Review: The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

I recently posted my review of THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB by Richard Osman, on my library's Facebook page.

THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB is ‘National Treasure’ Richard Osman’s debut crime novel and a sequel is on its way. The titular club meets on a Thursday to discuss old/unsolved murder cases and the four current members are Elizabeth, newcomer Joyce, Ron and Ibrahim and they reside in Coopers Chase Retirement Village in leafy Kent.

They soon have a current murder to investigate when one of the builders of the Village is found bludgeoned to death shortly after an argument with his business partner.

Elizabeth, a former secret agent by all accounts, has fingers in many pies and that includes the local police force, following a routine visit from PC Donna who only went there to talk about home security.

Elizabeth is soon at work, getting Donna onto the Murder Squad led by DCI Chris with a view to both teams sharing information.

When a second murder occurs, it brings things closer to home as it seems a killer might live at the Village.

Will Team Elizabeth get to the truth before Team Donna?

This is a very enjoyable read. It’s funny and the characters are a joy. Often in amateur-detective novels the police are portrayed as a bit dim, but Donna and Chris are anything but. Indeed, all the characters are likeable including a few “lovable rogues”. The storytelling is breezy with short chapters and a variety of points of view, interspersed with diary entries from Joyce. It’s well plotted with mystery upon mystery with long-buried secrets reluctantly being revealed.

If you like the sound of this then you might also want to try Simon Brett’s Fethering books, and his Mrs Pargeter series.