Tag Archives: thriller

Lady Living Alone by Norah Lofts – British Library Women Writers series

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Lady Living Alone Book Cover

Lady Living Alone by Norah Lofts was first published in 1945 but the setting is mainly the 1930s. It is just about to be reprinted by British Library in their Women Writers series. This is one of four novels that Lofts wrote under the name Peter Curtis.

I read quite a lot of Norah Lofts books back in the 1970s, but they were all historical romances. This one begins as a domestic novel with the usual problems of finding and keeping domestic servants.

Penelope Shadow seems to be well named, she’s quite shy and retiring, so when she bought a typewriter and started to write novels people were surprised to discover that they were being published and in fact were being very well received, making her a lot of money. This means that she will be able to buy a home of her own, in recent years Penelope had  been staying with her older half sister who was a widow with children. It’s only when Penelope tells her sister of her plans that she realises that her sister had been doing her a favour in allowing Penelope to live with her, and had really put her own plans on hold.

An old house is quickly purchased, it’s rural, a bit of a lonely situation, and as Penelope is frightened to stay in a house on her own it’s not really a good choice for her, but she loves the house. It’s only when she is left on her own in it that she realises she still has a phobia about being on her own in a house.

When she meets a young man who seems to be capable of solving all domestic problems she hires him as a housekeeper/man of all work, that should solve the problem of her being on her own in the house. Terry is a young Irishman, not much more than a boy really, and he has been drifting from job to job, he’s very happy to move in to the house, it’s well paid and he’s really his own boss. For Penelope all her problems are over – or are they just beginning?

This one turns from being a domestic tale to a thriller, albeit quite late on in the book, but it’s an enjoyable read with twists and turns. The book has an Afterword by Simon Thomas and I must say that I appreciate the extras such as the mini Lofts bio and the interesting tidbits of information on what was going on during the 1940s.

My thanks to British Library for sending me a copy of this book in return for a review.

The Spider-Orchid by Celia Fremlin

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The Spider-Orchid by Celia Fremlin was first published in 1977. I suppose that means it’s vintage crime – astonishingly!

This one is I suppose a psychological thriller, that means that for me it was an uncomfortable read, it’s certainly not cosy crime. Also it takes a very long time for an actual crime to take place, despite all that, it’s a very good read – at the end anyway.

Adrian has recently been divorced from his wife Peggy after she declared that she couldn’t stand it any longer. What she couldn’t stand was Adrian’s long term affair with a woman called Rita. Adrian is amazed as he didn’t even realise that Peggy had been aware of his affair, despite him flaunting Rita around the local neighbourhood and even in front of friends and work colleagues.

Living in a rented flat on his own is ideal for Adrian, with just a few visits from Rita a week, he’s happier living on his own, but Sundays are sacrosanct, that’s when his daughter spends the day with him. When Rita decides to move in Adrian is not at all happy, but he only has himself to blame as he has been agreeing with Rita for years that it would be wonderful if they could be together all the time. He’s aghast, especially when it transpires that Rita is very much against the existence of Amelia his daughter.

Ultimately I enjoyed this one because for me the ending went in the right direction, but for a lot of the time the plot was a bit of a worry!

It’s a quick read at just 176 pages.

 

 

The Wild Coast by Lin Anderson

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The Wild Coast by Lin Anderson was published in 2023. It’s the first book I’ve read by the author, but she has written lots which feature Rhona MacLeod as a forensic scientist.

It begins in Arisaig, an idyllic setting in the North-West Highlands of Scotland, a very remote area. A young woman has driven there in her camper van and it transpires that she has taken the chance to leave her violent partner while he is out of the country. She has the bruises to show for it, but is attempting to cover them up with make-up. Stopping at a small camp site which is mainly used by just a few wild campers she’s reticent about communicating with the few other campers around, so when she disappears overnight nobody even knows what her name was.

But just before that happens a shallow grave has been found in the machar (grassland) on the edge of the camp. It’s the body of a young woman and bizarrely there’s a figure of a stick man alongside her in the grave. There’s also a stick man figure in the campervan, but the grave is around two months old, so it’s not the missing woman from the campervan. Rhona MacLeod is called in to dig up the body in the grave and gather as much forensic evidence as possible.

The setting changes to Glasgow where there are rumours of corrupt police officers sexually assaulting young students and it looks like Rhona’s close colleague McNab is involved – or is he?

Most of the male characters in this book are truly obnoxious and at one point I wondered if it would ever feature any men who weren’t monsters, although if I’m recalling correctly the reader is never actually in the room when women are being physically abused.

As ever I enjoyed the Scottish setting and it was good to have so many mentions of my old stomping ground of Glasgow’s west end. I’ll definitely read more in this series, but I imagine that if you have suffered from abusive and coercive men in the past then you probably won’t want to read this one.

