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Roderick Alleyn #18
Scales of Justice
The lives of the inhabitants of Swevenings are disrupted only by a fierce competition to catch the Old Un, a monster trout known to dwell in a beautiful stream which winds past their homes.
Then one of their small community is found brutally murdered; beside him is the freshly killed trout. Both died by violence - but Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn's murder investigation seems to be much more interested in the fish....
Scales of Justice was first published in 1955
Then one of their small community is found brutally murdered; beside him is the freshly killed trout. Both died by violence - but Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn's murder investigation seems to be much more interested in the fish....
Scales of Justice was first published in 1955
Audiobook
First published January 1, 1955
About the author
Ngaio Marsh
187 books753 followersDame Ngaio Marsh, born Edith Ngaio Marsh, was a New Zealand crime writer and theatre director. There is some uncertainty over her birth date as her father neglected to register her birth until 1900, but she was born in the city of Christchurch, New Zealand.
Of all the "Great Ladies" of the English mystery's golden age, including Margery Allingham, Agatha Christie, and Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh alone survived to publish in the 1980s. Over a fifty-year span, from 1932 to 1982, Marsh wrote thirty-two classic English detective novels, which gained international acclaim. She did not always see herself as a writer, but first planned a career as a painter.
Marsh's first novel, A MAN LAY DEAD (1934), which she wrote in London in 1931-32, introduced the detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn: a combination of Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey and a realistically depicted police official at work. Throughout the 1930s Marsh painted occasionally, wrote plays for local repertory societies in New Zealand, and published detective novels. In 1937 Marsh went to England for a period. Before going back to her home country, she spent six months travelling about Europe.
All her novels feature British CID detective Roderick Alleyn. Several novels feature Marsh's other loves, the theatre and painting. A number are set around theatrical productions (Enter a Murderer, Vintage Murder, Overture to Death, Opening Night, Death at the Dolphin, and Light Thickens), and two others are about actors off stage (Final Curtain and False Scent). Her short story "'I Can Find My Way Out" is also set around a theatrical production and is the earlier "Jupiter case" referred to in Opening Night. Alleyn marries a painter, Agatha Troy, whom he meets during an investigation (Artists in Crime), and who features in several later novels.
Series:
* Roderick Alleyn
Of all the "Great Ladies" of the English mystery's golden age, including Margery Allingham, Agatha Christie, and Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh alone survived to publish in the 1980s. Over a fifty-year span, from 1932 to 1982, Marsh wrote thirty-two classic English detective novels, which gained international acclaim. She did not always see herself as a writer, but first planned a career as a painter.
Marsh's first novel, A MAN LAY DEAD (1934), which she wrote in London in 1931-32, introduced the detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn: a combination of Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey and a realistically depicted police official at work. Throughout the 1930s Marsh painted occasionally, wrote plays for local repertory societies in New Zealand, and published detective novels. In 1937 Marsh went to England for a period. Before going back to her home country, she spent six months travelling about Europe.
All her novels feature British CID detective Roderick Alleyn. Several novels feature Marsh's other loves, the theatre and painting. A number are set around theatrical productions (Enter a Murderer, Vintage Murder, Overture to Death, Opening Night, Death at the Dolphin, and Light Thickens), and two others are about actors off stage (Final Curtain and False Scent). Her short story "'I Can Find My Way Out" is also set around a theatrical production and is the earlier "Jupiter case" referred to in Opening Night. Alleyn marries a painter, Agatha Troy, whom he meets during an investigation (Artists in Crime), and who features in several later novels.
Series:
* Roderick Alleyn
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 217 reviews
May 22, 2018
This is such a classic cosy mystery from the Golden Age of crime writing that it almost feels like a spoof of that genre.
Tucked away in the sleepy little 1940s English village of Swevenings is a little pocket of the aristocracy, clinging on to their old ways of life from before before the war. Privileged and eccentric they for the most part get on despite a few petty feuds. That is until Sir Harold Lacklander asks gives his old friend Colonel Cartarette his memoirs to publish. A few days after Sir Harold's death, the Colonel is found murdered in a very nasty way while fishing for trout in his own stretch of stream. Could it be that something in Sir Harold's memoirs that caused the Colonel's death or is there another reason altogether? To make sure the case is handled by a gentleman and not the local police, Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn is called in to lead the investigation.
There is quite a lot of humour poked at the characters who inhabit the novel. The feudal Lacklanders, the heir George who is an ass, his mother who is very large and paints and the son trying to escape by becoming a doctor. Then there is Octavius Danberry-Phinn, whose son committed suicide while working for Sir Harold during the war. Now he consoles himself by being surrounded by cats and kittens and trying to poach a very large trout from Colonel Cartarette's neighbouring stretch of stream. Commander Syce who practices archery recklessly and is so lonely he pretends to be ill to get the nurse to visit daily. Nurse Kettle, the only character not of the gentry and earning an honest living (apart from the police) was the unlucky person who found the Colonel. Of course there has to be a femme fatale, in the form of Kitty Lacklander married to Sir Henry but fluttering her eyelashes elsewhere. A very fishy tale involving old secrets, fish scales and a hungry cat. 3.5★
Tucked away in the sleepy little 1940s English village of Swevenings is a little pocket of the aristocracy, clinging on to their old ways of life from before before the war. Privileged and eccentric they for the most part get on despite a few petty feuds. That is until Sir Harold Lacklander asks gives his old friend Colonel Cartarette his memoirs to publish. A few days after Sir Harold's death, the Colonel is found murdered in a very nasty way while fishing for trout in his own stretch of stream. Could it be that something in Sir Harold's memoirs that caused the Colonel's death or is there another reason altogether? To make sure the case is handled by a gentleman and not the local police, Chief Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn is called in to lead the investigation.
There is quite a lot of humour poked at the characters who inhabit the novel. The feudal Lacklanders, the heir George who is an ass, his mother who is very large and paints and the son trying to escape by becoming a doctor. Then there is Octavius Danberry-Phinn, whose son committed suicide while working for Sir Harold during the war. Now he consoles himself by being surrounded by cats and kittens and trying to poach a very large trout from Colonel Cartarette's neighbouring stretch of stream. Commander Syce who practices archery recklessly and is so lonely he pretends to be ill to get the nurse to visit daily. Nurse Kettle, the only character not of the gentry and earning an honest living (apart from the police) was the unlucky person who found the Colonel. Of course there has to be a femme fatale, in the form of Kitty Lacklander married to Sir Henry but fluttering her eyelashes elsewhere. A very fishy tale involving old secrets, fish scales and a hungry cat. 3.5★
May 31, 2019
This, the eighteenth, in the Roderick Alleyn series, was published in 1955 and is set in a changing world. Not that you would know it from the idyllic village of Swevenings, a classic setting for a Golden Age mystery. However, the local families, who have all lived there for centuries, are beset with old feuds and secrets, while incomers, who are ‘not quite,’ endure the frosty politeness of an outsider. These families are viewed from the complacent snobbery of local, Nurse Kettle, who travels around, seeing everything, knowing everyone and, later in the book, causing Fox some romantic interest for the first time in the series.
