Aberystwyth Mon Amour (The Aberystwyth Mysteries)

by Malcolm Pryce

Schoolboys are disappearing all over Aberystwyth and nobody knows why. Louie Knight, the town's private investigator, soon realizes that it is going to take more than a double ripple from Sospan, the philosopher cum ice-cream seller, to help find out what is happening to these boys and whether or not Lovespoon, the Welsh teacher, Grand Wizard of the Druids and controller of the town, is more than just a sinister bully. And just who was Gwenno Guevara?

• ISBN10: 0747557861
• ISBN13: 9780747557869
• Publish Date: 6 May 2002
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 5 March 2009
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
• Format: Paperback (A-Format (178x111 mm))
• Pages: 256
• Language: English
• URL: http://bloomsbury.com/Trade/

Reviews

[brokentune]

Well, this was different...

A noir-style mystery set in alternative version (one hopes!) of Aberystwyth, where a Druid mob silences its opposition by making them ... disappear or just kills about anyone who knows too much.

And all because the Grand Wizard is...
Ah. Hehe.

The mystery in this one started off intriguing. A schoolboy has disappeared. Then other schoolboys turn up dead. So, when Aberystwyth's finest ... and only ... private eye is hired to investigate, the mystery turns into a spoofy, yet, gritty detective story that tries and tries.

This issue I have is that I am not sure what it tried exactly.

The noir feel was there, certainly, but the spoofiness didn't really work for me. Maybe it was the lack of subtlety, maybe it was the abundance of schoolboy humour (gaah...), maybe it was abrupt (and somewhat predictable) ending. I don't know. What I do know is that this book made me want to pick up a Thursday Next novel again...which, btw, also features Wales in a special light, even tho slightly differently.

I'm glad I read this, and parts of the book were funny, but I'm not going to continue with the series.