Gervase Fen # 5
I loved this! Academic setting perfect for the plot. ( )

Murder on a secondary school campus, and a newly discovered Shakespear manuscript might be behind it. Not as good as the previous ones; the characters felt even less developed than usual, though Gervase Fen makes amusing remarks, as usual. ( )

A bit too silly for my taste, I think. ( )

Crispin writes in an ostentatiously pompous style with a rich vocabulary that often sends me to the dictionary, and with an overwhelming number of similes - all to jocular effect (I hope it is done on purpose). As to the plot, Gervaise Fen, invited to a prize-giving at a boys' school not far from Stratford-on-Avon, discovers the perpetrator(s) of three - perhaps four - murders motivated by the discovery of a lost manuscript thought to be by Shakespeare. He keeps the entangled threads of the mystery to himself until the conclusion. Fen almost falls asleep during his explanations of alibis and underhand plotting and blotting paper and I almost did too. Apart from the lengthy conclusion I found it all most enjoyable. A pity about Mr Merryweather. ( )

A schoolgirl is badly frightened at a Shakespeare rehearsal but before she can be made to say what happened, two teachers at a boys' school are murdered and the girl herself has disappeared. Fortunately Professor Gervase Fen is on the spot, having been asked to come down to give the prizes on Speech Day.

The usual splendid romp. ( )