Shroud for a Nightingale

by P.D. James

Book Overview

Hailed as "mystery at its best" by The New York Times, Shroud for a Nightingale is the fourth book in bestselling author P.D. James's Adam Dalgliesh mystery series.The young women of Nightingale House are there to learn to nurse and comfort the suffering. But when one of the students plays patient in a demonstration of nursing skills, she is horribly, brutally killed. Another student dies equally mysteriously, and it is up to Adam Dalgliesh of Scotland...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0743219600
• ISBN13: 9780743219600
• Release Date: September 2001
• Publisher: Scribner Book Company
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 0.71 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Sink into the subtly sinister and claustrophic setting!

A Murder occurs during a nurses training demonstration. From that moment, you will be committed to the story. This story is a wonderful classic British who-dun-it. But it is so much more than that. Like all P.D. James novels, you'll find yourself caught up by the characters as layer by layer their good and bad intentions are revealed. The author never designs her novels with cardboard characters. Each player is complex, usually with faults, but so human and fallible, they are never one dimensional villians. This book stands out among all of her novels for two reasons. One is the atmosphere she creates, the claustrophic tense nurses training house, surrrounded by storms, driving rain, and falling tress. This all contributes to the high tension maintained throughout. The second reason is the mystery's solution. One of her most shocking and intense endings This is an outstanding book. If youre lucky...read it while snowed in with the phone lines down, and refuse to let the world outside interrupt theis intense and wonderful reading experience.

My cup of tea!

This is my second P.D. James book. Loved it and could barely put it down. Interesting setting and good plot. Just enough detail about the medical profession in England. Watched for clues along the way, but was surprised by ending. I had picked someone else for the murderer altho I decided early on that the two murders were done by same person. This book has me hooked on Ms. James. Am planning to read the rest of her books as soon as I can.

Terror at Nightingale House

With her fourth Adam Dalgliesh novel, "Shroud for a Nightingale," P. D James ventured into new and dark territory, both in terms of the mystery and underlying themes.The first three novels in the Dalgliesh canon were, for the most part, traditional mystery novels with characters who you sensed were complex human beings, but who were never fleshed out entirely, as if to do so would be violating the "rules" of the detective story.With "Shroud for a Nightingale," however, P. D. James introduced us into the dark world of Nightingale House, where nurses, nursing students, physicians, and patients suddenly find a double murderer in their midst.This is the first of P. D. James's novels in which the characters' pasts are truly made to bear on the present. By the end of the novel, we are terrified at the bounds of loyalty and deception to which our fellow human beings are capable.The terror in "Shroud for a Nightingale" is there from the start, as the first victim-to-be meets a demise that, simply put, is worthy of a horror novel. Such horror, when expressed in James's elegant prose, becomes even more frightening.

One of James' best

Adam Dalgliesh investigates the murders of two young student nurses at Nightingale House, the former by intra-gastric poisoning, the second by nicotine poisoning. His detective work leads him into a chilling world of deception, long-buried secrets, repressed sexuality, and blackmail among an almost exclusively female list of suspects.This is James at her most provocative, her most intriguing, and her most thrilling. The plot is one of her most brilliantly conceived--not only are there plenty of well-laid clues and red herrings, but the murderer's true identity comes as a surprising twist. James' plot construction is even more sound than usual--everything fits perfectly. But anyone who reads a James novel knows that there's more to her books than just a satisfying mystery. She offers the reader a lot to think about--the motive behind the murders is both shocking and thought-provoking, and Dalgliesh is written with great sensitivity and complexity as a human being! . His subordinate, Sergeant Masterson, is a rather unsavory but interesting character, and the suspects are all extremely well-developed and vividly drawn. The setting, a dark, lonely nurse training school with a frightening history, creates atmosphere and adds suspense to an already suspenseful plot.Read this book--you won't be disappointed.

superb mystery; superb writing; superb characterizations

As always with PD James, the mystery form is marvelously supported by superb writing. The famous Adam Dalglish is somewhat tangential to this mystery, which deals with the legal system and law courts of Great Britain. Fascinating details for the legally trained. Strong female characterization, although the victim is both admirable and despicable.