Murder on Campus: An Advancement of Learning by Reginald Hill (1971)

Last year I read my first Reginald Hill: A Clubbable Woman and enjoyed it tremendously but it has taken me more than a year to read the second outing of Hill's detective duo. Holm Coultram College is facing some very rough weather. First a student, Anita Swell, who had been suspended from the college because …

Police Procedural: Last Seen Wearing by Hillary Waugh (1952)

"She walked out of the dorm and that’s it. She vanished into thin air.” Lowell Mitchell, a young student of a women's college in Massachusetts, disappears one fine day. On that day, she had attended her classes but when the lunch break came refused to go to the Mess claiming that she wasn't feeling well …

Women in Translation: Shadow Sister by Simone Van Der Vlugt

Usually, I don't enjoy modern mysteries because I feel the world intrudes too much. Racism, sexism, pedophilia, dysfunctional families become the foci of the novel rather than the murder. However, while reading Simone Van Der Vlugt's Shadow Sister, I was surprised when I became more interested in the problems that a teacher of a school …

Forgotten Book: The Third Eye by Ethel Lina White (1937)

In 2012, Curtis Evans reviewed Ethel Lina White's 1937 novel The Third Eye, very-very favourably (read his review here). As I had liked all the books that I had read of White till then it immediately went on my wish-list. But it is  only now that Project Gutenberg, Australia has made it available (along with …

G is for Geographer’s Library

At first all I could hear was a whooshing sound, like someone was holding the phone out an open car window. Then something or someone tapped on the mouthpiece, three times, then a pause, then three times again."Hello? Hello?" I called down the phone."Not this one. Not this one. Not this one. Not this one..." …

Charles Dickens Month: Edwin, Rosa, and Jasper

This month, I am participating in the Charles Dickens bicentennial celebrations hosted by Amanda at Fig and Thistle. The book that I am reading right now is one that has long been on my wishlist: The Mystery of Edwin Drood. So far, the mystery has been fairly gripping. There are two young people, Edwin and …

Chasing a Crooked Shadow: Eric Ambler’s Dimitrios

Colonel Haki was slowly turning the pages inside the folder, and on his way was a look that Latimer had not seen there before. It was the look of the expert attending to the business he understands perfectly. There was a sort of watchful repose in his face that reminded Latimer of a very old …