The Thursday Murder Club, by Richard Osman

 

9781984880963

Viking, 2020

355 pp

hardcover

I genuinely hope there is another book after this one, since I really enjoyed The Thursday Murder Club.  Obviously I'm a reader who is much more into the dark/bleak side of crime, but sometimes I just feel this need to go light for a change, a sort of palate cleanser/brain relaxer if you will.  The trick is in finding just the right book without falling deep into cozyland or cutesyville, neither of which I like.   I bought this book because my spouse and I are huge Richard Osman fans after watching way too many British TV quiz shows, and I figured that this book had to be good because he is so witty and snarky funny.  I made a good decision here: the mystery is rather slow burning, without the usual pileup of clues that would normally titillate my inner armchair detective, but here it's much more about the cast of characters that make up the Thursday Murder Club, as well as the members of the police department they've sort of co-opted into the group.  Prepare to giggle, but keep a tissue by your side. 

The Thursday Murder Club is a group of four friends who meet every Thursday in the Jigsaw Room at Coopers Chase Retirement Village ("You can't move here until you're over sixty-five").  It had originally been started by retired Kent Police inspector Penny Gray and the mysterious Elizabeth; sadly, Penny now lays dying in the Village's nursing home, Willows.  When she'd left the police force, she'd brought with her a number of files of unsolved murder cases, and she and Elizabeth would pore over them, looking for anything that may have been missed.  Two other members soon came along, Ibrahim and Ron, and with Penny out, Joyce has stepped in to become the fourth.  They continue to go over old cases from Penny's files, but they up their game with a real murder that hits close to home.  It seems that the builder of Coopers Chase has been bludgeoned to death, and that the killer has left behind only a photograph.   Elizabeth wants to investigate the murder, but the problem is that they "have no access to any case files, witness statements, any forensics."  What they do have, though, is PC Donna De Freitas, who gives lectures at Coopers Chase, and who would rather be out solving this murder instead of bringing teas to the officers working on it in the incident room.  Elizabeth finagles her way into visiting PC De Freitas at the local station, where she asks Donna point blank if she wouldn't rather be "part of it."   There's nothing Donna would like more, and the group members manipulate things so that Inspector Chris Hudson puts her on the team, making it easier for the Thursday Murder Club to know what's going on as the case progresses and to provide information they think worthy of turning over -- when they're ready.    When a second murder hits, the Thursday Murder Club moves into even higher gear.  

The book is related from two perpectives. First, there's Joyce's diary, where she not only talks about what's happening with the group, but also through her writing provides insight into the members' histories including her own.  She also offers glimpses here and there of what living in this community is like, and through her, the author has written compassionately about these older people and how they cope with aging or finding themselves alone without family or widowed.  Her diaries produce alternating bouts of giggles and sadness that wells up without warning, When we're not reading Joyce's diary entries, the story is related in a standard style, incorporating other characters and moving the mystery and its solution forward.  There's always more than a tinge of humor to be found here, and the ending allows the reader to consider the true nature of justice, which isn't always as black and white as one might believe. 

The dustjacket blurber has absolutely nailed it, saying that

"Richard Osman has employed all of his considerable wit and intelligence to give us just the curl-up-and-read novel we need right now."

This book was, as the blurber stated,  "pure enjoyment," and a "flat-out pleasure of a book," precisely what the doctor ordered during our strange present time.   I also agree with author Val McDermid's blurb when she says that The Thursday Murder Club is  a "warm, wise, and witty warning never to underestimate the elderly."  Sadly not only are senior citizens too often underestimated, but ignored as well. And even though this book isn't my usual sort of reading material, it was such a pleasure to have read this novel: it is truly the "curl-up-and-read novel we need right now" that the description promises. 

Absolutely delightful. To Richard Osman: Thank you so very much and let's have another!!