Wednesday, September 03, 2008

The Franchise Affair

I have never read anything by Josephine Tey before, even though I had the kids read her The Daughter of Time, but I'll be reading her books from now on. The Franchise Affair was everything you could want in a classic English mystery novel. I enjoyed reading it. The book is on the Crime Writers Association list of top 100 crime novels of all time.

There's a Methodist mention when one of the characters early in the book says, "She has discovered that the Methodists are 'whited sepulchres,' it seems, so she is going to those 'Bethel' people above Benson's bakery, and is due to be 'saved' any day now. She has been shouting hymns all the morning." There's also an interesting element involving answered prayer and angels, though it's minor and late in the going.

from the back of the book:
Robert Blair was about to knock off from a slow day at his law firm when the phone rang. It was Marion Sharpe on the line, a local woman of quiet disposition who lived with her mother at their decrepit country house, The Franchise. It appeared that she was in some serious trouble: Miss Sharpe and her mother were accused of brutally kidnapping a demure young woman named Betty Kane. Miss Kane's claims seemed highly unlikely, even to Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard, until she described her prison - the attic room with its cracked window, the kitchen, and the old trunks - which sounded remarkably like The Franchise. Yet Marion Sharpe claimed the Kane girl had never been there, let alone been held captive for an entire month! Not believing Betty Kane's story, Solicitor Blair takes up the case and, in a dazzling feat of amateur detective work, solves the unbelievable mystery that stumped even Inspector Grant.


The Washington Post calls Tey's novels
elegantly written, populated with interesting and sometimes eccentric characters, witty but also laugh-out-loud funny, engaged with far deeper themes and ideas than one is accustomed to encounter in most mystery novels
and I look forward to experiencing more of them.

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