November 2012 Guest Editor Kate Mosse on Sleeping Murder...
No list would be complete without the Queen of Crime herself. I first stumbled upon Christie on a wet teenage family holiday. Her characterisation, her neat and slick plotting, the way she summons up a sense of place and period. This is one of my favourites, the last Miss Marple, a tale of old secrets and long shadows.
A strange house A ghost from the past As soon as she moves into Hillside, Gwenda knows there’s something strange about this house. A sealed room. A hidden door. The apparition of a young woman being strangled. But strangest of all – this all seems quite familiar. As her friend Jane Marple investigates, the answer seems to lie in a crime committed nearly twenty years ago. The killer may have gotten away with murder. But Miss Marple is never far behind. Never underestimate Miss Marple ‘Reading a perfectly plotted Agatha Christie is like crunching into a perfect apple: that pure, crisp, absolute satisfaction.’ Tana French ‘Miss Marple is spry, shrewd and compassionate.’ Sunday Telegraph