The Ghost Fields by Elly Griffiths is one of her Dr Ruth Galloway mysteries and it was published in 2015. The setting is Norfolk where Ruth has been called in to help when a body is discovered in a World War 2 aeroplane which has been dug up by a man in a digger who is clearing a field prior to houses being built on it. The whole area had been peppered with US airfields during the war, Norfolk was the ideal location due to the extreme flatness of the county. Of course nothing is straightforward and so begins a mystery involving a local landowning family.
This is an enjoyable read, it was good to catch up with everyone again and a bit of a shock to realise that Ruth’s daughter Kate is at the stage of starting school already, but such is life as you’ll know if you’ve been down that road yourself.
The love lives of everyone involved in these books have just become even more of a mess. There’s nobody in a truly happy relationship although it looks like Cloughie might be on the right road, although I’m not holding my breath.
I’m looking forward to reading the next one in the series which I think is called The Woman in Blue.
One mild annoyance is that aeroplane hangar is spelled hanger – silly.
Katrina,
I don’t think that the misspelling of hangar is a minor thing. It is what one of my writer friends calls an “eye bump” as you are reading along. It is, indeed, a sign of very poor editing and proofreading, which, unfortunately is becoming more and more and more common.
This series intrigues me. And Norfolk!! So many books I’ve been reading lately have been set in East Anglia, or have characters travelling there. So now, as always, I feel I must go before too much more time has passed. So many, many ancestors of mine from Norfolk and Suffolk, in particular–those Puritans coming over from 1620-1640.
I like it that P.D. James sets many of her books in East Anglia. A way to travel vicariously.
Judith,
You’re right but I’ve become so used to mistakes in books. I don’t think editors and proofreaders even exist nowadays.
Even now people in Norfolk have a reputation for being a bit odd. Obviously a lot of them felt they didn’t fit in and felt the need to up sticks and set sail for America – very brave, or just crazy! I must say that I quite like that area of England – Suffolk too. Norfolk is very flat though. I think that travelling via books is so much better than the real thing – no airport or port problems involved.
I just finished her latest book, The Dark Angel. I enjoyed it, as I have all of the Ruth Galloway series. However, interesting you should mention the misspelling of ‘hangar’. In the First U.S. edition of The Dark Angel, the edition I read, I was annoyed and distracted because it had clearly not been proofread, just run through some type of spell check. I counted over 20 instances of using ‘than’ for ‘they’ or ‘that’ and several ‘double words’ (words that shouldn’t be there). I was so annoyed that I sent an e-mail to the publisher and asked it they’d fired all their proofreaders. (I am turning into a cranky old woman!) I got a response asking if I’d provide page numbers for the errors. I replied that I didn’t have the inclination to do their job or the time to re-read the book. What is publishing becoming?!
Joan,
It infuriates me because most authors are very poorly paid by publishers and as they don’t seem to be employing editors or proofreaders – where is all the money going?! A while ago I emailed a magazine here offering my services as a proofreader as it was absolutely full of mistakes. Needless to say I didn’t get a reply from them! I suppose Jack is doing their job for them as every book he reads he sticks a piece of paper in to mark every page that has a mistake. Sometimes the book ends up bristling with paper. Then when he reviews the book he lists them all and has a good old moan about them.