When Sir Harold Lacklander is dying, he entrusts his memoirs to Colonel Carterette for publishing. These memoirs include a very contentious chapter, concerning the suicide of the only son of Mr Danbury-Phinn, who was known to Roderick Alleyn in an earlier life. There are some odd characters in this book, including Danbury-Phinn and his cats, and Commander Syce, an alcoholic, lonely man, who practices his bow and arrow and invents attacks of lumbago, so Nurse Kettle will visit. This mystery has a touch of the Montagues and Capulets, with Mark Lacklander and Rose Carterette providing the young, wistful, sweethearts, Kitty Carterette the temptress and Nurse Kettle the more mature, but rather touching, love interest.
On one hand, this is a typical, Alleyn mystery. A murder by a stream, the mystery involving the importance of trout scales (a pun on the Scales of Justice, used in the title), and family secrets. However, it is also about a country which is dealing with changing attitudes to class, particularly in the countryside. In a sense, the way Marsh deals with this is more realistic than you would expect. I do find Marsh an excellent author; although she is inconsistent and her books vary widely in quality. This is one of her better ones.
When Sir Harold Lacklander is dying, he entrusts his memoirs to Colonel Carterette for publishing. These memoirs include a very contentious chapter, concerning the suicide of the only son of Mr Danbury-Phinn, who was known to Roderick Alleyn in an earlier life. There are some odd characters in this book, including Danbury-Phinn and his cats, and Commander Syce, an alcoholic, lonely man, who practices his bow and arrow and invents attacks of lumbago, so Nurse Kettle will visit. This mystery has a touch of the Montagues and Capulets, with Mark Lacklander and Rose Carterette providing the young, wistful, sweethearts, Kitty Carterette the temptress and Nurse Kettle the more mature, but rather touching, love interest.
On one hand, this is a typical, Alleyn mystery. A murder by a stream, the mystery involving the importance of trout scales (a pun on the Scales of Justice, used in the title), and family secrets. However, it is also about a country which is dealing with changing attitudes to class, particularly in the countryside. In a sense, the way Marsh deals with this is more realistic than you would expect. I do find Marsh an excellent author; although she is inconsistent and her books vary widely in quality. This is one of her better ones.
March 26, 2016
Description: The quiet village of Swevenings seemed an English pastoral paradise, until the savagely beaten body of Colonel Cartarette was found near a tranquil stream. Suddenly, the playground of British blue bloods has been soiled by murder and the lowest sort of intrigue. But if anyone can clean it up, it's the famous Inspector Roderick Alleyn of Scotland Yard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFXr0...
Sometimes a Golden Age whodunnit is my only weakness.
3* A Man Lay Dead (Roderick Alleyn, #1)
2* Enter a Murderer (Roderick Alleyn, #2)
3* The Nursing Home Murder (Roderick Alleyn, #3)
WL Death in Ecstasy (Roderick Alleyn, #4)
WL Vintage Murder (Roderick Alleyn, #5)
WL Artists in Crime (Roderick Alleyn, #6)
3* Death in a White Tie (Roderick Alleyn, #7)
4* Overture to Death (Roderick Alleyn, #8)
3* Death at the Bar (Roderick Alleyn, #9)
4* Death of a Peer (Roderick Alleyn, #10)
WL Death and the Dancing Footman (Roderick Alleyn, #11)
WL Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn, #12)
WL Died in the Wool (Roderick Alleyn, #13)
2* Final Curtain (Roderick Alleyn, #14)
WL A Wreath for Rivera (Roderick Alleyn, #15)
3* Night at the Vulcan (Roderick Alleyn, #16)
WL Spinsters in Jeopardy (Roderick Alleyn, #17)
3* Scales of Justice (Roderick Alleyn, #18)
3* Hand in Glove (Roderick Alleyn, #22)
3* Dead Water (Roderick Alleyn, #23)
3* When in Rome (Roderick Alleyn, #26)
3* A Grave Mistake (Roderick Alleyn, #30)
WL Clutch of Constables (Roderick Alleyn, #25)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFXr0...Sometimes a Golden Age whodunnit is my only weakness.3* A Man Lay Dead (Roderick Alleyn, #1)
2* Enter a Murderer (Roderick Alleyn, #2)
3* The Nursing Home Murder (Roderick Alleyn, #3)
WL Death in Ecstasy (Roderick Alleyn, #4)
WL Vintage Murder (Roderick Alleyn, #5)
WL Artists in Crime (Roderick Alleyn, #6)
3* Death in a White Tie (Roderick Alleyn, #7)
4* Overture to Death (Roderick Alleyn, #8)
3* Death at the Bar (Roderick Alleyn, #9)
4* Death of a Peer (Roderick Alleyn, #10)
WL Death and the Dancing Footman (Roderick Alleyn, #11)
WL Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn, #12)
WL Died in the Wool (Roderick Alleyn, #13)
2* Final Curtain (Roderick Alleyn, #14)
WL A Wreath for Rivera (Roderick Alleyn, #15)
3* Night at the Vulcan (Roderick Alleyn, #16)
WL Spinsters in Jeopardy (Roderick Alleyn, #17)
3* Scales of Justice (Roderick Alleyn, #18)
3* Hand in Glove (Roderick Alleyn, #22)
3* Dead Water (Roderick Alleyn, #23)
3* When in Rome (Roderick Alleyn, #26)
3* A Grave Mistake (Roderick Alleyn, #30)
WL Clutch of Constables (Roderick Alleyn, #25)
December 8, 2016
I made the mistake of telling my stepdad, a man with an interest in fishing, that I'd read a mystery in which the scales of a trout played a major role.
'Oh, yeah?' he said. 'How big was it?'
I had completely neglected to remember this absolutely crucial piece of information and had to go back and find the passage where this important fish is introduced. My stepdad listened. 'Five pounds? Yeah, that's a big fish--for England. I know rivers here where the average size is seven pounds.' He then proceeded to enlighten me on the differences between fishing in England and NZ, and why there are rules against taking fish over a certain size as well as under. Fascinating stuff--and we'd never have had the conversation if it hadn't been for Ngaio Marsh.
Inspector Fox and Nurse Kettle were absolutely delightful, and I loved Sergeant Oliphant.
'Oh, yeah?' he said. 'How big was it?'
I had completely neglected to remember this absolutely crucial piece of information and had to go back and find the passage where this important fish is introduced. My stepdad listened. 'Five pounds? Yeah, that's a big fish--for England. I know rivers here where the average size is seven pounds.' He then proceeded to enlighten me on the differences between fishing in England and NZ, and why there are rules against taking fish over a certain size as well as under. Fascinating stuff--and we'd never have had the conversation if it hadn't been for Ngaio Marsh.
Inspector Fox and Nurse Kettle were absolutely delightful, and I loved Sergeant Oliphant.
November 11, 2017
A cute little murder mystery. But the best part is I found it on youtube read by Benedict Cumberbatch. *romantic sigh* he could make the phone book sound good. The man is a genius at acting the various roles. Oh, and the story is good, too. A who-dunnit mystery involving a fish. Apparently their scales vary as much as fingerprints. Who knew? 🤷🏼♀️
July 1, 2018
I generally keep my reviews brief, but this was an odd book. I experienced two stories at the same time. The first story gets a quick comment, the second prompted an essay. The essay is full of spoilers, so skip that if you are planning to read the book anytime soon.
1. The classic murder mystery - small English village, upper crust suspects, buried secrets , a femme fatale, a couple of young lovers, and a humorous district nurse. The solution hinges on the fate of Old 'Un, the trout that everyone has wanted to catch for years. I enjoyed it, Marsh is a good writer. I thought the ending was unlikely - I didn't believe that the murderer would take such a huge risk with so little chance of gain.
