The Last Devil To Die: The Thursday Murder Club 4

Product Information

I'd love one of those books that's a caper around the world, but that also has some truth about the world, and also makes you laugh and has also has some of the aesthetic of Thursday Murder Club, but it's Da Vinci Code. And I couldn't quite find one. Osman doesn’t disappoint… Everything is here that fans of the series have come to expect: humour, warmth, the confounding of expectations as these pensioners investigate… Along with the laughs, there is grief, and an ending that is handled sensitively (I was weeping)… We all need a regular injection of the Thursday Murder Club to keep our spirits up.”

Astronauts look down on our fragile Earth in Samantha Harvey’s Orbital. Photograph: Volodymyr Burdiak/Alamy The Last Devil to Die is a Cozy Mystery I devoured in two big gulps. It's full of eye-opening perspectives into the antiques business, drug-smuggling, fine-art fraud, and on-line romance fraud. But who am I kidding? I'm here for the four main characters in this series, their comradery and banter, along with Joyce's journal entries that keep me listening time and time again. I did crave a bit more of Joyce's loyal pooch Alan, but that's just the dog-lover in me chiming in. While author Richard Osman will be moving on to write a second series, he assured me (and the many other readers who are similarly invested) that he’ll return to the funny, sweet stories of my favorite retirement home sleuths. The Last Devil to Die is a beautiful send-off that will get us through the wait.” It’s wonderful to see how many people have fallen in love with Richard’s fabulous Thursday Murder Club and simply couldn’t wait to read the next instalment,” said his publisher Joanna Prior, managing director of Penguin General. “The response to these characters and the crimes they solve from readers around the world has been extraordinary and it has been a joy to work with retailers to make publication week such a big moment for everyone to share in.” Other characters in my books are constantly being outsmarted by the four protagonists. Even the police officer, Chris, thinks, ‘I must be polite to these people’ and then realizes he doesn’t need to be at all. They twist people around their little fingers, but of course, in the end, everyone is firm friends.Osman concocts a satisfyingly complex whodunit full of neat twists and wrong turns. But unlike most crime novelists, he ensures his book’s strength and momentum stem not from its plot or its thrills but rather its perfectly formed characters. Once again, the quartet of friends makes for delightful company… Heartwarming and enthralling. ‘They carried a kind of magic, the four of them,’ a policeman muses. That magic is still there in abundance.”

Joyce plays a more major role in The Last Devil to Die and almost becomes more Elizabeth than Elizabeth herself. Ibrahim makes a quiet revelation to Computer Bob and I wonder whether he will ever make this revelation to the other members of the Thursday Murder Club. There's always something just out of reach. . . . Everyone chasing the thing they don't have. Going mad until they get it." Members of the group often visit the nearby (and fictional) seaside town of Fairhaven. Based on descriptions in the book, the town might be loosely based on the real life Hastings in East Sussex. It's described as being “around 30 minutes in the other direction from Tunbridge Wells” and having a police station, pier, and access to the A21 for entering/exiting the town. The Thursday Murder Club books follow a group of four seventy-something residents of a retirement community who come together each week to discuss old murder cases. The main characters are:I'm always sad when I get to the end of another book in the Thursday Murder Club series but I know there's more to come from these septuagenarians. It may be a bit longer wait this time around for Book #5 but I'll be here for it when it's published.