A quirky, engaging book with a likeable hero.

Birmingham, 1943. A twenty-year-old murder sets Chief Inspector Mason on the trail of a killer. Along with his sidekick Constable O’Rourke, he investigates the death of a boy – Robert McFarlane – who was murdered in 1923. Weirdly, although the body was discovered on dry land, the boy appeared to have drowned. When a possible second victim is discovered, the parallels are too alike to ignore and Mason finds a link to the killings that could point directly to the murderer.

This is the first book in the Erdington Mysteries series, though I’d already read the second one (The Automobile Assassinations). The author skilfully recreates the atmosphere of the war years and brings plenty of relevant details to the story without overegging the custard (excuse the pun). The tale itself is an engaging one, and quirky enough to keep me wondering how it would all end. Creating realistic characters and believable relationships, the author avoids the stereotypical tropes of mysteries set in this period. One erroneous detail did stand out – bananas didn’t return to this country (certainly not in the northeast of England) until 1947. My only other niggle is down to the narrator Matt Coles, who does a decent job for the most part but managed to mispronounce the word ‘drawing’ (draw-ring) several hundred times, which spoiled the narration for me.

A quirky, engaging book with a likeable hero.

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Great

Really well written, nostalgic and descriptive, great storyline and characters and very well narrated would highly recommend

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1 person found this helpful

Captivating story....

The cover was what attracted me to the book in the first place. Which is something that's more pertinent than you would think until you've read it.

The story was gripping, and it took effort to not listen to it in one sitting. A good story is riveting. A good story that has ties to your own town, with places and things you know, is even more so. The plot is believable and incredibly well thought out. The characters are likeable, ordinary, people with, for the 1940s, a lot of biscuits. Matt Coles did a fabulous job of the narration, although his accents need work.

My family live in Weston, so as soon as I heard the words 'Weston Mercury' the story took on a whole new relevance. My granddaughter, who is of a similar age to Antony, goes to Walliscote Road School.... In the 1940s, my grandmother would have been a young mother with four small children, with her husband away fighting in the war, and bombs dropping around her.

All of these facts brought atmosphere and an added shiver to the story for me but, even without them, this is a brilliant book.

I do hope M J Porter writes more mysteries because, with this as their first attempt, further books will be unmissable.....

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2 people found this helpful

Enjoyable new series

The emphasis in this book is on the characters. The plot is satisfying but there’s no major twist or underlying conspiracy (both of which I enjoy when they are suited) just a solid plot in which the police solve a crime by putting the evidence together. If you’re from the Black Country you may question the narrator’s southern accent but having heard the one Brummie woman in the book, it was probably for the best.

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1 person found this helpful

excellent storyline

loved the period story line very good narration , will read others by this author .

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Absolutely dreadful accents.

The narrator significantly interfered with the flow of this story . His mangled accents were truly dreadful and his pronunciation of certain words was bizarre.

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Interesting plot. A great listen

This was such a great listen. Not my usual thriller, but a more toned down 'who dun it' mystery in keeping with the era in which it is set. This is cleverly written cold case murder mystery with an unusual storyline, and lots of historical details. It kept me listening to the very end. The narration was spot on, which made the characters engaging.
The period and the feel of police procedural work and how cases were solved in the 1940s came across well.
Having not read (listened) to anything by the author before this was an enjoyable surprise.

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