2. Women and bad relationships:
1. The classic murder mystery - small English village, upper crust suspects, buried secrets , a femme fatale, a couple of young lovers, and a humorous district nurse. The solution hinges on the fate of Old 'Un, the trout that everyone has wanted to catch for years. I enjoyed it, Marsh is a good writer. I thought the ending was unlikely - I didn't believe that the murderer would take such a huge risk with so little chance of gain.
2. Women and bad relationships:
January 8, 2019
As a true murder mystery not so much. As English village farce, very rich indeed. The reader is invited from the outset to look down at the houses and trout stream, from the point of view of the village nurse who stops with her bicycle (car in shop for repair) surveying the scene she so admires. "Smoke rose in cosy plumes from one or two chimneys; roofs cuddled into surrounding greenery...Nurse Kettle thought with satisfaction, 'It is pretty as a picture.'" This view of the village will quickly be brought to rights with sharp exchanges from the various inhabitants who bicker over cats, arrows and most of all the big old trout that escapes capture through the years.
Dame Marsh was having a game of it as she put together the characters in this book. By page 56 Nurse Kettle finds a body. The leading family knows people, so of course Lady Lacklander is a friend of Alleyn's mother and calls Scotland Yard to demand Alleyn come solve the murder.
I love that - "roofs cuddled" - what a portent, eh? Like, this village is too good to be true. One of the old dudes starts his drinks early in the day, and when sufficiently lubricated goes out to his bucolic area of greenery to shoot off arrows from his 60-pound bow. Shooting his neighbor's cat was simply an accident, he claims.
The action kicks off with the dying husband of Lady Lacklander breathing his last instructions to his neighbor to ensure that the truth will be told in his published memoirs - a hidden secret that will harm his family's reputation.
By page 177, Alleyn has had enough of the secrecy. "'You may as well sit down, Rory. One feels uncomfortable when you loom. There is, after all, a chair.'
'Thank you,' Alleyn said, taking it. 'I don't want to loom any more than I can help, you know, but you can't expect me to be all smiles and prattle when you, as a group, close your ranks with such a deafening clank whenever I approach you.'"
A great deal of mumbling went on in a family gathering until Alleyn had to give it up since the Lady was not granting anyone permission to speak frankly. "I suggest that you consider just exactly what is at stake in this matter. When a capital crime is committed, you know, all sorts of long-buried secrets are apt to be discovered. It's one of those things about homicide."
I did enjoy the book, yet another pristine paperback from my library from Felony & Mayhem.
Dame Marsh was having a game of it as she put together the characters in this book. By page 56 Nurse Kettle finds a body. The leading family knows people, so of course Lady Lacklander is a friend of Alleyn's mother and calls Scotland Yard to demand Alleyn come solve the murder.
I love that - "roofs cuddled" - what a portent, eh? Like, this village is too good to be true. One of the old dudes starts his drinks early in the day, and when sufficiently lubricated goes out to his bucolic area of greenery to shoot off arrows from his 60-pound bow. Shooting his neighbor's cat was simply an accident, he claims.
The action kicks off with the dying husband of Lady Lacklander breathing his last instructions to his neighbor to ensure that the truth will be told in his published memoirs - a hidden secret that will harm his family's reputation.
By page 177, Alleyn has had enough of the secrecy. "'You may as well sit down, Rory. One feels uncomfortable when you loom. There is, after all, a chair.'
'Thank you,' Alleyn said, taking it. 'I don't want to loom any more than I can help, you know, but you can't expect me to be all smiles and prattle when you, as a group, close your ranks with such a deafening clank whenever I approach you.'"
A great deal of mumbling went on in a family gathering until Alleyn had to give it up since the Lady was not granting anyone permission to speak frankly. "I suggest that you consider just exactly what is at stake in this matter. When a capital crime is committed, you know, all sorts of long-buried secrets are apt to be discovered. It's one of those things about homicide."
I did enjoy the book, yet another pristine paperback from my library from Felony & Mayhem.
February 26, 2015
Many, many, many, many years ago, when I was a little boy in Scotland, the family went on holiday to somewhere Really Glamorous and Thrilling, like Tomintoul. There wasn't much to do in Tomintoul at the best of times except admire the gravestones in the cemetery, but there was even less to do when it was bucketing with rain. So there I was, stuck in a poxy little B&B for several days.
But wait! There was a book in the B&B. Had some earlier guest left it behind, or had the B&B management invested in it for precisely such emergencies as this, like a fire extinguisher? Who knows. But it was put into my small hands.
And it was -- you've guessed it -- Ngaio Marsh's Scales of Justice.
I was most reluctant to read it. First of all, it wasn't science fiction. Second, it was quite obviously far too old for me. I'd by this time probably encountered crime fiction before, in the form of Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books, but that was about it. This was a book for grown-ups and it was in the wrong genre.
One wan look out the window at a gray and blurry world, and then with a sigh I got started . . .
And was, of course, absolutely gripped. I've had an extraordinarily sentimental affection toward the book ever since. Years later, when I must have been in my late teens or early twenties, I read it a second time and enjoyed it all over again. And now, finally, in connection with Rich Westwood's Past Offences 1955 book signup, I've read it again.
In a small but aristocrat-heavy village, Swevenings, local dignitary Colonel Cartarette is found gorily murdered at the side of his favorite fishing stream. Called in, Roderick Alleyn and Br'er Fox soon elicit that this may well have had something to do with the fact that, on his deathbed, Sir Harold Lacklander, the blue-bloodedest of the local bluebloods, requested that Cartarette take charge of editing his memoirs for publication, and that those memoirs blow wide open a long-held guilty secret. Of course, for fear of Scandal, everyone's stupidly unwilling to tell Alleyn what that secret is -- must be the inbreeding, I guess. There are various other intrigues and counterintrigues going on, and of course a young couple madly in love whom circumstances seem to be conspiring to drive apart. And there's also the mystery of the substituted trout.
The narrative features some good hard knocks at the class-structuring of at least this small society. Here's a diatribe from someone who's widely rergarded as an outsider, and who so regards herself:
The trouble is that
This is rather unlike Marsh, and at times I wondered if, wickedly sly old dog that she undoubtedly was, the novel as a whole might not be -- in addition to a well constructed mystery of the classic kind -- a parody of the oeuvre of Agatha Christie, whose attitudes these more resemble. I wouldn't put it past her. There are quite a few overt pieces of humor in the novel (a running joke that's far more effective than it sounds is that, whenever a particular character is referred to, whoever's speaking automatically describes him as an ass), and one or two instances where Marsh seems to be slipping something past her editor (a character mutters "something that sounded very much like 'luck'"), so the idea of a parodic intent doesn't seem outrageous.
Whether that's the case or not, Scales of Justice is a very readable and entertaining example of mystery's Golden Age. Well worth a read.
But wait! There was a book in the B&B. Had some earlier guest left it behind, or had the B&B management invested in it for precisely such emergencies as this, like a fire extinguisher? Who knows. But it was put into my small hands.
And it was -- you've guessed it -- Ngaio Marsh's Scales of Justice.
I was most reluctant to read it. First of all, it wasn't science fiction. Second, it was quite obviously far too old for me. I'd by this time probably encountered crime fiction before, in the form of Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books, but that was about it. This was a book for grown-ups and it was in the wrong genre.
