Colour Scheme (1943)

WARNING: This review contains spoilers.

This is the sort of book I would have enjoyed more if I had received just a little bit more information beforehand. This is billed as a Roderick Alleyn mystery, but for most of the book we don't see Alleyn at all. This distracted me from the business at hand as I waited for him to arrive. Instead there was a team of amateur detectives solving the case. Now that is perfectly fine, but I could have done without the distraction.

The story takes place at a hot springs resort in New Zealand, where there is suspicion of spies helping the enemy sink Allied ships in the bay. Dr. Ackrington, the brother of the resort owner, suspects interloper and generally obnoxious fellow Maurice Questing of being such a spy ("Just call him 'Quisling' and get it over with!" he says at one point). Indeed, as the object of murder, Questing is a pretty good choice: he's a hustler, scheming, and when he propositions Barbara Claire, daughter of the resort owner, he makes the reader's skin crawl with horror at his odiousness.

As a reading experience, the book is kind of slow in the first half but then picks up the pace. Along the way we are treated to detailed descriptions of scenery, clever asides about the theatre and actors' personas (ample opportunity for same being provided by actor Geoffrey Gaunt), and very easy-to-picture characters. The aforementioned Questing provokes a reaction for sure, and I found myself rather uncomfortably closely identifying with Barbara, at least in the social awkwardness and goofy-face-pulling, trying to be funny departments. I do think the solution was a bit more sudden than I would have liked, just pulling this guy's name out because he hasn't said much for a good deal of the book. And I actually groaned out loud when it was revealed on the very last page that *DOUBLE SPOILER* Septimus Falls was actually Roderick Alleyn in disguise. That felt like a bit of a kick in the gut to be honest. Here I was waiting for him, being distracted from the story because of it, and he was right there all along! Boy did I feel stupid. It was rather clever, so I'll award points for that, but still. *END DOUBLE SPOILER*

I would recommend this for fans of WW2-era mysteries with inventive means of murder, those who like New Zealand culture (or want to get a taste of the landscape), and existing fans of the author. ( )

Not the best Marsh book I've chanced upon. It plods along for far too long, a lot of the story could have been stripped away to speed things up and stop the reader/listener getting bored.

The murder itself doesnt happen until half way into the book at which point it does speed up, but there's still an awful lot of sitting around and talking.

Alleyn (as Alleyn) doesn't turn up until the end, (although he's in the book from the middle).

The narrator - i got this as an audiobook - was reasonable, having quite a few different voices to contend with, although I did find some of his NZ characters a bit grating (I only hope that that was the point).

I found most of the book plodding and by the numbers. As a novel set in New Zealand in the early years of WWII it was interesting; as a murder mystery it needed to be no more than a novella. Almost all the cast of characters are little more than caricatures. I found myself uninterested in or impatient with most of them. The book would probably have been less tortuous to read had Marsh not felt a need to shoehorn Alleyn into an environment where one would not expect him to be given the state of the world at the time. A disappointment after the hints of deeper philosophical questioning glimpsed in the previous novel she wrote. ( )

Interesting setting in an ill-run thermal spa in NZ during the middle of WWII. Did he fall or was he pushed into the boiling mud? Who is the spy, who is stealing sacred Maori objects? Everyone has a motive. (Interesting to note that when this was written the outcome of the war was still unknown). Somewhat stereotyped characters - the pakeha as much as the Maori, and her much loved theatrical sideline. Enjoyable period piece, though not her very best. ( )

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/node/3339 ( )