 

Redheads at the Chalet School by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer

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Redheads at the Chalet School by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer was first published in 1964, but my copy is a very recent reprint by Girls Gone By.  This one is a bit of a departure from the usual Chalet School series as it’s more of a thriller than boarding school story.

It begins with Flavia and her step-father travelling on a train on the way to the Chalet School. Flavia has red hair and most people call her Copper for that reason, but her step-father explains she must use her real name at school and she has been enrolled under her original surname, instead of her step-father’s surname.

Flavia’s step-father is a policeman and one of his investigations has led to the hanging of a member of a vicious gang. The other gang members have sworn to get their own back on him, Flavia’s life is in danger, but to begin with she doesn’t know that.  The headmistress has been given all the information though.

From almost the beginning it’s obvious that there are nefarious characters hot on the track of Flavia, they know that they’re looking for a girl with red hair, but there are several such lucky girls at the school. Inevitably the wrong girl is nabbed! But of course all ends well eventually.

I enjoy these Girls Gone By reprints, there’s usually a short story at the end by a contemporary Girls Gone By writer.  In this case it’s  An Inspector Calls by Lisa Townsend. There’s also a few pages about the publishing history, notes on the text, and at the very beginning there’s a bit by Ruth Jolly about the apparently fairly regular appearance of girls with red hair attending The Chalet School,  there are more of them than would be expected in society. She also mentions other characters with red hair in literature, and that old chestnut that redheads are supposed to have a fiery temper, which of course had me rolling my eyes as a redhead myself, or as my mother described me – a strawberry blonde.

I almost feel a blogpost coming on about walking in a person’s shoes, because unless you have red hair you have no idea what it’s like! It is the only prejudice which is quite happily allowed nowadays, and features in TV adverts, where derogatory comments about skin colour definitely aren’t tolerated.

 

Natasha’s Will by Joan Lingard

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Natasha’s Will by Joan Lingard was first published in 2020. It was a Federation of Children’s Book Groups’ Pick of the Year. I must admit that I’ve never heard of that group. It’s a very quick read at just 166 pages.

This is a dual time and place setting. It begins in contemporary Scotland where Natasha has just recently died. She had been over 90 and had been cared for in her own home by family friends of generations’ standing.  Natasha had started life in St Petersburg where she had a very privileged life – until the revolution in 1917. After a lot of difficulty danger and disasters Natasha and her mother had managed to make their way out of Russia and eventually ended up in Scotland, along with Eugenie, a friend who marries a Scot.

Years later it’s Eugenie’s family that look after Natasha in her own home until she dies. Natasha had always said that she was going to leave the family her house, but her will can’t be found anywhere, and it’s thought that she didn’t actually get around to writing it. It’s a disaster for the family, especially when Natasha’s official next of kin turns up to claim his inheritance. This was a good read with plenty of tension although I was pretty sure  that everything would turn out right in the end.

As ever it’s a plus when you know the locations and I was happy to be able to recognise St Petersburg as well as Scotland. I didn’t know anything about this book when I saw it in a charity bookshop in Edinburgh, but I’ve started to collect Lingard’s books whenever I see them, which isn’t that often, even in her hometown of Edinburgh.

 

Comes the Blind Fury by Douglas Rutherford – 20 Books of Summer 2023

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Comes the Blind Fury by Douglas Rutherford was first published in 1950.

Harry Forsythe and Paddy Regan had been in the army together in WW2 and they have been having a bit of a hard time settling into civilian life at the end of it all, they decided to set up a detective agency. They were just beginning to think that it was a mistake as they had no clients at all, when one turned up in the shape of Angela Dove, a young woman who was worried about her brother Robert. He had gone to France and Angela hadn’t been able to contact him at all. She’s worried as their step-father is a wealthy businessman, and she suspects that someone might have kidnapped Robert.

Harry gets the job of going to Paris to try to track Robert down, but his subsequent phone call to Paddy ends abruptly and Paddy fears the worst.  Of course Paddy has to follow his partner to Paris to see what has happened.

I don’t want to say much more about the plot, but it features Scotland Yard and a chase to Zurich. I really enjoyed this thriller, I think it’s the first book that I’ve read by Douglas Rutherford whose bio on the back of this Penguin crime reads like one of those spoof bios you sometimes see. He was a Counter-Intelligence Officer in WW2 and that background in espionage and international crime obviously gave him the ideas for his writing career.

I must say though that whenever I read about a private detective and a young female client I inevitably think of Bogart and Bacall, but this book doesn’t seem to have been made into a film.

In Pursuit of Clarinda by Mabel Esther Allan – 20 Books of Summer 2023

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In Pursuit of Clarinda by Mabel Esther Allan was first published in 1966 but it was reprinted by Greyladies in 2018, This one is aimed at young adults or teenagers.

