Something Wicked
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Product Description
Daily Mail, review
A really well-crafted and charming mystery story
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
"'This is a witty and meticulous recreation of the class-ridden middle England of the 1930s... a perfect example of golden-age mystery traditions with the cobwebs swept away, for the many readers who like their sleuthing elegant and their sex and violence concealed behind the curtains.' Guardian"
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
20 of 26 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I did not finish this book. I have read the rest of the series and found them intriguing and entertaining. Obviously they are going to be compared with Dorothy L Sayers' Peter Wimsey stories - aristocratic sleuth with girlfriend not so high up the social scale but independent. Setting this aside and judging it on its merits I did not find this book to be as good as the rest of the series. I had worked out who the murderer was almost as soon as he appeared and felt the circumstances in which Edward found himself to be a little too obviously contrived to fit the plot. Period details were as usual authentic, but the story lacked this author's usual sparkle. I shall not give up however and will read the next one. If you are thinking of trying this series don't start with this one - try 'Hollow Crown' or 'Dangerous Sea'.
Format:Paperback
Summer 1938, the Henley Regatta, and the circumstances leading up to both Lord Edward Corinth and his lady love, Verity Browne, being in attendance are unpleasant, to say the least. Verity has returned from an assignment for the Communist Party in Prague suffering from TB, and Edward has been plunged into a murder mystery due to a connection with a dead dentist and a cryptic message left at the scene containing the Corinth coat of arms.
As luck, or fate, would have it, a former acquaintance of Edward's, now a Lord himself, has a house near Henley, where Verity is sent to recuperate from her illness, and it's also the place where three murders - classed as accident or suicide - have occurred. So off he goes to investigate...
Though I do agree with a couple of the other reviews that parts of the plot are a little contrived, it's still a good read. The reader is plunged into the action right from the off, and the pace is pretty much maintained all the way through, apart from a few instances at the clinic where Verity is recuperating. Intertwined with the investigation into the murders is the ever-present threat of war from Nazi Germany, and a former nasty customer involved in the Reich who's decided that Edward and Verity have got in his way one too many times.
I found there was a nostalgic air to this story, not only in the understanding and comparison of class in 1930's England, but also in the realisation that for a lot of the men rowing with such pride for club or country, this would be the last time they would ever be at such leisure. There is also the changes to Verity caused by her illness and the gentle theme of realising your mortality has its effects on her, too, which was interesting to read.
Even if you do guess the murderer, it's still well worth reading, just for Roberts' addictive way of drawing you into a story, and a time of the past forever lost.
As luck, or fate, would have it, a former acquaintance of Edward's, now a Lord himself, has a house near Henley, where Verity is sent to recuperate from her illness, and it's also the place where three murders - classed as accident or suicide - have occurred. So off he goes to investigate...
Though I do agree with a couple of the other reviews that parts of the plot are a little contrived, it's still a good read. The reader is plunged into the action right from the off, and the pace is pretty much maintained all the way through, apart from a few instances at the clinic where Verity is recuperating. Intertwined with the investigation into the murders is the ever-present threat of war from Nazi Germany, and a former nasty customer involved in the Reich who's decided that Edward and Verity have got in his way one too many times.
I found there was a nostalgic air to this story, not only in the understanding and comparison of class in 1930's England, but also in the realisation that for a lot of the men rowing with such pride for club or country, this would be the last time they would ever be at such leisure. There is also the changes to Verity caused by her illness and the gentle theme of realising your mortality has its effects on her, too, which was interesting to read.
Even if you do guess the murderer, it's still well worth reading, just for Roberts' addictive way of drawing you into a story, and a time of the past forever lost.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I think the reasons this book fails are
1/. The motives for the psychopathic villain were just not credible.
2/. Too muddled.
3/. Implausible plot , too much a pastiche of the wilder plot lines of Agatha Christie.
There wasn't enough well -researched historical description, which is what lifts his other books above the run of the mill.
Whole book just felt a bit lazy.
1/. The motives for the psychopathic villain were just not credible.
2/. Too muddled.
3/. Implausible plot , too much a pastiche of the wilder plot lines of Agatha Christie.
There wasn't enough well -researched historical description, which is what lifts his other books above the run of the mill.
Whole book just felt a bit lazy.
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