The setting is Cambridgeshire in the 1920s and the authors, under the pen name ''Charles Todd'', are a mother and son writing team living in Delaware and North Carolina respectively. The novel follows a theme I've noted in other detective fiction, where the main character is psychologically damaged by wartime experiences on the battlefield, in Rutledge's case, World War 1.
Rutledge is a man who ''brought the war home with him'' and like many men of that era, finds his memories haunting him. In particular, the shade of his Scottish corporal, killed by a shell burst as they stood together, who advises him throughout the book and with whom Rutledge discusses the case. Rutledge is left to deal with the ghosts of war on his own, as this was a time when ''shell shock'' was a disgrace and regarded as cowardice and a ''lack of moral fibre''.
The murder case he investigates is itself a reminder of the war for Rutledge, with the way the two victims are killed suggesting a soldier's involvement.
There are one or two oddities in the narrative, which, like a fly in one's beer, spoil a pleasant interlude and these include ''American'' spelling and phrases like ''phone closet''. Otherwise known as a phone cabinet in New Zealand and nothing to do with making phone calls as far as I'm aware.
The book, as noted, is set in the early 1920s and the vintage car era, with the authors putting Rutledge on the end of a crank handle to get the car started. (They don't give the make of car). While the writers are reasonably consistent in having this happen, they do in one instance have Rutledge managing to reverse away without cranking the car engine into life first, and a similar action at the end of the book makes the denouement somewhat impossible.
The book is readable and interesting but, like Rutledge's solving of the case(s), it needed to be able to stand up to scrutiny. Especially to vintage people who've driven vintage cars.
- Ted Fox is a Dunedin online marketing consultant
