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Angel with Two Faces (Hardcover)

by Nicola Upson (Author)
3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
RRP: £12.99
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Product details

  • Hardcover: 432 pages
  • Publisher: Faber and Faber (2 Jul 2009)
  • ISBN-10: 0571237959
  • ISBN-13: 978-0571237951
  • Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.8 x 4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 20,358 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

Within a relatively short period, Nicola Upson has established herself as one of the most inventive and unusual of crime writers, marrying a sure storytelling grip to a non-pareil skill at evoking both period atmosphere and English locales. However – as Angel with Two Faces comprehensively demonstrates -- her real coup lies in her canny utilisation of a classic English writer, Josephine Tey (of The Franchise Affair and The Daughter of Time fame) as the protagonist of her books. And, what’s more, doing full justice to her much-loved predecessor's memory; it’s easy to feel that Tey herself would be delighted with these fictitious imaginings of her life an investigative figure.

The first book in the series, An Expert in Murder, was acclaimed by no less a figure in the field than PD James (admittedly, a stablemate at the same publisher), and this second outing maintains the quality of the first. Set against a strongly realised Cornish landscape, Upson begins her tale with death of a young man in the Loe Pool while on a riding excursion. Archie Penrose, a policeman whose family are the custodians of the estate, looks at the death askance – particularly when another young man goes missing, and a village prelate falls to his death from a nearby cliff. Josephine Tey, a friend of Archie Penrose, finds her wish for a quiet holiday banished when she becomes involved in a grim and baffling mystery.

The interaction between the duo here is delightfully handled, and the metaphor they adopt – death as an angel with two faces looking at both past and present -- is as allusive and strange as the narrative itself. Let’s hope Nicola Upson has more plans for the imaginary amateur detective life of Josephine Tey. --Barry Forshaw



Product Description

Inspector Archie Penrose has invited Josephine Tey to his family home in Cornwall, a struggling but beautiful country estate on a magnificent stretch of coastline. Still haunted by the dark events of the year before - depicted in An Expert in Murder - and disillusioned with the London stage, Josephine is ready to begin work on her second mystery novel and finds much to inspire her in the landscape and its legends - in particular, a lake on the estate which is said to claim a life every seven years, and the nearby Minack Theatre, an open-air auditorium which overlooks the sea. But death clouds the holiday from the outset: Josephine's arrival coincides with the funeral of a young estate worker, killed in a mysterious riding accident, and another local boy disappears shortly afterwards. When the Minack proves to be a stage for real-life tragedy and an audacious murder, Archie's loyalties are divided between his friends and his job, and he and Josephine must confront the violent reality which lies beneath a seemingly idyllic community - a community with one face turned towards the present, and another looking back to the crimes of the past.
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Customer Reviews

42 Reviews
5 star:
 (11)
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 (13)
3 star:
 (12)
2 star:
 (2)
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Average Customer Review
3.6 out of 5 stars (42 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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32 of 36 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Atmospheric golden age style thriller, 28 Jul 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
The setting is Cornwall summer 1935 and Josephine Tey the crime writer is on holiday at the invitation of her friend police Inspector Archie Penrose. Before Tey even arrives, a local man has been killed in a riding accident and a local boy is missing. Soon after another tragedy occurs at the scenic Minack Theatre and Penrose is asked to investigate this murder.

This novel has recreated the golden age of crime fiction writing with a very contemporary feel. The writing is polished, very descriptive and atmospheric with full rounded characters which are flawed and very real. Cornwall itself is a major character here and the beauty of the Cornish landscape is conveyed here in breathtaking prose.

The main theme running through the book is relationships. The characters relationships with each other and even with the geographic landscape in which they were born drive the plot.

This novel is a tribute both to the golden age of crime writing and Cornwall. I haven't read the novel previous to this, but I don't think it's necessary. This novel will work as a stand alone but I will be seeking out the first novel and look forward to more in this series.
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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Amateurish writing made bingo more exciting, 30 Aug 2009
By Dr. K. E. Patrick (England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
I did not like this book.

I took it with me on holiday, on a two-week cruise, and looked for any excuse to set it aside. I really only kept going with it because I had to review it for the Vine programme.

So, what was so bad? Apart from the unbelievable attempts to set it in the 1930s and the over-wrought, melodramatic revelations that other reviewers have noted, I must say that I nearly didn't get past the first chapter because the writing itself was so poor.

First of all, viewpoints shifted constantly. Second, the sentence structure was monotonous with poor pacing. Third, the main characters -- the Scotland Yard detective back home on holiday, and his crime-writing girlfriend from Scotland -- responded and reacted but didn't make anything happen themselves. In fact, they didn't even work out the mystery for themselves!

