multiple murders and lots of intrigue but slow and talky. Traditional genteel cosy.

Another odd British family, another peculiar batch of servants, another batch of murder cases with all sorts of possibilities. That's Inspector Hannasyde's lot, and he's rather good at it. Heyer's writing is very smooth and her stories are comfortable reading, if you enjoy "that sort of thing", and I do. Mostly. B 1936, #2 Inspector Hannasyde, rural England; odd family in an odd, old house, with peculiar servants; multiple murders and lots of intrigue but slow and talky. Traditional genteel cosy.

Another odd British family, another peculiar batch of servants, another batch of murder cases with all sorts of possibilities. That's Inspector Hannasyde's lot, and he's rather good at it. Heyer's writing is very smooth and her stories are comfortable reading, if you enjoy "that sort of thing", and I do. Mostly. But perhaps I read this too soon after reading the first in the Hannasyde series (DEATH IN THE STOCKS, 1935) as there are many similarities between the two, and after a while I began to anticipate plot threads even more than usual, which can be fun, but only in moderation IMO.

Heyer wasn't a particularly strong plotter like Christie, nor are her characters as interesting as Sayers', but then, what writers of that period were? But she has a way with a turn of phrase, a sly, nicely calibrated sense of satire mixed with just a touch of broad humor as well, so that her mysteries are entertaining even if there are no great puzzles to unravel. She uses characters that were even at the time extremely stereotypical, but to good effect; I believe she did the broad strokes quite deliberately. The characters are nearly cutouts (the thoroughly unlikeable Head of House victim, the wastrel young son, the daughter with Attitude, the wishy-washy Mummy-with-Plans, the Batty Auntie, the suitor on the make, and the Family Black Sheep) but each is endowed with nice bits that bring them to life, even almost a century later when most of these "types" don't quite exist any more.

Heyer's range may not have been wide in the mystery field, but it appears to me on the strength of having read her first four mystery novels, that she knew what "worked" for her and kept to it. And within those parameters (Big House Mystery, weird family, mildly twisted plot, snarky interactions between family members and friends) she was very good. I enjoy her writing quite a lot - the plots are easily (but not quite too easily) guessed, the characters are entertaining, the dialogue still very funny, at least to my own odd sense of humor. Heyer was an entertaining, if not spectacular, mystery writer, and I'm glad I "met" her. I look forward to reading the rest of her mysteries, but perhaps not too quickly one after the other.

[NOTE: cover pix belongs to slightly later edition, couldn't find one for true first edition.]
...more

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Aug 10, 2016 Teri-K rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: amusing-to-funny, mystery, mystery-golden-age

This is one of my favorite of Heyer's mysteries. It's truly puzzling and full of characters that I love reading about, though in real life I wouldn't like being around them at all. lol

(Slight Spoilers Below)
A grouchy old man lives with his penny-pinching unmarried sister plus a vacuous, dramatic, widowed sister-in-law and her grown son and daughter. He also has an overbearing sister married to a very quiet man and a sardonic nephew who drops in occasionally to make sarcastic remarks about all of ...more

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Apr 12, 2020 Bev rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: british-mystery, vintage-mystery, mystery, bought-1993

see review on other edition

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Mar 05, 2011 Bev rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: vintage-mystery, british-mystery, mystery

When Gregory Matthews was found dead in his bed one morning, most of his family thought it was due to blood pressure and over-eating. The doctor was even willing to sign off on the death certificate....but then Matthews' meddling sister takes one look at the corpse and decides she's not satisfied. What a surprise for the family to find out that it wasn't the roast duck that did Gregory in, but a dose of nicotine poisoning. Now it's up to Inspector Hannasyde and Sergeant Hemingway to get to the b ...more

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May 03, 2019 Bev rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: british-mystery, mystery, vintage-mystery, mcpl-book, audionovel, virtual-mount-tbr-2019, country-house

Another of my forays into audionovel versions of mysteries. On the whole, I much prefer listening to books that I've already read at one time or another. Even if it's been a while (as with this one), things at least seem familiar once I get settled in. That's especially useful for mysteries--because I'm definitely apt to miss important points if I'm hearing the story for the first time (it's much harder to keep everything straight in my head if I'm not actually reading). Of course, with this one Another of my forays into audionovel versions of mysteries. On the whole, I much prefer listening to books that I've already read at one time or another. Even if it's been a while (as with this one), things at least seem familiar once I get settled in. That's especially useful for mysteries--because I'm definitely apt to miss important points if I'm hearing the story for the first time (it's much harder to keep everything straight in my head if I'm not actually reading). Of course, with this one I still didn't catch on to who the murderer was even though I'd read it all before.

As with my previous audionovel reviews, I'm going to focus more on the reading performance rather than the story. For my views on Heyer's work, please see the review linked to the title above. Ulli Birve is a much more talented narrator than John Franklyn-Robbins was in Murder Must Advertise. Though her tone remains languid and cultured for nearly all of Gregory Matthews's relations and acquaintances (for the most part--not counting the lower servants and the smoking shop keeper late in the story), she provides a strong range of voices and it is extraordinarily easy to keep the characters straight even though there are many of them. If I have any complaint on that score, it's that she goes a little overboard with the languid, listless tone for Randall Matthews. I do realize he's supposed to be the uninterested, sneering cousin--but she really overdoes it. I don't remember being quite so put off by his tone as it came to me off the page.

She is particularly good with the aunts, Gertrude and Harriet. Though I do think Gertrude gets short shrift in the story--she's the one who is the most honest and wants the truth to come out, no matter what it is. She knows her own mind and I only wish she weren't quite so abrasive. Strong female characters should be a good thing.

Overall, an excellent audio version of Heyer's novel. One I enjoyed quite a bit.
★★★ and a half for the audio edition. (rounded up here)

First posted on my blog My Reader's Block. ...more

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Jun 15, 2020 Michelle rated it really liked it · review of another edition

It’s not Agatha Christie but it’s significantly better than Patricia Went worth’s Miss Silver. All of Heyer’s deft touch with characters and dialogue on display here.

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Feb 26, 2018 Elena added it

The solution... Wow!

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Oct 26, 2011 Jenn Estepp rated it really liked it

Shelves: sleuths-and-gumshoes, libraries-are-great

Definitely my favorite of the Heyer mysteries, although it could just be that I'm more accustomed to her style now. And the fact that the books are way slow in the beginning. I would've paid good money for a character guide in this one and I managed to suss out the perpetrator, but it was a really fun ride and I loved Randall. ...more

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