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Faber & Faber/Allen & Unwin, Dec 2007
Reviewed by Sally Roddom
Ten years after the events at Ffolkes Manor in THE ACT OF ROGER MURGATROYD,
retired Scotland Yard Chief-Inspector Trubshawe is having afternoon tea at
the Ritz hotel when he bumps into his collaborator on the case, mystery
novelist Evadne Mount. He ends up having lunch with her and then
accompanying her to see the actress Cora Rutherford, another character who
was at Ffolkes Manor. Cora has just got a part in a film and she invites
Trubshawe and Mount on to the set to watch the filming. There in front of
the whole film set, Cora drops dead after drinking poisoned champagne. The
intrepid duo are asked by Scotland Yard to get on the case and start to do
a bit of sleuthing. They soon realise that there are only five people who
knew that Cora was going to drink the wine. Only trouble is that none of
them had a motive to want Cora dead.
It seems to me that so many murder mysteries of today have psychopath
serial killers with blood dripping off axes and investigators who are
either alcoholic or suffering from ‘a past.’ A MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR OF STYLE
is a story that you can take refuge in and enjoy for the simple cleverness
that is lacking in so many mysteries today. Set in post-war London our
fearless investigators use brains and intelligence instead of computers to
solve the crime. Adair recreates the wonderful Golden era of mystery
writing, where blood splattered bodies are not spread from one side of the
room to the other, but left tidily in one spot. Gilbert Adair read all
sixty-six of Agatha Christie’s books before he commenced writing his
parody of her books. In fact she is cleverly mentioned in both
THE ACT OF ROGER
MURGATROYD and A MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR OF STYLE as a fellow author who is
disliked by Evadne Mount. I loved the Agatha Christie books – and I loved
this one – there are more red herrings than in a fishing boat – but the
resolution is perfectly satisfactory.
July 2008 review originally published on Murder and Mayhem
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