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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
You're the top!, 10 May 2001
By A Customer
With this her 17th book, P.D. James once again executes an admirable balancing act by combining, in her definition of a classic detective story, "a credible mystery with believable characters and a setting which both complements and integrates the action." The setting is East Anglia, one used by James in a number of her novels. It is here on the gloomy, windswept Suffolk coast, within yards of the North Sea, that we find St. Anselm's, a small theological college with only four resident priests and a student body which never exceeds twenty. St. Anselm's is described as High Church, probably Prayer Book Catholic, strong on theology, elitist, opposed to practically everything that's happened in Anglicanism in the past 50 years . . . and the food and wine are good. It is the action's locus, of which the reader is well aware long before Detective Inspector Kate Miskin observes, "So, it's going to be one of those self-contained cases with all the suspects under one roof . . ."In "Death in Holy Orders," James gives us an apparent suicide (Ronald Treeves, ordinand), a certified natural death (Margaret Munroe, employee), and a brutal murder (Archdeacon Crampton, guest and trustee). Commander Adam Dalgliesh, who is brought to St. Anselm's at the request of Ronald Treeves's influential father, is convinced that the three deaths are connected. The Treeves and Munroe deaths occur before his arrival, but the murder of the unpopular Archdeacon takes place during Dalgliesh's stay at the college. Upon viewing the body, he becomes angered and vows to lift the burden of his past failure ("A Certain Justice") by making an arrest in the present murder. Soon after, yet another death (murder or accident?) broadens the challenge. Dalgliesh's presence throughout much of the book will be well-received by his admirers, and James further indulges his fans with what appears to be the promise of a new romance. And she carts out a cast of typically Jamesian characters: diverse, some pleasingly off-center, and all believable. The assemblage of deaths imbues the story with an aura of mystery from start to finish, which is intensified by the superb setting. All things considered, "Death in Holy Orders" is P.D. James at the top of her classic detective story game.
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