However, most unforgivable of all, the author insisted on telling instead of showing. This was most obvious with perhaps the only interesting character of an uninteresting bunch -- the supposedly half-wit teenager named Loveday. Constantly, we were reminded how she was a bit loopy in the head and living in a dream world, and yet, anytime the crime-writing girlfriend, Josephine Tey, spoke to her, Loveday seemed a more reliable witness than anyone else.

By the time I finally reached the end, I was bored by the entangled relationships experienced in that town, and had no empathy for anyone -- neither those left standing nor those who were otherwise dispatched.

It really was hard work, and I would not be interested in reading another book by this author until her writing style improves.
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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars "We makes our own entertainment down 'ere", 26 Aug 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
Far from being tranquil and dull, it appears that 1930's Cornwall was
a hotbed of lust, homosexuality, rape, arson, murder, incest, underage sex and wife beating. I feared that the farm animals would be next.

Just one or two of these dramatic secrets would have been enough for any one story, but they're packed into this book to an extent that makes you wonder if its set in a village or a lunatic asylum. I particularly liked the dastardly vicar (brother of the saintly squire) who stalks the churchyard twirling his moustaches when he's not forcing parishioners to their knees to perform unspeakable acts, the local wise woman who pops up everywhere being wise and the Ophelia who floats through the village, mad in white linen. Most of the characters have similar depth and definition and I expected a young man to burst through the French windows shouting "anyone for tennis" at the same time as tea was offered to the vicar.

Seriously, this book would benefit from a few less revelations of age old family secrets, which all the locals seem to be bursting to tell outsiders who've been there less than a couple of days and a bit more attention to characterisation. The attitudes of the main characters are anachronistic if this was a serious attempt to recreate the thirties. I can remember the revulsion towards homosexuality in the 1960s, and this is 30 years earlier, the calm acceptance by the main characters of this and all the other shattered taboos just do not ring true.

Despite all of the above, its a readable book and Upton can write, but the appropriation of Josephine Tey's name leads to expectations that it will live up to her elegant and ingenious Inspector Grant books, "The Franchise Affair" and "The Daughter of Time". Instead this is too long, too melodramatic and not a patch on Dorothy L Sayers or Josephine Tey.

3 stars because the story was readable, but I didn't care about the characters because they didn't feel real.



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Most Recent Customer Reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars A disappointing follow up
I had thoroughly enjoyed the first Josephine Tey book and had eagerly awaited the second one. Sadly I was very disappointed with this one. Read more
Published 22 days ago by slb

3.0 out of 5 stars Angel of Death
Where to start. Nicola Upson writes a fine novel. The story is engaging, the plot imaginative, the settings evocative, the characters not. Read more
Published 26 days ago by Donald Thompson

4.0 out of 5 stars Think Midsommer Murders - Just with more weirdoes!
It took a while to get into this for similar reasons to those already mentioned, in particular the overwhelming intrigues peppered though the books, you almost long for a... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Mr. M. P. Duffy

1.0 out of 5 stars Golden Age shouldn't mean boring
I'm sorry but I just couldn't get into this book - the other reviews mention atmospheric golden age and harking back to a golden age of crime writing. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Bridget O

3.0 out of 5 stars Atmospheric and worthwhile but heavy going in places
Having read and thoroughly enjoyed Josephine Tey's classic The Franchise Affair a few years ago and being a Mebyon Kernow (son of Cornwall), I was certainly predisposed to like... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Cartimand

5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling Mystery
I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

The narrative is concerned with the events that occur on and around an apparently idyllic Cornish country estate in the 1930's. Read more
Published 2 months ago by AHW Rea

4.0 out of 5 stars Predictable but not!!!!
I found it easy to figure out the secrets that weren't spoken by the cornish villagers so I thought that this was going to be a fairly predictable book but the secrets were the... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Suzanne Moore

4.0 out of 5 stars A good pudding, slightly over-egged
Nicola Upson playfully has her Josephine Tey reflecting that writing detective novels is as disciplined as writing sonnets. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Francis Norton

3.0 out of 5 stars Upson Downs
If you are a fan of the classic English "Whodunnit", where clues to the identity of a fiendish murderer who has upset the idyllic charm of a bucolic village community are... Read more
Published 2 months ago by J. J. O'neill

3.0 out of 5 stars Two faces sometimes look in too many directions
This is a book which delivers in some aspects, particularly the rich descriptions of a Cornwall which harks back to a more feudal way of living. Rich cornwall descriptions. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Kirba

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