Product Description

At Seamnum Court, seat of the Duke of Horton, The Lord Chancellor of England is murdered at the climax of a private presentation of Hamlet, in which he plays Polonius. Inspector Appleby pursues some of the most famous names in the country, unearthing dreadful suspicion. "REVIEW: 'Michael Innes is in a class by himself among writers of detective fiction' (Times Literary Supplement) AUTHBIO: John Innes Mackintosh Stewart was born in Edinburgh, educated at Oxford, and taught English in universities all over the world. His scholarly career includes successful works on Rudyard Kipling and Thomas Hardy, but he is better known as mystery writer Michael Innes, whose legendary character, Inspector John Appleby, inspired a lasting vogue for donnish detective fiction.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #53830 in Books
• Published on: 2001-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 316 pages

Customer Reviews

"The Croaking Raven Doth Bellow for Revenge"
With the exception of Gladys Mitchell, Michael Innes is unique in writing a string of masterpieces in rapid succession. This is the second, set at one of England's most Stately Homes, and featuring the memorable onstage murder of no less a person than the Lord Chancellor while acting in Hamlet. Naturally, international implications are rife, andn the P.M. is worried - a very young Appleby is sent down. Everything in the book is a sheer joy - a delight, making this a genuinely intelligent novel a book to be read slowly - to be savoured. As is common with Innes, it is much more than mere mathematical ingenuity. Innes was a novelist. The characters are wonderful, and, despite a huge cast (30 odd), memorable and separable. The detection is first-class: indepth, but entertaining, and never dull. The detection culminates in a brilliantly Innesian solution at the end of Part 3 - a dazzling firework display.

A Classic
Excellent murder story, of the Lord Chancellor no less, set in a huge Blenheim-Palace-like country house during a grand production of Hamlet in the great hall. Giles Gott appears again, as director of the play, and the cast has many upper-upper-crust characters. A spy element, but basically a good mystery. The Hamlet stuff is very good, as is Lady Elizabeth's method of hiding from the killer. The killer is also a fascinating study, and the misdirection by the author that also contains the solution. Gott, of course, comes up with a logically ingenious explanation that turns out to be completely wrong.