Lucy lives in London in a flat close to Hyde Park with her parents, but as they are on holiday she has been left on her own, and all of her friends are away on holiday too. She’s feeling quite lonely so decides to take a book to the park. While there she gets into conversation with a young girl who is lame. Clarinda turns out to be 20 years old although she doesn’t look it, she’s already engaged, but her fiance is touring in Scotland and can’t be contacted easily.  Clarinda is an orphan and she’s having to live with an uncle who has been made her guardian until she turns 21. He’s refusing to allow the young couple to marry and Clarinda is sure that her aunts and uncles are on a mission to murder her and claim the large amount of money she has been left by her father.

Obviously Lucy feels that she has to help but the aunts and uncles always seem to be one jump ahead. When Clarinda disappears unexpectedly with her aunt and uncle Clarinda feels she has to confide in her next door neighbour William and his sister Della ends up joining them in a bid to track down Clarinda. The quest takes them through Yorkshire and into rural Wales.

I enjoyed this one which I think you could classify as a thriller with a dash of romance. It has an interesting and entertaining introduction by Scott Thompson of Furrowed Middlebrow fame.

 

The Blotting Book by E.F. Benson

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The Blotting Book by E.F. Benson was first published in 1908 but I read a reprint by Vintage Books which was published in 2013. I don’t think I had even realised that Benson had written crime fiction although when we visited Lamb House in Rye, where he used to live, I noticed that there was a bookcase jam-packed with books that he had written, and he had written a lot more than the Mapp and Lucia series, which I loved.

Mrs Assheton is a wealthy widow who dotes on her only child Morris. He’s just turned 22 and his father’s will stipulated that his lawyers would have control of Morris’s money until he was 24 – or until he got married, when he would need access to his money to set up his own home. As it happens Morris is in love with Madge who lives nearby. She’s rather well-heeled herself and Morris is nervous about ‘popping the question’.

So when Morris discovers that one of the partners of the law firm has been dropping poisonous lies into the ears of Madge’s father about him he’s naturally furious. It looks like his dreams of marrying Madge are in tatters.

This is a quick read at just 149 pages and it seems slow to begin with but the tension builds up bit by bit and I ended up liking it a lot more than I thought I would, so I’ll definitely read more of Benson’s crime fiction in the future.

A few years ago we visited Rye, where E.F. Benson lived and was the setting for the Mapp and Lucia books, we liked it so much we’re going back again. You might be interested in the blogposts I wrote about our visit. Henry James and Rumer Godden also lived in Lamb House over the years. You can see some photos of the town here and here.

The Chestnut Man by Soren Sveistrup

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The Chestnut Man by Soren Sveistrup was first published in 2019 and it was translated from Danish by Caroline Waight. I think it’s the first Scandi Noir book that I’ve read and I borrowed it from the library so that I could take part in a Scandi meme which involved reading five books, I already have books at home by Finnish and Icelandic authors and I thought this would spur me on to read more over 2023, then I realised that the project was just for January! Oh well, I’ll be doing my own wee Scandi reading project over this year anyway.

The setting is Copenhagen where the body of a young woman has been found, minus one hand. It seems that the killer has left his calling card in the shape of a little ‘man’ made from chestnuts and matchsticks. More of them turn up at crime scenes and it’s obvious that there’s a serial killer around. It seems that the killer might be somehow linked to the disappearance of the young daughter of a politician the previous year, her body had never been found, but the police think they have solved the case, did they get the wrong man?

Naia Thulin has been assigned to the case and she has been given a new partner. Mark Hess has just been thrown out of Europol for some mysterious reason, and nobody is impressed with him, as far as they’re concerned he’s damaged goods.

I’m not sure if ‘enjoy’ is the correct word to use in relation to this reading experience. I like the plot and some of the characters, but it was just a wee bit too gruesome for me, – but then that was no real surprise, having watched The Killing on TV, and that was written by this author.

The Doll’s House by Evelyn Anthony

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The Doll’s House by Evelyn Anthony was first published in 1992. I read a lot of Evelyn Anthony’s books back in the 1970s, those ones seemed to mainly feature Germany and Nazis if I’m recalling correctly, but The Doll’s House begins in 1990s London where Rosa Bennet works for the Foreign Office, she’s quite a high-flyer and is focused on her career, much to the chagrin of her husband who wants to start a family. Inevitably the marriage collapses.

Rosa is expecting to be sent to Brussels by the Foreign Office, it looks like she’ll eventually become a diplomat, but before that she’s sent undercover on a mission to a posh hotel. The running of the hotel has recently been taken over by a man who had been working as a spy for Britain but after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War he had been pensioned off at the age of just 52, with his espionage skills no longer needed. His old bosses had felt it necessary to check out that he was indeed settling down to ordinary life in the hotel industry.

Rosa gets dragged into the violence of Middle Eastern politics, and an unexpected romance.

This is quite a suspenseful thriller, but I preferred the World War 2 related plots of her earlier books.