A Taste For Honey
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- £3.99
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- £3.99
Publisher Description
Mycroft has turned detective...
A masterclass of classic crime - 'A triumph of ingenuity and horrific simplicity' Boris Karloff
'A very clever thriller' Raymond Chandler
In an English country village, a recluse and a beekeeper team up to catch a cunning villain.
Far from the noise of Victorian London, Sydney Silchester's two passions are privacy and honey. But when his honey supplier is found stung to death by her hive, the search for a new beekeeper takes Sydney to Mr. Mycroft, a brilliant man who has retired to Sussex to take up precisely this occupation, and who shares many traits with the great detective, Sherlock Holmes.
Mycroft, himself no stranger to crime-solving, immediately senses the bloody hand of murder. But what villain would have the mad intelligence to train an army of killer bees? And will Mycroft risk his own life to find the killer?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A love of honey leads Sydney Silchester, the curmudgeonly narrator of this solid entry from Heard (1889 1971) in the American Mystery Classics series, to the door of the Heregroves, the only beekeepers in the environs of the English village of Ashton Clearwater. When, some months later, Mrs. Heregrove is stung to death by a swarm of her own bees, Silchester is distressed: how will he satisfy his sweet tooth? Out for a walk, he notices a neatly written sign posted on a gate advertising surplus honey. Up the garden path he goes and meets Mr. Mycroft, whom he subsequently describes as "a very remarkable man... a little vain and fanciful and rather exhausting to be with." Mycroft embraces him as a Watson-like companion in adventure, and the game is afoot as they investigate the bee-stinging death. At the time of its first publication in 1941, this novel was met with great rejoicing among Sherlock Holmes fans, though contemporary readers may struggle to care about Silchester and his schemes. That said, there is fun to be had in reading Silchester's self-absorbed narration.
