Rating: 
Summary: Tey's Best
Review: "The Singing Sands" is Tey's most riveting and well-crafted novel. It has more wonderful characters, more variety and beauty in the scenery/locations, and a less intense pace than her other books. It also takes the reader deeper into Grant's psyche than any of the others.Grant is a complex and interesting man, and his Scottish voyage is more than just chasing down a confounding mystery: it is a lonely and revealing internal journey for him, at the end of which he finds resolution and new depths in himself, comfort and at-homeness within. Tey was fascinated with Grant and in "Sands" she explored new aspects of her delicious character, perhaps falling in little in love with him in the process. I know I did.
Rating: 
Summary: Mind travels in the Scottish isles
Review: Because I have always adored The Daughter of Time, I recently spent a weekend with The Singing Sands, The Franchise Affair, and The Man in the Queue. Singing Sands I found compelling and satisfying in an old-fashioned way -- we get a deep, poetic examination of the hero's psychological journey and his Scottish surroundings. Fine irony and good jokes at the reader's expense made me enjoy this book even more.
DO read this Josephine Tey -- but, if you are wise, do not expect a similar treat from her first mystery, The Man in the Queue: the world of that book is too far away from ours.
Rating: 
Summary: Fairly good mystery reading
Review: Good story, good characterization good descriptions easy to hold onto difficult to put down.
Rating:
Summary: A lovely book, wonderful characters
Review: I read this first a very long time, and like other Tey fans, I am sorry to know that she wrote so few books. I'm also sorry a younger Sean Connery didn't get given this book for a movie -- he'd have been perfect as Grant.
Rating:
Summary: Terrific atmosphere
Review: I think it was Robert Barnard that pointed out Tey's avoidance of the "play fair" whodunnit--the type where a reader could deduce the solution from clues given a la Agatha Christie. That is certainly true here. Information is given to Inspector Grant by characters who are introduced quite late in the book. While these nuggets propel the narrative and lead to a satisfying conclusion, this is not the sort of mystery one could solve with the clues given.One reservation I have about her writing is her use of extended interior dialogues for Grant. They feel contrived and stilted. Otherwise I found the book compelling, especially due to the vivid atmosphere created. After reading it I have become quite interested in the Hebrides !
Rating:
Summary: Terrific atmosphere
Review: I think it was Robert Barnard that pointed out Tey's avoidance of the "play fair" whodunnit--the type where a reader could deduce the solution from clues given a la Agatha Christie. That is certainly true here. Information is given to Inspector Grant by characters who are introduced quite late in the book. While these nuggets propel the narrative and lead to a satisfying conclusion, this is not the sort of mystery one could solve with the clues given.One reservation I have about her writing is her use of extended interior dialogues for Grant. They feel contrived and stilted. Otherwise I found the book compelling, especially due to the vivid atmosphere created. After reading it I have become quite interested in the Hebrides !
Rating:
Summary: Tey's Best
Review: Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard has worked too hard for too long; his flair is giving out on him and he's developed a tendency toward what we, these days, would call panic attacks. He's given the opportunity (or more likely, ordered) to take vacation and decides to visit his cousin in the Scottish Highlands. On the train north, two young men are overheard apparently planning to 'rob the Caley'; later, one of them is found dead, with a strange little verse in his possession. Grant, with his usual fascination for faces, is intrigued by the young man, and winds up inadvertently investigating his death.
By the time the book ends, you'll not only meet Grant's cousins, a noted explorer, a very strange Scottish nationalist and get a walking tour of parts of the Highlands and the islands of Scotland, but you'll find out where there really are singing sands, streams that stand and stones that walk. You'll also find out that 'rob the Caley' has nothing to do with the Caledonian (or a Scottish dance party :).
Tey's books are lovely slices of post-WWII Britain, a very different time and place. I've always been sorry a younger Sean Connery didn't get given her books for a movie -- he'd have been perfect as Grant.
Rating:
Summary: It may take some time to appreciate
Review: The concept behind Tey's *The Singing Sands* immediately drew me in. A bit of poetry written on a newspaper leads the inspector to solve a crime that only he believes is indeed actually a crime. Yes, very interesting. However, once I started reading I found the pacing a little slow. Grant was far more introspective, more concerned with his own fears, than most mystery protagonists. Which was not, by any means, a bad thing. I just had to adjust my mindset a bit. Once I realized that this was not to be a typical solve it and feel good mystery, I found myself sinking in, slowly. Admittedly, it took me a couple of days after finishing the novel to appreciate it, to find it a satisfying read. But one thing has definitely come from reading *The Singing Sands*--I'm now looking forward to reading more Josephine Tey novels.
Rating:
Summary: Tey at the top of her form
Review: This (posthumously published) novel shows Tey at her best. Inspector Alan Grant, on his way by train to Scotland for a long-overdue spell of R&R, is on hand when a young man's body is found in an adjoining compartment. By accident, he finds himself in possession of a clue that hints that something wasn't right about the young man's death; in his pursuit of the truth, he travels as far as the Hebrides and meets characters ranging from a lovely widow who looks good in waders to a world-famous Arabian explorer, a young pilot friend of the deceased, and the unforgettable Wee Archie. The story line seems to ramble at times, but the conclusion is highly satisfying. Thoroughly enjoyable.
Rating:
Summary: Fairly good mystery reading
Review: This book is definitely my favourite of the Ins. Grant series. It is truly unfortunate that Ms. Tey was taken from us so young. Just think what she would have written! This book was published posthumously after her untimely death. It is as perfect a mystery as you will ever come across. In the book Grant is going on a holiday. On the train that he has taken to go to Scotland to visit friends, a young man is found dead in his room. It truly looked like misadventure, but something about it disturbed Grant and got him searching a trail that took him to the Hebrides, back to London, and to Marseilles. And what actually got him going on this impossible search were a few lines of poetry scrawled on a newspaper that the young victim had had with him before he died. Wonderful story!
| 
