Rating: 5/5
Review:
Very enjoyable
I enjoyed this book very much – and far more than I expected
to. I grew tired of the Midsomer Murders
TV series a long time ago, but this is actually very different in tone and
character from what the series became.
The book is a very good novel of character with crime as its plot
driver.
A Ghost In the Machine is 550 pages long and I have to say
that the first third of the book was good but a bit of a plod sometimes. Caroline Graham paints intricate portraits of
her characters and their lives and we spend a long time getting to know them while
not much actually happens, but she does it very well and I did get quite involved
in them. The plot really begins to develop
with a death after almost 200 pages, and by that time I was pretty well
hooked. The story is well told and
pretty plausible, with the characters' behaviour very believable, which is by
no means always the case in such books.
By half way I was immersed and gripped and I enjoyed the second half
very much indeed – especially the lack of a ridiculous Cornered Killer Climax,
but a plausible, sensible denouement which was no less gripping.
Graham writes very well.
She has a fine understanding of her characters and their motivations and
there is genuine psychological insight here.
She paints some scathing portraits but others with genuine compassion
and depictions of goodness, all of which I found very realistic. The prose is a pleasure to read, with plenty
of pithy phrases like the man welcoming people to a spiritualist evening:
"He bared his teeth in a fearsome grimace of synthetic
friendliness." Or setting the scene
and character neatly with "Choosing her moment carefully, after Alan
Titchmarsh but before the snooker…"
It's excellent stuff. (Oh, and
you might be surprised by the real Sergeant Troy who, far from the lovable
character of the TV series, is a lecherous, ignorant bigot - excellently
portrayed.)
So, somewhat to my surprise, I can recommend this warmly as
a very good, involving novel of character as well as being a gripping crime
mystery.
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