One wan look out the window at a gray and blurry world, and then with a sigh I got started . . .
And was, of course, absolutely gripped. I've had an extraordinarily sentimental affection toward the book ever since. Years later, when I must have been in my late teens or early twenties, I read it a second time and enjoyed it all over again. And now, finally, in connection with Rich Westwood's Past Offences 1955 book signup, I've read it again.
In a small but aristocrat-heavy village, Swevenings, local dignitary Colonel Cartarette is found gorily murdered at the side of his favorite fishing stream. Called in, Roderick Alleyn and Br'er Fox soon elicit that this may well have had something to do with the fact that, on his deathbed, Sir Harold Lacklander, the blue-bloodedest of the local bluebloods, requested that Cartarette take charge of editing his memoirs for publication, and that those memoirs blow wide open a long-held guilty secret. Of course, for fear of Scandal, everyone's stupidly unwilling to tell Alleyn what that secret is -- must be the inbreeding, I guess. There are various other intrigues and counterintrigues going on, and of course a young couple madly in love whom circumstances seem to be conspiring to drive apart. And there's also the mystery of the substituted trout.
The narrative features some good hard knocks at the class-structuring of at least this small society. Here's a diatribe from someone who's widely rergarded as an outsider, and who so regards herself:
So how did it go? We married and came here and he started writing some god-awful book and Rose and he sat in each other's pockets and the county called. Yes, they called, all right, talking one language to each other and another one to me. Old Occy Phinn, as mad as a meat-axe and doesn't even keep himself clean. The Fat Woman of Nunspardon, who took one look at me and then turned polite for the first time in history. Rose, trying so hard to be nice it's a wonder she didn't rupture something. The parson and his wife, and half a dozen women dressed in tweed sacks and felt buckets with faces like the backside of a mule. My God, what have they got? They aren't fun, they aren't gay, they don't do anything and they look like the wreck of the schooner Hesperus. Talk about a living death! And me! Dumped like a sack and meant to be grateful!
The trouble is that
This is rather unlike Marsh, and at times I wondered if, wickedly sly old dog that she undoubtedly was, the novel as a whole might not be -- in addition to a well constructed mystery of the classic kind -- a parody of the oeuvre of Agatha Christie, whose attitudes these more resemble. I wouldn't put it past her. There are quite a few overt pieces of humor in the novel (a running joke that's far more effective than it sounds is that, whenever a particular character is referred to, whoever's speaking automatically describes him as an ass), and one or two instances where Marsh seems to be slipping something past her editor (a character mutters "something that sounded very much like 'luck'"), so the idea of a parodic intent doesn't seem outrageous.
Whether that's the case or not, Scales of Justice is a very readable and entertaining example of mystery's Golden Age. Well worth a read.
December 13, 2021
A cosy mystery set in the quintessential English village Swevenings. A murder takes place beside a stream Colonel Cartarette is found dead with his faithful spaniel Skip beside him. Nurse Kettle finds the body and raises the alarm.
Alleyn and Fox are soon on the case. The suspects are many. Kitty his wife, George infatuated with Kitty, Phin with the battle of the trout, Commander Sync an alcoholic expert archer, Mark the fiancé of Rose the victim’s daughter as well as the obese Lady Lacklander.
An enjoyable read with lots of red herrings or trouts. The scales of trout and their uniqueness were interesting and the class aspect. Blue Bloods aghast with motives of memoirs being published and disgrace as well as one person wanting to be higher in class.
I wonder if Marsh had a penchant for female murderers as the last Alleyn mystery also had a female murderer.
Alleyn and Fox are soon on the case. The suspects are many. Kitty his wife, George infatuated with Kitty, Phin with the battle of the trout, Commander Sync an alcoholic expert archer, Mark the fiancé of Rose the victim’s daughter as well as the obese Lady Lacklander.
An enjoyable read with lots of red herrings or trouts. The scales of trout and their uniqueness were interesting and the class aspect. Blue Bloods aghast with motives of memoirs being published and disgrace as well as one person wanting to be higher in class.
I wonder if Marsh had a penchant for female murderers as the last Alleyn mystery also had a female murderer.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 26, 2019
Scales of Justice (1955) is one of Ngaio Marsh's most classically British mysteries. In fact, despite its 1955 printing date, it has a very pre-WWII feel to it. It is set in the standard small charming village with all the familiar figures--former British military types (Colonel Carterette, the murderee, and Commander Syce, an inebriate ex-navy man); the local landed gentry represented by Lady Lacklander and her son (recently elevated to Sir George Lacklander after the death of his father); the nosy middle-aged woman (this time Nurse Kettle,the county nurse), the romantic young couple (Dr. Mark Lacklander--George's son--and Rose Carteretts--the Colonel's daughter; and the Outsider in the form of Colonel Carterette's second (much younger) wife. There's a nice, healthy on-going feud between Carterette and his neighbor Mr. Octavius Danberry-Phinn over fishing rights and the attempt to catch the Old Un (a rather spectacular trout).
Then Carterette manages to alienate his friends the Lacklanders when Sir Harold (while on his deathbed) commissions the colonel with taking charge of and seeing to the publication of his memoirs. That wouldn't be so bad, but Sir Harold had made some alterations and confessions that the family would rather not see the light of day. Sir George has a huge row with Carterette and tells him that any understanding between their children is now off. This is followed by another loud disagreement with Danberry-Phinn over the Old Un...and then later that evening, Nurse Kettle stumbles across the Colonel's body with the disputed fish lying beside it.
Lady Lacklander doesn't want the local bobby mucking up the investigation, so she calls in favors at Scotland Yard and asks that Inspector Alleyn take up the case. Because he is a gentleman. And..because she knew him when he was young and it appears that she thinks she may be able to manipulate him into hushing things up. She and her family also think they can keep Sir Harold's skeletons firmly in the closet. She and her family would be wrong. As they soon learn, Alleyn may be a gentleman but he is also a dedicated copper and will follow up every lead, no matter how fishy* until he has identified the murderer.
This really is quite good. There is a lot of humor in the book. Marsh pokes fun at the class distinctions--particularly the Lacklanders--without making them into caricatures. The country village setting is well done and we're given a nice overview of the landscape and social set-up in the opening with Nurse Kettle. Marsh lays a good trail of clues with a nice batch of red herrings mixed in (mixed better than my metaphors, I'm happy to add). Though I show on my reading list that I'd read this one, I had no memory of having done so and little more of the production with Patrick Malahide as Alleyn, so Marsh was able to lead me up the garden path for quite a bit of the book. I did manage to untangle the clues before Alleyn explained it all, but not long before. Overall, a satisfying read.
*forgive me, I couldn't resist
First posted on my blog My Reader's Block. Please request permission before reposting. Thanks.
Then Carterette manages to alienate his friends the Lacklanders when Sir Harold (while on his deathbed) commissions the colonel with taking charge of and seeing to the publication of his memoirs. That wouldn't be so bad, but Sir Harold had made some alterations and confessions that the family would rather not see the light of day. Sir George has a huge row with Carterette and tells him that any understanding between their children is now off. This is followed by another loud disagreement with Danberry-Phinn over the Old Un...and then later that evening, Nurse Kettle stumbles across the Colonel's body with the disputed fish lying beside it.
