'A true master of British crime writing' RICHARD OSMAN
'The brilliant Savernake is a fascinatingly enigmatic character.' WASHINGTON POST
A superb Golden Age mystery packed with twists, from the winner of the Diamond Dagger 2020
ENGLAND, 1930. Grieving widows are a familiar sight on London's Necropolis Railway. So when an elegant young woman in a black veil boards the funeral train, nobody guesses her true purpose.
But Rachel Savernake is not one of the mourners. She hopes to save a life – the life of a man who is supposed to be cold in the grave. But then a suspicious death on the railway track spurs her on to investigate a sequence of baffling mysteries: a death in a blazing car; a killing in a seaside bungalow; a tragic drowning in a frozen lake. Rachel believes that the cases are connected – but what possible link can there be?
Rich, ruthless and obsessed with her own dark notions of justice, she will not rest until she has discovered the truth. To find the answers to her questions she joins a house party on the eerie and remote North Yorkshire coast at Mortmain Hall, an estate. Her inquiries are helped – and sometimes hindered – by the impetuous young journalist Jacob Flint and an eccentric female criminologist with a dangerous fascination with perfect crimes...
Mortmain Hall is at once a gripping thriller and a classic whodunit puzzle: a Golden Age Gothic mystery, perfect for fans of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.
Reviews for Mortmain Hall:
'Maintains a cracking pace... Elegant period escapism' Mail on Sunday
'A classic whodunit' Daily Express
'Rachel Savernake is on spectacular form... A Miss Marple for the 21st century' Daily Mail
'Martin Edwards is a guru of the Golden Age... His work pays homage to the intricate puppetry and byzantine plotting popular in the period' The Times
Reviews for Martin Edwards:
'Superb – a pitch-perfect blend of Golden Age charm and sinister modern suspense, with a main character to die for. This is the book Edwards was born to write' Lee Child
'Edwards has managed, brilliantly, to combined a Golden Age setting with a pace that is bang up-to-date. A great sense of the era observed through a cut-throat-sharp eye, every page dripping with brilliant period authenticity' Peter James
'A ripping tale of retribution and rough justice, set against a finely realised 1930s London. It reads as if Ruth Rendell were channelling Edgar Wallace' Mick Herron
'Gripping' Peter Robinson
Mortmain Hall is the second book in the Rachel Savernake series by Martin Edwards. Released 22nd Sept 2020 by Poisoned Pen Press, it's 368 pages and available in paperback and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references throughout. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately. I've seen the series touted as an homage to the golden age of British detective fiction, and while it's certainly set in the interwar period in England, it didn't necessarily feel like it was of the period to me. It's very well crafted, with the hallmarks of the era (courtroom drama, skullduggery, genteel (and not so genteel) murder, suspects gathered together in a gloomy stately home), but the setting could have been any time from about 1920 to the present day (except for the capital punishment parts).
The plotting is rather slow, built up over time rather than explosive. The narrative arc is deliberate - stately even, and the denouement is less of a crescendo than an inescapable inevitability when it finally comes. There were a number of fairly outlandish plot twists which interfered with my suspension of disbelief, but in the end the plot threads resolve, the clues are deciphered, and the mysteries are solved.
There is very little background information provided by the author, so the book (in my opinion) doesn't work very well as a standalone. I do recommend the series and the author, so reading the first volume will reward diligent readers.
Four stars. Not classic golden age, but quite readable (and edgy with a sort of noir vibe).
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
