Murder After Christmas (British Library Crime Classics, #96)

by Rupert Latimer

Martin Edwards (Introduction)

“A war’s on and a murder has been committed—and we sit here talking nonsense about almond whirls and mince pies!”

Good old Uncle Willie—rich, truculent and seemingly propped up by his fierce willpower alone—has come to stay with the Redpaths for the holidays. It is just their luck for him to be found dead in the snow on Boxing Day morning, dressed in his Santa Claus costume and seemingly poisoned by something in the Christmas confectionery. As the police flock to the house, Willie’s descendants, past lovers and distant relatives are drawn into a perplexing investigation to find out how the old man met his fate, and who stands to gain by such an unseasonable crime.

First published in 1944, Murder After Christmas is a lively riot of murder, mince pies and misdirection, cleverly twisting the tropes of Golden Age detective fiction to create a pacey, light-hearted package admirably suited for the holiday season.

• ISBN13: 9780712353892
• Publish Date: 10 October 2021
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: British Library Publishing
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 320
• Language: English

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally posted on my blog Nonstop Reader.

Murder After Christmas is an irreverent classic murder mystery by Rupert Latimer curated by Martin Edwards. First published in 1944, this reformat and re-release by Poisoned Pen Press as part of the British Library Crime Classics series was published in Oct 2022. It's 352 pages and is available in paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

This is a lighthearted historical country house mystery set in 1944 England as the hostilities in Europe are blazing up in earnest. The author has peopled the scenes with a repulsive and irascible "uncle", a selection of characters of various backgrounds and levels of wealth, sprinkled in a murder, lots of secrets, and stirred well with murder the inevitable result.

It's banter filled but not always in a good way. It hearkens back to the days of witty repartee drawing room comedies of the stage. I honestly found much of the dialogue forced and found myself (after a while) reading the lines as if they were read by actors in a play in the plummiest of accents in my head, but it did nothing for the narrative as a whole.

The mystery, resolution, and denouement are fairly well constructed, if straightforward and heavily foreshadowed. It's the dialogue and relentlessly, almost frenetically, "witty" writing which I found wearying. I would recommend it to die-hard fans of period mysteries, but this book in particular won't be for all readers.

There are two standout aspects which elevated this well into "worthwhile read" for me.... first, that the author (whose life was tragically cut short) was absolutely hitherto unknown to me in any way which intrigued me, as I read boatloads of interwar and golden age British crime. The second aspect was that as always with the books in this series, the introduction and historical notes by mystery maven Martin Edwards was well worth the price of admission.

Three and a half stars. It's a very very light read and will entertain folks who enjoy golden age country house mysteries. I do highly recommend this series and Mr. Edwards' writing in general.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.