Lady Lacklander doesn't want the local bobby mucking up the investigation, so she calls in favors at Scotland Yard and asks that Inspector Alleyn take up the case. Because he is a gentleman. And..because she knew him when he was young and it appears that she thinks she may be able to manipulate him into hushing things up. She and her family also think they can keep Sir Harold's skeletons firmly in the closet. She and her family would be wrong. As they soon learn, Alleyn may be a gentleman but he is also a dedicated copper and will follow up every lead, no matter how fishy* until he has identified the murderer.
This really is quite good. There is a lot of humor in the book. Marsh pokes fun at the class distinctions--particularly the Lacklanders--without making them into caricatures. The country village setting is well done and we're given a nice overview of the landscape and social set-up in the opening with Nurse Kettle. Marsh lays a good trail of clues with a nice batch of red herrings mixed in (mixed better than my metaphors, I'm happy to add). Though I show on my reading list that I'd read this one, I had no memory of having done so and little more of the production with Patrick Malahide as Alleyn, so Marsh was able to lead me up the garden path for quite a bit of the book. I did manage to untangle the clues before Alleyn explained it all, but not long before. Overall, a satisfying read.
*forgive me, I couldn't resist
First posted on my blog My Reader's Block. Please request permission before reposting. Thanks.
June 21, 2010
A strange outing for Marsh. From comments made by various characters one can tell that the author herself knows that she is writing about a world which, if it ever existed, is now nearly gone. She has various characters mount assaults on the dying status quo and yet in the end allows it to triumph without ever putting up a cogent defense. The final defense of the status quo is that its greatest attacker is a bad person.
The murder itself is, for Marsh, excessively grisly although one only learns of that in dribs and drabs. If it were not for the many character distractions and for Alleyn unwillingness to act as a police officer rather than a 'gent' the murder would be blatantly obvious and the case would have been rolled up in a matter of hours.
The murder itself is, for Marsh, excessively grisly although one only learns of that in dribs and drabs. If it were not for the many character distractions and for Alleyn unwillingness to act as a police officer rather than a 'gent' the murder would be blatantly obvious and the case would have been rolled up in a matter of hours.
August 3, 2020
It had all the potential and none of the fun of a cosy mystery.
8/3/20 I have to agree with my earlier assessment. It had moments when Alleyn and Fox were at their best, and too many more moments dealing with the British class system and being terribly feudal. I did learn fish scales are like fingerprints.
8/3/20 I have to agree with my earlier assessment. It had moments when Alleyn and Fox were at their best, and too many more moments dealing with the British class system and being terribly feudal. I did learn fish scales are like fingerprints.
June 9, 2019
3.5 stars - great fun as an audiobook, I’d give 4 stars for the setting, the interesting, quirky characters, but three stars for a rather questionable motive and too pat a resolution - no spoilers, but I wasn’t really satisfied with the ending and the way Inspector Alleyn arrived at his solution. So, I’d give this Inspector Alleyn mystery, Marsh’s 18th in a long series, 3.5 stars.
I did enjoy the idyllic English country setting, and the couple of old county families that Marsh provides as the victim, and the primary suspects, in a brutal bludgeoning death; the victim was well-liked, and bizarrely, found with a dead fish beside him. Lady Lacklander, leader of county society and an old friend of Alleyn’s mother, as well as neighbor of the victim, calls Scotland Yard to demand he investigate. Of course, as Alleyn soon learns upon arrival and beginning his investigation, old families are often hiding old secrets...
I did enjoy Marsh’s setting and several characters, even if I got a little bogged down with Alleyn’s recitation of the forensic evidence at the end. She seemed to be almost parodying the English country house murder, and the old, privileged families that had ruled their rural fiefdoms with unquestioned authority for generations. She peels back the layers of family honor, reputation and noblesse oblige to show the sordid scandals dwelling beneath the surface of a seemingly golden family. I found that theme well done; however, as I said above, the identity of the killer seemed a bit pat and convenient, and I really didn’t feel we had seen the perpetrator as a realistically vicious murderer.
Having said that, I always enjoy watching Inspector Alleyn and his assistant Fox work, and look forward to reading more in this series. I read this book with the Reading the Detectives group, and look forward to continuing with the Ngaio Marsh reading challenge.
I did enjoy the idyllic English country setting, and the couple of old county families that Marsh provides as the victim, and the primary suspects, in a brutal bludgeoning death; the victim was well-liked, and bizarrely, found with a dead fish beside him. Lady Lacklander, leader of county society and an old friend of Alleyn’s mother, as well as neighbor of the victim, calls Scotland Yard to demand he investigate. Of course, as Alleyn soon learns upon arrival and beginning his investigation, old families are often hiding old secrets...
I did enjoy Marsh’s setting and several characters, even if I got a little bogged down with Alleyn’s recitation of the forensic evidence at the end. She seemed to be almost parodying the English country house murder, and the old, privileged families that had ruled their rural fiefdoms with unquestioned authority for generations. She peels back the layers of family honor, reputation and noblesse oblige to show the sordid scandals dwelling beneath the surface of a seemingly golden family. I found that theme well done; however, as I said above, the identity of the killer seemed a bit pat and convenient, and I really didn’t feel we had seen the perpetrator as a realistically vicious murderer.
Having said that, I always enjoy watching Inspector Alleyn and his assistant Fox work, and look forward to reading more in this series. I read this book with the Reading the Detectives group, and look forward to continuing with the Ngaio Marsh reading challenge.
December 5, 2021
Review of the audiobook narrated by Phillip Franks.
Scales of Justice may be my favorite Alleyn book. The characters were well done and the mystery was intriguing. It is “cozy,” but not there. The interplay between Alleyn and Fox is delightful.
Phillip Franks’ narration is spot on. I enjoyed his performance much more than James Saxon, who did the majority of Marsh’s books. Nadia May also narrated several Marsh titles, but her mispronunciation of Alleyn’s name is bothersome.
Scales of Justice may be my favorite Alleyn book. The characters were well done and the mystery was intriguing. It is “cozy,” but not there. The interplay between Alleyn and Fox is delightful.
Phillip Franks’ narration is spot on. I enjoyed his performance much more than James Saxon, who did the majority of Marsh’s books. Nadia May also narrated several Marsh titles, but her mispronunciation of Alleyn’s name is bothersome.
June 15, 2023
Spot the play on words.
July 25, 2021
Dame Agatha Christie and Her Peers
BOOK 65 - 1955
Better than a few of this author's early works?
CAST - 2 stars: "Old 'un" is particularly memorable as a very large trout. A smaller trout makes an appearance before the cat drags it away for dinner. Mr. Octavious 'Occy' Danberry-Phinn is a widower, loves cats and lives in seclusion-I'd have just changed my name and joined society. Commaner Syce is a bachelor, has lumbago when it is convenient, and says he didn't kill one of Occy's cats with hs 60-pound-bow and arrow. Colonel Maurice Cartarette's 2nd wife, Kitty, may have been the love of another village occupant. (Get it...Kitty...) Rose Cartarette is all aflutter over Dr. Mark Locklander. Sir Harold at 75 dies naturally and Lady Lacklander has a toe that hurts. Nurse Kettle has been around the bend a few times and is competent and full-figured...like all good nurses. I really like "Old 'un" and some of the cats. But when a trout is your favorite character...that's not a good thing.
