The Lighthouse - P.D. James

I’ve had this book for a year now and for one reason or another, have only just got around to reading it. I do enjoy P D James’ books and have done for years, so that is not really why I left it for so long, it’s just that as the series has gone on, I’ve come to dislike the hero, Commander Dagleish more and more and this tends to colour my opinion of the books. Anyway, finally I read it, and as expected, thoroughly enjoyed it, despite Dagleish’s appearance. P D James has become famous for her traditional ‘closed door’ murders, where the murder takes place in a restricted area to which a certain number of people only have access. This book is no exception and I, for one, ...  Read the complete review

Combe Island, off the Cornish coast is a privately-owned retreat offering respite to people in stressful jobs. They are guaranteed privacy and complete security. Some residents are pleasanter than others and when one dies in suspicious circumstances Commander Adam Dalgliesh is called in to investigate. It’s just over a year since I read the last P D James novel, The Murder Room, and I hoped that there would not be a sequel. I felt that Baroness James, in her eighties, was no longer up to producing good crime fiction. Whilst The Lighthouse isn’t up to the standard of her best work – for me that was Devices and Desires – I think that her latest novel is a ...  Read the complete review