Sleep No More
Six Murderous Tales
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4.1 • 30 Ratings
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- $5.99
Publisher Description
A WASHINGTON POST NOTABLE BOOK • Six stories from the beloved "Queen of Crime"—swift, cunning murder mysteries from throughout her extraordinary career.
"A sophisticated collection. . . . Stylishly told and worthy of being read aloud by the fire.” —The New York Times Book Review
“An unexpected delight. . . . This small collection is indeed a gift. . . . James’ skills at complicating the genre are never more apparent than here.” —USA Today
When it comes to crime, it’s not always a question of “who dunnit?” Sometimes there’s more mystery in the why or the how. And what about the clever few who carry out what appears to be the perfect crime? Or whose most essential selves are changed by the crimes they commit? And what about those who know the identity of the murderer but keep the information to themselves? These are some of the questions that these six stories begin to unlock as they draw us into the inner workings—the thoughts and emotional machinations, the recollections and rationalizations, the dreams and desires—behind both murderous cause and effect. And no one gets inside the head of a perpetrator—or makes it a peerlessly thrilling and entertaining read—like the incomparable P. D. James.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The selections in this solid second posthumous collection from MWA Grand Master James (after 2016's The Mistletoe Murder and Other Stories) explore variations of the theme of looking back on past violent incidents. In "The Yo-Yo," a yo-yo that a septuagenarian played with as a child sparks memories of a murder that occurred while he was in prep school; the tale ends with an ironic twist. In "The Murder of Santa Claus," the recollections of writer Charles Mickledore the creator of an aristocratic sleuth dismissed by critics as "a pallid copy of Peter Wimsey" about a long-ago murder case alternate with those of elderly Det. Insp. John Pottinger. James pokes fun at herself when Mickledore remarks, "I'm no H.R.F. Keating, no Dick Francis, not even a P.D. James." The standout is "The Victim," in which the cuckolded first husband of Princess Ilsa Mancelli, who was a film and TV star before marrying into royalty, plots revenge. James (1920 2014) was just as gifted an author of short stories as she was a novelist.)
