Hopjoy Was Here (Flaxborough Chronicles, #3)

by Colin Watson

Within the quiet respectable market town of Flaxborough lurks a dangerous criminal: someone who has no compunction in committing horrific crimes. A secret agent has been murdered in unsavoury circumstances connected to an acid bath and it is up to Inspector Purbright to investigate, but it does not take long for two more operatives to arrive in Flaxborough looking for the same answers. How can one of their colleagues have been murdered in such a bland, provincial town? As ever Purbright must use all his skills as an investigator to get to the truth. Described by the Literary Review as 'wickedly funny,' Hopjoy was Here, the third in the Flaxborough series, was first published in 1962.

'[A] macabre and jolly English tale.' New Yorker

'Mr Watson has an unforgivably sharp eye for the ridiculous.' Anthony Boucher, New York Times

Faber Finds will be reissuing all the Flaxborough novels in sequence.

• ISBN10: 041337890X
• ISBN13: 9780413378903
• Publish Date: 2 June 1977 (first published May 1977)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 18 October 2003
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Methuen Publishing Ltd
• Edition: New edition
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 160
• Language: English

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally published on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

Hopjoy Was Here is the third in the Flaxborough Chronicles and another winner in Colin Watson's classic English crime procedural. Like the other books in the series, this entry sees Inspector Purbright on the hunt for a potential murderer. It's not immediately clear if there has been a murder, so Purbright & co. have to figure out what has happened and to whom. The author's incredibly dry humor and sense for the absurd is spot on and this book is really funny albeit macabre (see cover for this edition) in places.

This re-release, out 22 March, 2018 from Farrago is 160 pages. Originally published in 1962, this reformat and re-release is available in ebook and paperback formats. The plot is convoluted (in a good way) and the humor is wry and subtly sharp. For having been written over 50 years ago, it has aged very well and doesn't seem very dated at all in my opinion.

Colin Watson was a really masterful and precise author who wrote very enjoyable humorous books. This is one of them and well worth picking up.

Four stars, I liked it very much!

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes