THE CIRCLE

There can be few pleasures as reliable as a well-made British murder mystery read by Simon Prebble. This one concerns a widowed van driver named Bob who writes slight but funny doggerel and is persuaded by his teenaged daughter to join a writer's circle. Bob finds the circle much upset because a publisher who recently addressed the group and offended most members has been murdered. Detective Henrietta Malin arrives late to the case, but the reader is long since completely suckered by Prebble's renditions of the prissy high churchman's widow, the slacker who writes fantasy novels, the kindly twittering secretary of the circle, and so on, all suspecting each other. Prebble has a pitch-perfect feel for the vocal detail that will bring each to life. B.G. © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC 06/ JAN 07]