ATMOSPHERE - 3: Our village name is 'Swevenings' or perhaps shortened 'Sweet Evenings' and is a remnant of a feudal age. There are 4 homes/cottages, several bridges, lots of lanes for illicit late night meetings. If Marsh had provided us with just the briefest of a map, I'd not have had to try to draw one. (Don't, you won't really need it.) It all does sound lovely and perhaps really is, but I sorta got lost in the whole 'who crossed which bridge at 8:10pm and what did they see?'. Because all in all, this landscape doesn't make much sense.
CRIME: 4: A murder with 2 weapons provides lots of ifs, lots of possibilities and suspects.
INVESTIGATION - 3:Lady Lacklander is related in some way to Inspector Roderick Alleyn of Scotland Yard, so he drops everything and comes running. He spends a lot of time studying trout scales and asking about that bridge and who was on it at 8:10pm.
RESOLUTION - 1: A revelation on the third from the last page throws everything you may have thought out the window: this is the biggest foul play by authors in this genre. But here's the thing: there is a GREAT subplot about one character betraying the English during WW2. THAT story is fascinating but doesn't much impact the story. Still, 1 star for his element: Marsh commits the ultimate mystery sin. AND, I didn't believe the motivation for a second.
SUMMARY: 2.6. Just a simple map and the placement of a pertinent clue earlier in the novel would have improved this story very much. BUT, it appears there is no map because nothing about it would match the text. Still, I liked visiting this old village, the cats, and the trout. Yes, this Marsh outing is a tad better than earlier efforts which included xenophobic and homophobic characters, like in "Death In Ecstacy."
BOOK 65 - 1955
Better than a few of this author's early works?
CAST - 2 stars: "Old 'un" is particularly memorable as a very large trout. A smaller trout makes an appearance before the cat drags it away for dinner. Mr. Octavious 'Occy' Danberry-Phinn is a widower, loves cats and lives in seclusion-I'd have just changed my name and joined society. Commaner Syce is a bachelor, has lumbago when it is convenient, and says he didn't kill one of Occy's cats with hs 60-pound-bow and arrow. Colonel Maurice Cartarette's 2nd wife, Kitty, may have been the love of another village occupant. (Get it...Kitty...) Rose Cartarette is all aflutter over Dr. Mark Locklander. Sir Harold at 75 dies naturally and Lady Lacklander has a toe that hurts. Nurse Kettle has been around the bend a few times and is competent and full-figured...like all good nurses. I really like "Old 'un" and some of the cats. But when a trout is your favorite character...that's not a good thing.
ATMOSPHERE - 3: Our village name is 'Swevenings' or perhaps shortened 'Sweet Evenings' and is a remnant of a feudal age. There are 4 homes/cottages, several bridges, lots of lanes for illicit late night meetings. If Marsh had provided us with just the briefest of a map, I'd not have had to try to draw one. (Don't, you won't really need it.) It all does sound lovely and perhaps really is, but I sorta got lost in the whole 'who crossed which bridge at 8:10pm and what did they see?'. Because all in all, this landscape doesn't make much sense.
CRIME: 4: A murder with 2 weapons provides lots of ifs, lots of possibilities and suspects.
INVESTIGATION - 3:Lady Lacklander is related in some way to Inspector Roderick Alleyn of Scotland Yard, so he drops everything and comes running. He spends a lot of time studying trout scales and asking about that bridge and who was on it at 8:10pm.
RESOLUTION - 1: A revelation on the third from the last page throws everything you may have thought out the window: this is the biggest foul play by authors in this genre. But here's the thing: there is a GREAT subplot about one character betraying the English during WW2. THAT story is fascinating but doesn't much impact the story. Still, 1 star for his element: Marsh commits the ultimate mystery sin. AND, I didn't believe the motivation for a second.
SUMMARY: 2.6. Just a simple map and the placement of a pertinent clue earlier in the novel would have improved this story very much. BUT, it appears there is no map because nothing about it would match the text. Still, I liked visiting this old village, the cats, and the trout. Yes, this Marsh outing is a tad better than earlier efforts which included xenophobic and homophobic characters, like in "Death In Ecstacy."
December 5, 2021
On second reading, I'm glad Marsh reaches back once in a while to the cozy, though this cozy spans hill and vale. At first I kept imagining it taking place on the Microsoft Windows XP background, but since that doesn't have a visible river, I had to keep beating that out of my mental imagery.
Starting to see some of Marsh's habits; like the word 'footling' and the propensity to understate love stories. She breaks one of her habits here, though. She usually puts the "I don't know anything about art but I know what I like" into unattractive characters, but here she puts it in the mind of Nurse Kettle, who is bustling and nosey but designed to be likable.
Marsh often throws "historical" references in her books; some of them real but most of them seemingly made up. Herrenvolk heresy doesn't seem to be a "well-known conspiracy" but at least shows up in a couple of Google results not related to this book. But Thompson and Bywaters was a well-known case in the 1920s where a man and a woman murdered the woman's husband. Singapore and Hong Kong are real; Zlomce is not. In Vintage Murder, Marsh wrote a forward blurb about how Middleton, North Island, New Zealand wasn't a real place. I think I need that for all her books, except expanded to all of her references.
First Read
Another pleasantly entertaining Marsh cozy. This one seemed to have more invested in the actual mystery but the Marsh watermark of cleverly-crafted descriptions remains the reason to read; "Smoke rose in cozy plumes from one or two chimneys; roofs cuddled into surrounding greenery ... a trout stream meandered through meadow and coppice and slid blamelessly under two bridges."
Starting to see some of Marsh's habits; like the word 'footling' and the propensity to understate love stories. She breaks one of her habits here, though. She usually puts the "I don't know anything about art but I know what I like" into unattractive characters, but here she puts it in the mind of Nurse Kettle, who is bustling and nosey but designed to be likable.
Marsh often throws "historical" references in her books; some of them real but most of them seemingly made up. Herrenvolk heresy doesn't seem to be a "well-known conspiracy" but at least shows up in a couple of Google results not related to this book. But Thompson and Bywaters was a well-known case in the 1920s where a man and a woman murdered the woman's husband. Singapore and Hong Kong are real; Zlomce is not. In Vintage Murder, Marsh wrote a forward blurb about how Middleton, North Island, New Zealand wasn't a real place. I think I need that for all her books, except expanded to all of her references.
First Read
Another pleasantly entertaining Marsh cozy. This one seemed to have more invested in the actual mystery but the Marsh watermark of cleverly-crafted descriptions remains the reason to read; "Smoke rose in cozy plumes from one or two chimneys; roofs cuddled into surrounding greenery ... a trout stream meandered through meadow and coppice and slid blamelessly under two bridges."
May 31, 2023
Not one of her better mysteries. When Marsh is great, she is really great. However, she can write some real stinkers too. This took forever to read because it was so boring. I chose almost anything to do over sitting down and reading this. I finished it in the vain hope that the resolution of the mystery would redeem the book. Nope.
Besides a boring plot and cliched mystery solution, I found the constant harping on the weight of one of the characters to be extreme. I'm not exaggerating when I say that every description of this character had a reference to her weight. I started to imagine her as a character in one of those reality tv shows about extreme weight; that she must weigh a 1,000 pounds or something for this repetitive focus on weight. It turns out she weighed 230. Wow. I know that people used to be a lot thinner and that England had food rationing until 1954 so people were limited in their food intake but 230 is not crazy and warranting a stream of comments.
She jabbed her fat finger at Alleyn.
