The Murder Room: An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery

by P.D. James

Book Overview

NATIONAL BESTSELLER - Murders present meet murders past in this harrowing, thought-provoking thriller - Part of the bestselling mystery series that inspired Dalgliesh on Acorn TV

"Suspenseful, atmospheric.... No shortage of surprise twists." --The New York Times Book Review

Commander Adam Dalgliesh is already acquainted with the Dupayne--a museum dedicated to the interwar years, with a room celebrating the...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1400076099
• ISBN13: 9781400076093
• Release Date: November 2004
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 432 Pages
• Weight: 0.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.2" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Another Winner by the Grande Dame of Literary Mystery.

A complex crime involving scheming people of various classes who are not necessarily what they seem. That's the hallmark of a P.D. James novel and exactly what she serves up here. I loved the setting: a museum devoted to the Inter-War years that features a Murder Room chronicling the most heinous crimes of that period. A copycat killer seems to be on the loose, slaying two people in one night and then going after a third. Now in her eighties, James is in fine form, her writing as tight and deep as ever. This feels like her intended end for the Adam Dalgleish series since she gives him a happy fiancée at the close.

Running beautifully before the wind - PD James at work

This is not only the latest P.D. James book, it is also her best work in some time. She has gone back to the core of her work, to murder and to Adam Dalgiesh, the Commander. He is still at Scotland Yard and the book is still about people that come into contact with a murder and how it affects them. In contrast to several other very good writers writing today about their continuing characters, Adam Dalgiesh shows no sign of becoming a private eye, and this is a very good thing for us. I think that what I really like about P.D James is her gift for expressing apparently intuitively an insight into the core her characters. She knows what makes these individuals run. They each react to the intrusion of a full scale police investigation in a believable fashion. These individual reactions of each of her characters are different, but they are so incredibly nuanced that they are seemingly real. It is as close as you can get to a fictional person. You feel that the author actually knows these characters as people, and what they think and how they feel, each of them. They are not stand ins for the author. I do not remember if she has been doing this for a while, but there were several words in this book that I admit that I had to mark to look up later. An example of this was the word "etiolated" at page 244. I had never seen the word before and had not an idea what it meant. Merriam-Webster OnLine says it means: "1 : to bleach and alter the natural development of (a green plant) by excluding sunlight; 2 a : to make pale b : to deprive of natural vigor : make feeble." That makes sense and given the context it was clear enough, but there were six or seven of these words that I finally had to look up one after the other - it was fun. But it is not for the words that I read P.D. James, nor even for the characters, how ever well and completely presented, rather it is for the writing, an example: "He was after all, a poet with a writer's interest in the fabric of other lives." at page 243. That is to me a beautiful sentence, and in context it is close to perfect. It expresses the poetic side of her major character poetically, and talks of the author as well. It is multifaceted. It is elegant. It is prose carried to the edge by an author in full command of her arsenal of words. But the book itself shows an author in full command of her story as well, and that is special too.

P.D. James never disappoints...

The latest installment in the Adam Dalgliesh series, "The Murder Room" is classic P.D. James. As some previous reviews have correctly pointed out, there is nothing new in this book. As a reader, the appeal of P.D. James is not the search for something new, but rather the confidence of a high quality, well written mystery."The Murder Room" is set in a privately held, small, family museum that focuses on the interware years of 1919-39. The title refers to one room in the museum that features infamous murders from this time period. As always, P.D. James fills the book with interesting and complex characters--two dysfunctional families, loyal caretakers, mis-guided youths, and of course, New Scotland Yard. Sex, intrigue, loyalty, and of course, money, create alliances between some characters while pitting others against one another.Although the reader knows the murderer is likely to be closely connected to the museum, P.D. James leaves the reader guessing until quite close to the end. The detailed character development, and the way the words lead the reader to envision the atmosphere of this country museum will keep you entranced until the end.

A Wonderful Book, Satisfying at all levels.

P.D. James is by far the best mystery novelist around. Her writing, plot and character development are unsurpassable. This book is no different. It's powerful and suspenseful, and a true psychological thriller. There are a lot of copycats out there, but none can touch Ms. James. In this book Dalgliesh investigates a gruesome murder at a small private museum. This museum is dedicated to displays of art, literature, pop culture, etc. in the years in Britain between the two great wars, and one of the displays is a "murder room" where information is set out about infamous murders that happened during this time in English history. When the first murder occurs, it looks like a copycat from one of the earlier murders. Before Dalgliesh and his team can solve the first murder another body turns up which reinforces the copycat theory. Dalgliesh manages to solve the cases, but not before we see a lot of unexpected complications. James can magically transcend genres and she accomplishes that brilliantly with this novel.

Dame James is back!

Any P.D. James is preferable to no P.D. James and while some readers may have found "The Murder Room" faint in some areas, Dame James' latest Adam Dalgleish is, well, Adam Dalgleish. How can a reader go wrong?Granted, James has given us a new twist (Adam is in love and her traditional police procedural takes a different turn. But before one cries "soap opera," "The Murder Room" is not about Adam Dalgliesh's personal life. It is about a series of murder, a plot outline with which James is quite comfortable and her legions of fans come to expect.Circumstances surround the undertakings (forgive the pun) of the Dupayne Museum,, a small, rather esoteric, museum devoted to the "interwar years," the period in England from 1919 to 1939. However, the rub is that the lease on the museum is about to expire and the three trustees (siblings) must agree totally on its extension or else the museum cannot continue. One brother, Dr. Neville Dupayne, is dead set (forgive the pun again) against signing; thus the demise of the museum is at hand, it appears. Quickly into the book, the good doctor is found burned alive in very suspicious circumstances and just about everyone has a motive for seeing him dead. Commander Dalgleish and his team from New Scotland Yard are called in and before this death can be solved, two others follow, all with connections to the museum.James clearly is in charge of this narrative and, as always, controls the pace and the revelations of the investigation. Dalgleish is, as always, superb. The resolution comes not through histrionics or melodrama, but the James/Dalgleish penchant for brilliance.Is this James' best? Hmmmm. "The best" is probably the individual reader's personal choice, as I've yet to read a "bad" James, or even a "poor" one. "The Murder Room" joins the other dozen or so Dalglieshes comfortably. It is an excellent read. (Billyjhobbs@tyler.net)