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julesjones51) Edward Marston -- Railway to the grave
Seventh in the Railway Detective series, about a Victorian detective inspector specialising in railway crime in the early days of the railways. As usual with this author, enjoyable pulp fiction that I won't bother keeping but am glad to have read. In this one a retired Colonel commits suicide by walking into an oncoming train. Tarleton's wife went missing a few weeks earlier, and is presumed murdered. The case might have come to Robert Colbeck in the normal course of events anyway, but there is a personal link -- the dead man was a friend of Colbeck's superior officer, from Tallis's days as an army officer. Tallis wants his dead friend's name cleared, and the person responsible for both deaths found. Colbeck has to persuade Tallis to leave the investigation to him, because Tallis is far too emotionally involved to do a good job.
The series in general tends to fairly cardboard characters, and Tallis has been something of a stock stereotype in spite of being a regular character, but Marston has finally begun to flesh him out a little in this book.
I'd note that the author tries to reflect period mores and attitudes in his historical mysteries, and this does mean that some of the characters' reactions to various plot developments are not likely to sit well with much of my friends list. Colbeck himself is a broad-minded and humane man, but that simply means that he gets to clash with people who aren't, such as the local rector who has no intention of allowing a suicide to be buried in hallowed ground.
LibraryThing entry
Seventh in the Railway Detective series, about a Victorian detective inspector specialising in railway crime in the early days of the railways. As usual with this author, enjoyable pulp fiction that I won't bother keeping but am glad to have read. In this one a retired Colonel commits suicide by walking into an oncoming train. Tarleton's wife went missing a few weeks earlier, and is presumed murdered. The case might have come to Robert Colbeck in the normal course of events anyway, but there is a personal link -- the dead man was a friend of Colbeck's superior officer, from Tallis's days as an army officer. Tallis wants his dead friend's name cleared, and the person responsible for both deaths found. Colbeck has to persuade Tallis to leave the investigation to him, because Tallis is far too emotionally involved to do a good job.
The series in general tends to fairly cardboard characters, and Tallis has been something of a stock stereotype in spite of being a regular character, but Marston has finally begun to flesh him out a little in this book.
I'd note that the author tries to reflect period mores and attitudes in his historical mysteries, and this does mean that some of the characters' reactions to various plot developments are not likely to sit well with much of my friends list. Colbeck himself is a broad-minded and humane man, but that simply means that he gets to clash with people who aren't, such as the local rector who has no intention of allowing a suicide to be buried in hallowed ground.
LibraryThing entry
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Date: 2011-05-30 11:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-05-31 06:19 am (UTC)