Her face was too fat to be expressive.
She began heavily to ascend. He could hear her labored breathing.
Her enormous bosom heaved.
She shifted her great bulk.
You won't mind saving my mammoth legs a journey.
She stood massively beside him.
These are all within the first 26 pages of the book. It's nuts. Does this character not have any other traits? If there was a drinking game and you had to take a shot every time the character's weight was mentioned, you'd be drunk within the first 10 pages.
Besides a boring plot and cliched mystery solution, I found the constant harping on the weight of one of the characters to be extreme. I'm not exaggerating when I say that every description of this character had a reference to her weight. I started to imagine her as a character in one of those reality tv shows about extreme weight; that she must weigh a 1,000 pounds or something for this repetitive focus on weight. It turns out she weighed 230. Wow. I know that people used to be a lot thinner and that England had food rationing until 1954 so people were limited in their food intake but 230 is not crazy and warranting a stream of comments.
She jabbed her fat finger at Alleyn.
Her face was too fat to be expressive.
She began heavily to ascend. He could hear her labored breathing.
Her enormous bosom heaved.
She shifted her great bulk.
You won't mind saving my mammoth legs a journey.
She stood massively beside him.
These are all within the first 26 pages of the book. It's nuts. Does this character not have any other traits? If there was a drinking game and you had to take a shot every time the character's weight was mentioned, you'd be drunk within the first 10 pages.
June 3, 2024
Another female mystery writer, I introduced myself to. In any case, this book proved to me that Agatha Christie still remains my all-time favorite.
Scales of Justice was good, and I really enjoyed it, but it dragged on with noticeably irrelevant narration intended to keep the reader going. However, I found that very boring, and I quickly skimmed through such pages – and chapters. Overall, I wasn’t disappointed, her works are not the type I would read again (for the time being…), I could tell.
Scales of Justice was good, and I really enjoyed it, but it dragged on with noticeably irrelevant narration intended to keep the reader going. However, I found that very boring, and I quickly skimmed through such pages – and chapters. Overall, I wasn’t disappointed, her works are not the type I would read again (for the time being…), I could tell.
December 30, 2016
This one is solid, but not spectacular. Mostly, I enjoyed it. It's a murder in a small English village. The character work is solid. The mystery ends up hinging on fish scales, which is a bit of a novelty.
It does really emphasize Marsh's tendency to have the unlikeable characters be guilty, while the likeable ones are almost always innocent.
It does really emphasize Marsh's tendency to have the unlikeable characters be guilty, while the likeable ones are almost always innocent.
October 10, 2020
A smooth, well-written mystery that vivisects an England that was already curdling in 1955
Overall impressions
"Scales of Justice" was my first Ngaio Marsh book. It's the eighteenth book featuring Roderick Alleyn as the upper class Scotland Yard Detective Inspector but it can be read as a stand alone with no problems.
At the start of the boook, Marsh lays out the geography of the small English village the story takes place in, like a cleverly designed stage set and acquaints us with the principal character through the optimistic eyes Miss Kettle, the District Nurse, as she glides through the desmesnes of the County set on her sturdy bicycle. She is the cheerful, pragmatic voice of the common woman, filling her speach with valedictions such as "Be good and if you can't be good, be careful" and through her we first get to know the four interconnected households that the mystey revolves around. These are drawn with such skill that, by the time the murder happens, about a quarter of the way through the book, I found myself regretting the life lost and wanting the murderer caught.
I loved the language in the book, which offered descriptions like this one which is the first introduction of one of the key characters:
The evening light had faded to a bleached greyness. Silvered grass, trees, lawns, flowers and the mildly curving thread of the shadowed trout stream joined in an announcement of oncoming night. Through this setting Colonel Cartarette moved as if he were an expression both of its substance and its spirit. It was as if from the remote past, through a quiet progression of dusks, his figure had come up from the valley of the Chyne.
There are also some good insights into how people really behave towards one another, like this description:
Sometimes there exists in people who are attracted to each other a kind of ratio between the degree of attraction and the potential for irritation. Strangely, it is often the unhappiness of one that arouses an equal degree of irascibility in the other. The tear-blotted face, the obstinate misery, the knowledge that this distress is genuine and the feeling of incompetence it induces, all combine to exasperate and inflame.
The mystery itself is satisfyingly complex. There is a only a small pool of suspects but they are all colourful, it's a motive-rich environment and the method of the killing takes some working out. Inspector Alleyn, who comes from the same class as the people he is investigating, has a wonderfully calm manner and is very skilled at not being deflected or intimidated by the pressures the entitled habitually bring to bear to protect themselves.
So, as a mystery, this is definitely entertaining. What makes it more than that is what Marsh uses the mystery to do.
Some thoughts on what Ngaio Marsh is using this mystery to do.
It seems to me that Ngaio Marsh was using her mystery to prod and push and perhaps even slice open a particular view of England.
It's the view of those who believe themselves born to rule. The ones who see nothing odd about the term Home Counties. The ones who honestly believe that England is exceptional because they believe that they and their ancestors before them are and were exceptional.
It's also about the people who enable and sustain this point of view. The people like Nurse Kettle who believe in "degree" and who are reassured by a social hierarchy which doesn't change and in which they know and are satisfied with their place.
It's an England born of and nurtured by the stories the English tell themselves about how the world works.
The picture map that is drawn for Nurse Kettle is a good manifestation of that world view. Someone told me that it reminded them of "Wind In The Willows". I think that may be because it expresses the same England-as-we-would-like-it-to-be-if-we-were-all-good-chaps spirit. Alleyn describes the place as charming, saying it's:
'Like a lead pencil vignette in a Victorian album.'
Given the precision of Alleyn's language, I was reminded that charm is an illusion, cast to please the eye of the beholder and to hide what is really there.
We're told that Swevenings, the village name, means dream and the river's name Chyme, means yawn. Which I think is a hint that the map is a dream of England.
I think Ngaio Marsh manages to show the power of the charm and the ugliness it hides and grant both things a degree of authenticity.
Nurse Kettle, who is happily in the charm's thrall, is admirable in her way and her world view helps her to remain admirable. Lady Lacklander, who helps to cast the charm, is also admirable in her way. She plays the noblesse obligé game without reluctance and props up the dream through her unassailable certainty in her own entitlement.
Yet the reality the charm is hiding is not just one of disproportionate privilege but of treachery and exclusion and thoughtless exploitation.
Alleyn is able both to see the charm and see through it. He has dedicated himself to facts, even when he doesn't like where they lead him.
It seems to me that the biggest 'fact' Alleyn exposes is that the charm itself is toxic and damages those who cast it, those entralled by it and those excluded from it.
Try the audiobook if you can
I recommend the audiobook version, narrated by Philip Frank. I think he does a superb job. Click on the SoundCloud link below to hear a sample.
September 13, 2020
I should have known. This book starts with a map AND a cast of characters...never a good sign.
I enjoyed the beginning of the book, in spite of the budding ro-mance (which fortunately gets very little play), but by the end I was so annoyed that I'm only giving it two stars. Annoyed because Marsh keeps any real information off the page until the bitter end, preferring to have Alleyn tell all in the typical Christie/Murder She Wrote style rather than let the reader follow his and Fox's trail through the maze. Added to that, her construction of the maze consists of yet more conversations between all those who will be suspects, but which are also kept off the page. We see them just-before or just-after terribly significant meetings for pages and pages and pages and pages. We know they talked and met up but not about what. There are many significant looks and interesting silences between Alleyn and Fox, by which the authoress implies that if the reader doesn't "get it", they must be slow indeed. Pfffft. Not content with that, as we finally draw near the end of this tiresome tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury but not much in the way of facts, she starts switching back and forth between two different places and groups of people!
