Magpie Murders

Magpie Murders is Anthony Horowitz’s first novel in his Susan Ryeland series. This book is a nested murder mystery, with the outer murder mystery in 2015 containing the reading of a draft of a murder mystery set in 1955. The reader gets two murder mysteries.

I listened to the audiobook via CloudLibrary. The outer story is read by Samantha Bond, representing the first-person narrative of Susan Ryeland. The inner story, a third-person narrative, is read by Allan Corduna.

The novel begins with Susan Ryeland reminiscing about preparing to read and edit the typescript of Alan Conway’s latest Atticus Pünd murder mystery, the ninth and last volume in a series. Susan has edited all of the volumes so far, and the first eight Atticus Pünd books have sold eighteen million copies, making Alan a wealthy man and supporting Susan Ryeland’s editing job. Susan states very early that Alan’s new book changed her life: She changed her residence and she lost her job and many of her friends, all because of “that bastard, Alan Conway.”

The reader then reads Alan’s typescript, “Magpie Murders,” along with Susan. This is a murder mystery set in 1955 in Saxby-on-Avon, where there occurs a series of deaths associated with Pye Hall, home of the baronet Sir Magnus Pye (hence, “magpie”). Sir Magnus himself becomes one of the victims. Atticus Pünd, Alan Conway’s private detective, gets involved in the investigation.

This entirely enjoyable murder mystery has the flavor of the Golden Age of Detection murder mysteries by Agatha Christie or Dorothy L. Sayers, and there are many references to names and places in Agatha Christie’s works. This murder mystery includes a locked room murder and later the grisly but emotionally satifying murder of the hall’s lord. The many suspects include a vicar; the village doctor and her husband, a failed artist; the halls’s groundsman; other inhabitants of the village; and various family members of the victims. Each of the suspects has her or his own secrets, and the clues are sprinkled carefully and cleverly through the story.

In the style of Agatha Christie, the inner mystery is organized on a nursery rhyme, “One for Sorrow”, about magpies.

One for sorrow,
Two for joy,
Three for a girl,
Four for a boy,
Five for silver,
Six for gold,
Seven for a secret never to be told.

The nursery rhyme is included in Part One, Chapter Eight.) The number of magpies a person sees predicts good or bad luck. The first six parts of the inner mystery are titled “Sorrow,” “Joy,” “Girl,” “Boy,”, “Silver,” and “Gold.”

Susan finishes reading the typescript, which makes up half of the novel. The seventh and last part of the story, corresponding to “a secret never to be told,” is missing from the typescript, leaving the mystery unresolved. This circumstance initiates the outer mystery.

Susan learns the next day that Alan Conway has died, apparently of suicide. Susan begins digging into Alan’s life in an attempt to find the missing seventh part of the typescript. Without its revelation of the murderer, the book can’t be published, having a negative impact on the publisher where Susan works, thereby jeopardizing her job. As Susan begins her investigations, she quickly concludes that Alan did not commit suicide, and she discovers a facility for criminal investigation.

Magpie Murders is the basis of the Magpie Murders television series on PBS.

Anothony Horowitz, a proflific and popular talent, has written many other books. including two Sherlock Holmes novels, The House of Silk and Moriarty. Horowitz is also the creator of the television series Foyle’s War and co-creator of the television series Midsomer Murders. Horowitz wrote screenplays for eleven episodes of Poirot.

Rating: Three of five stars (good)