Murder From The Newsdesk
By Peter Bartram
Seven Crampton Of The Chronicle Mystery Stories
The Mystery Of The African Charity
The Mystery Of The Two Suitcases
The Mystery Of The Single Red Sock
The Mystery At The Beauregard Hotel
The Mystery Of The Precious Princess
The Mystery Of The Clothes On The Beach
The Mystery Of The Phantom Santa
9.25 / 10
I chose this book to read and review as part of the Crystal Lake Publishing Readers Book Club April challenge... and I'm glad I did.
Though it's a novella sized book of seven short stories there are two weightier tales, "The Mystery Of The African Charity" and "The Mystery Of The Phantom Santa". These bookend the much shorter stories and this is a brilliant layout as having the longest story at the beginning gives the reader a chance to familiarise themselves with the main characters, this, in turn, makes the shorter compositions more of a joyous quick romp, I say this as I pretty much devoured this book with a smile on my face; for that I thank you, Mr. Bartram.
Peter Bartram is an excellent writer with a steady and easily readable prose and narrative, who fills the whole story with observations and humour. I'll admit I'm not a big fan of writing in the first person, though Bartram is definitely a master of this style and crafts his words and characters so perfectly as to make them so believable they come off the page to live in your mind's eye.
Though I really enjoyed all the stories I particularly liked the second story "The Mystery Of The Two Suitcases" which goes to show how cunning and devious people can be.
Another thing I loved was that for most of the stories the clues are there for you to figure out; I didn't see or smell a single red herring. Though I tried, I never did quite figure it out, my detective skills must be slipping. The closest I got way in the last story... I was close, but not spot-on.
Even the book cover is as well thought-out as the mysteries within. Its simplicity and style actually drew me to the book. I notice the others in the series are in a similar style. Respect to the artist who designed them.
I am looking forward to reading the free novella Murder In Capital Letters and I will make an effort to read the other books in the Colin Crampton series. I really do like the idea of a crime reporter helping to solve a crime and the character is so well thought out and humorous it would be a shame not to read more.
If you like crime novels or just a good read you cannot go far wrong with this book.
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