Eeeechhhhh.
It's time people stopped comparing Marsh to Sayers and Christie. She holds all the aces and in her personal pack they add up to five or six.
Also, Marsh continues her obsession with people's hands. At one point the district nurse is being interviewed by Alleyn and she sits there "tidily", with her hands crossed at the wrists. Another posture I have tried several different ways, but with no ease or comfort or even natural positioning at all. If she had sat with her hands clasped, or one upon the other, all right, but nobody sits around with their wrists crossed, except in that one awful unfinished portrait of an ugly woman whose name escapes me.
This book could have been so much better than it was. As it was, the guilty party seemed to have been pulled out of left field because Marsh was tired of writing, or as if she hadn't really decided who was gonna dunit before her deadline loomed too large to ignore.
I enjoyed the beginning of the book, in spite of the budding ro-mance (which fortunately gets very little play), but by the end I was so annoyed that I'm only giving it two stars. Annoyed because Marsh keeps any real information off the page until the bitter end, preferring to have Alleyn tell all in the typical Christie/Murder She Wrote style rather than let the reader follow his and Fox's trail through the maze. Added to that, her construction of the maze consists of yet more conversations between all those who will be suspects, but which are also kept off the page. We see them just-before or just-after terribly significant meetings for pages and pages and pages and pages. We know they talked and met up but not about what. There are many significant looks and interesting silences between Alleyn and Fox, by which the authoress implies that if the reader doesn't "get it", they must be slow indeed. Pfffft. Not content with that, as we finally draw near the end of this tiresome tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury but not much in the way of facts, she starts switching back and forth between two different places and groups of people!
Eeeechhhhh.
It's time people stopped comparing Marsh to Sayers and Christie. She holds all the aces and in her personal pack they add up to five or six.
Also, Marsh continues her obsession with people's hands. At one point the district nurse is being interviewed by Alleyn and she sits there "tidily", with her hands crossed at the wrists. Another posture I have tried several different ways, but with no ease or comfort or even natural positioning at all. If she had sat with her hands clasped, or one upon the other, all right, but nobody sits around with their wrists crossed, except in that one awful unfinished portrait of an ugly woman whose name escapes me.
This book could have been so much better than it was. As it was, the guilty party seemed to have been pulled out of left field because Marsh was tired of writing, or as if she hadn't really decided who was gonna dunit before her deadline loomed too large to ignore.
March 1, 2018
The people of Swevenings live very insulated lives. Nurse Kettle makes her rounds of the four families in the community: the blueblood Lacklanders, Octavius (Occy) Phinn, Commander Syce, and the Cartaretts. Sir Harold Lacklander, a former ambassador, lies dying and sends for Colonel Cartarett to ask him to edit his memoirs. Once the colonel agrees, Sir Harold lets go and passes away. But the problems have just begun because something in Sir Harold's memoirs is scandalous, and his family desperately wants to keep it from being published. George, Sir Harold's son, declares that if Colonel Cartarett goes forward, he will stand in the way of Rose, Colonel Cartarett's daughter, marrying George's son, Dr. Mark. Plus, Colonel Cartarett has been feuding over fishing rights on the Chine creek with Occy Phinn. Occy has been fighting with Commander Syce because the latter shot one of Occy's cats with an arrow. It seems everyone is feuding with everyone else.
Read the rest of this review and other fun, geeky articles at Fangirl Nation
Read the rest of this review and other fun, geeky articles at Fangirl Nation
June 3, 2019
2.5* raised to 3*
An unsatisfactory Marsh. From the beginning, there was a sense of unreality which continued till the end. The characters never become tangible and their motivations failed to convince. This is not a general criticism of Golden Age detective fiction or even Marsh. Just this particular book.
The plot involves the after shocks of the death of Sir Harold Lacklander who has written a shocking memoir. But it is unbelievable that this kind of memoir would ever be written. Old men do not belittle their accomplishments and definitely not to the extent of ruining their legacy. Yes, they might boast of activities which make their families uncomfortable, but not this.
However, the final deduction has some fine reasoning,
An unsatisfactory Marsh. From the beginning, there was a sense of unreality which continued till the end. The characters never become tangible and their motivations failed to convince. This is not a general criticism of Golden Age detective fiction or even Marsh. Just this particular book.
The plot involves the after shocks of the death of Sir Harold Lacklander who has written a shocking memoir. But it is unbelievable that this kind of memoir would ever be written. Old men do not belittle their accomplishments and definitely not to the extent of ruining their legacy. Yes, they might boast of activities which make their families uncomfortable, but not this.
However, the final deduction has some fine reasoning,
May 29, 2022
This was an exceptional mystery. I hadn't read one of the Roderick Alleyn books before, but I could jump right into his character. A murder occurs in a small rural area where the same families have lived for generations. The clues seem to be all over the place, about fish, a memoir written by a recently deceased resident, and old family feuds. Ms. Marsh does a wonderful job of bringing all the suspects to life. I was hoping that the two young people could get together in the end. I don't like Romeo and Juliet endings. I am looking forward to reading the other two Insp. Alleyn books on my Kindle. I enjoyed the repartee between him and his assistant, Fox.
July 28, 2017
The second book in my 3-book sampler program of Ngaio Marsh's Roderick Alleyn series was less enjoyable than the first, although still a fairly complex mystery. This one comes about mid-way through the series and it seems to me the series (and characters have evolved some since the beginnings. Lots of focus on the potential suspects, their lives, and how they interact with one another. Alleyn and his sidekick, Fox, don't even make an appearance until nearly a third of the way through the book.
Soon, I will finish my sampling by selecting a book from the later part of the series and thus will form a more definitive opinion on the entire series.
Soon, I will finish my sampling by selecting a book from the later part of the series and thus will form a more definitive opinion on the entire series.
June 7, 2020
I love this very vintage British detective series, for the characters, the settings, and the mid-century ambience. This novel unfolds in "an almost unspeakably charming" English village dominated by "the county set," a collection of old-school Aristocrats who have occupied their estates for centuries. The mystery is tricky, filled with lots of fish scales and red herrings and prime British idioms ("Think he rumbled the 'bago?") that you have to figure out as best you can. I really enjoyed it.
July 22, 2021
It is not perhaps generally known [the Colonel had written] that the scales of not two trout are alike. I mean microscopically alike in the sense that not two sets of fingerprints correspond. It is amusing to reflect that in the watery world a rogue-trout may leave incriminating evidence behind him in the form of what might be called scales of justice.
August 26, 2021
Something’s fishy in this tucked away village in England. Of course there is murder, cats are running wild, Fox almost falls in love, the British noble are worried about their silly reputations, and there is a nurse named Miss Kettle?! That’s a pretty kettle of fish. Who knew the scales of justice have to do with fish!
December 26, 2021
I really like this clever mystery, set in a small English town, where cats, a giant trout, and secrets from the past all collide in murder. I've been revisiting this one for decades, and I always remember how it was done but I'm never sure who did it! I think Marsh's books are as good as Christie's.
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