Crook o’ Lune by E.C.R. Lorac

I have read and reviewed several of the author’s previous works. The most recent being: Post After Post-Mortem






There are certain older mysteries that are being reprinted, which hit the mark more accurately for me than others. Some I managed to pursue for longer, but in the past couple of years, getting my hands on them has been harder. Recently more of E.C.R. Lorac’s works have been popping up on NetGalley, much to my delight. When I started this book, I was not sure if I was going to like it as much as I liked certain others. I even abandoned it halfway and had to pick it up later. Once the story background was set, the ending felt refreshingly unique. When we enter the narrative, we meet a man who is going into a home which he has inherited. It is a comfortable home, and there is much that needs to be decided about the future of the land and the house itself. For a significant portion of the following pages, we wander amongst the people and their thoughts. On later reflection, I realised that the whole effect was purposeful since I left with a very strong feeling about what the village and its inhabitants were like and what the recent events might have meant to them. Chief Inspector Macdonald(a recurring protagonist in the author’s works, but who does not refer much to other cases, so can be read as standalone) is in the neighbourhood on holiday as he is planning a future retirement into a farming-adjacent life. He is called to the site of a fire where a woman is found dead since he is available. Once he looks at the scene and meets all the people associated with the area, he starts to get ideas. People reach out to him because he is unbiased since he is just visiting. This spurs him into action. I did not expect the events of the second half, nor did I expect to be so involved in the way things turned out. Given the pacing in the beginning, I thought I would just be relieved to see the end of things, but the people grew on me, and I would recommend this to fans of the author, the genre and who have some patience for the slower books. I received an ARC thanks to NetGalley and the publishers, but the review is entirely based on my own reading experience.