Death at the Bar/Cassettes

Rating:
Summary: A very clever plot
Review: I've just started reading Ngaio Marsh's mysteries, so I don't know if this book is a "typical" Marsh mystery, but I certainly hope so. The characters were well-drawn, and the plot quite brilliant. A man dies while playing darts, because it appears that a dart daubed with cyanide sticks in the back of his hand. Almost everyone has a motive, and the evidence at hand can point to almost any of them. Reading this novel is like threading a conch-shell. You slip in a piece of string and it snakes through various chambers and entries until it finally comes out at the end. I was a big Christie fan, but now I think I'll be moving on to Marsh.

Rating:
Summary: Good Intricate Poisoning
Review: One of Marsh's most tightly-knit jobs. Victim a famous K.C., poisoned with KNC in the private taproom of a Devon inn while taking part in a demonstration of darts-throwing; plenty of good circumstantial detail leads to supposition of impossible crime. Alleyn, called in both by publican and by local police, does a splendid and fast (24 hours) job of discovering murderer, whose identity is a masterly demonstration in diverting suspicion from the most likely person. Method ingeniously simple, and hence convincing: a very neat job. Virtuoso display of logic at the end, including a delightful false solution propounded by a most amusing Chief Constable.

Rating:
Summary: Dart over to this one!
Review: Perhaps not one of her more richly written efforts, but buoyed by a marvellous mystery plot, set in a wonderful English pub. Darts and beer, a fatal combination.