Murder at Mallowan Hall

By: Colleen Cambridge

Libby audiobook 9 hours

Read by: Jennifer M. Dixon

Published: 2021

Genre: mystery

 

I need to start with what I liked: the era / setting, some of the characters, the mystery aspect.

 

Here's what bugged me:

 

1.  It irritates me when I look for an Agatha Christie audiobook and I get a result like this. I've read one other like this (about Agatha Christie's mysterious disappearance in 1926), but can't find my blog entry. I thought I'd give this book a try, but it's no Christie book!
2. Phyllida Bright is not a very inspiring protagonist. She is an amateur detective who trash talks the actual law enforcement. And she doesn't like dogs!!!
3. When she got to her denouement, it just went on and on and on. I was like some of the characters, asking if it was almost over yet. (I wrote "make it end!" on my note sheet in my car.)
   
4. The author goes out of her way to make the point that illicit homosexual intimate photos are nothing untoward and it's sad that society doesn't see things that way. Why make the photos a central plot point, then? 

 

I liked Bradford the chauffeur a lot, though I was certain he was going to turn out to be an undercover officer. No such luck. I liked his surliness and the black puppy he brought in at the end! 

Summary from Libby and Google Books:

"Tucked away among Devon’s rolling green hills, Mallowan Hall combines the best of English tradition with the modern conveniences of 1930. Housekeeper Phyllida Bright manages the large household with an iron fist in her very elegant glove. In one respect, however, Mallowan Hall stands far apart from other picturesque country houses. For the manor is home to archaeologist Max Mallowan and his famous wife—Agatha Christie…

Phyllida is both loyal to and protective of the crime writer, who is as much friend as employer. An aficionado of detective fiction, Phyllida has yet to find a gentleman in real life half as fascinating as Mrs. Agatha’s Belgian hero, Hercule Poirot. But though accustomed to murder and its methods as frequent topics of conversation, Phyllida is unprepared for the sight of a very real, very dead body on the library floor…

It soon becomes clear that the victim arrived at Mallowan Hall under false pretenses during a weekend party. And when another dead body is discovered—this time, one of her housemaids—Phyllida decides to follow in M. Poirot’s footsteps to determine which of the Mallowans’ guests is the killer. Now only Phyllida’s wits will prevent her own story from coming to an abrupt end…"