The Mistletoe Murders and Other Stories by P.D. James
Publisher – Faber & Faber
Published – Out Now
Price £7.99 paperback
The acknowledged ‘Queen of Crime’, PD James was frequently commissioned by newspapers and magazines to write a short story for Christmas, and four of the best have been drawn from the archives and published here together for the first time. From the title story about a strained country-house Christmas party, to another about an illicit affair that ends in murder, plus two cases for detective Adam Dalgleish, these are masterful atmospheric stories, with the lure of a mystery to be solved.
I have remarked already this week that weirdly we seem to associate Christmas with crime. Is that because sadly we know this a time that family feuds can erupt; or that nights out and drunken violence can flow together? Perhaps as we lie safe in our homes with twinkling lights this is another way to remind us of the darkness that lies on the other side of the walls that peace and joy can hopefully prevent? But in a mood for some crime-solving I liberated this seasonal tale from Mount TBR and it’s a lot of fun taking what could be classic crime scenarios and giving them a modern twist. There is also a lovely tribute to James from Val McDermid and an interesting take on short stories from James herself. In this collection of four tales we have: -
The Mistletoe Murder - a famed crime novelist recounts a tale of murder in WW2 England. Our narrator is a young widow invited by her grandmother for Christmas to finally end a feud that started with her mother. She meets her cousin and an unexpected distant relative and they dine in a remote country house. The next day one is found brutally murdered. Two things struck me about this tale – the sense of atmosphere where we have people living on what for them was potentially the end of the world; they get lost in music; alcohol and loss. Its not a time of our finest hour its people fearing the future. But the crime itself is beautifully amoral as our narrator finds herself piecing the clues together and ultimately reaches a surprising conclusion and just for an additional cherry on top the last line is delightfully wicked.
A Very Commonplace Murder – This is a deeply nasty tale. Here our narrator finally arrives back in the flat where many years ago he witnessed people having an affair and saw something that potentially could have saved a life. Our narrator is seedy who as a clerk would use the empty office to read his boss’s pornography and he loved to watch his neighbour’s romantic entanglements. On the one hand a tale about never doing the right thing and then has a even worse twist for the reader in store. Engrossing but you may shudder at the end.
The Boxdale Inheritance – This seems James’ most famous sleuth Adam Dalgleish and its an unusual set-up. His godfather is an elderly canon and he has potentially got a huge inherence but the relative in question was viewed as the black sheep of the family and although found innocent in court was suspected of poisoning her wealthy husband. This tale has some black humour in it as we have the ‘sheep’ dying by falling from a rented cruise ship at a wild birthday party at the age of 88! But the real fun is piecing together a crime from several decades ago; we get witnesses; court testaments and experts. The solution is eventually simple but the delivery and aftermath of the crime is the more interesting element. Well worth a read.
The Twelve Clues of Christmas – This is perhaps the most traditional tale we have. Dalgleish as a young officer stumbles into a country house where the wealthy patriarch appears to have committed suicide, but he feels many things in the house are not right. This feels more like a Holmes tale as Dalgleish reveals what all the clues we see in the crime scene really mean. A fun tale of logic and deduction plus awful relatives – the true meaning of Christmas!
