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A Spoonful of Murder - J M Hall

 

Description

Introducing the three unlikeliest sleuths you'll ever meet…

Every Thursday, three retired school teachers have their ‘coffee o’clock’ sessions at the Thirsk Garden Centre café.

But one fateful week, as they are catching up with a slice of cake, they bump into their ex-colleague, Topsy.

By the next Thursday, Topsy’s dead.
 
The last thing Liz, Thelma and Pat imagined was that they would become involved in a murder.
 
But they know there’s more to Topsy’s death than meets the eye – and it’s down to them to prove it…

Sit down with a cup of tea and this perfectly witty, page-turning cosy crime novel. Fans of Agatha Christie, Death in Paradise and Midsomer Murders will be hooked from the very first page.

This audio edition includes an exclusive interview between J.M. Hall and Julie Hesmondhalgh.

Review

I listened to the audio version of this book. 

I loved Julie Hesmondhalgh narrating this book It really added to the cosy crime aspect and the subtle humour present throughout which she brought through so well when reading. Also it gave a different slant I think to the voices I would have had in my own head reading the book. 

All the characters were so believable and certainly were in my experience true to type for their ages. It wasn't until the book ended that I realised the author was a man. The voices of the women were so well written he has closely observed mannerisms and figures of speech. I found out at the end of the book that he is a primary school teacher and so he obviously drew a lot on that with the ladies all being retired teachers.

The book also relates to dementia and scams against the elderly. Again so very well written and true to life. I've been to most of the towns described in the book and I really liked that I could visualise where they were. 

If I had one tiny criticism about the audio is that I kept getting confused with who was speaking out of the three ladies. The name was soon mentioned though and I was able to follow the story. I would sum up this book as Agatha Christie meets Victoria Wood.

At the end of the audio the author read the acknowledgements and I really enjoyed this part and also the interview between him and the narrator. It brought so much more to the book and I hope other audios include something similar in the future.

I'm giving this book 4 out of 5 stars and my thanks to netgalley for the ARC of the audio to review.

The book is published 17 March 2022.


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