Death and the Dancing Footman (1941)

Death and the Dancing Footman is an enjoyable Alleyn mystery where an eccentric has gathered together a group that all have connections and conflicts with each other and a playwright to see what happens. The set up has the feel of many mysteries of this era with the beautiful country house and the slightly elaborate set up around the actual murder. Marsh though improves upon this formula with her deft hand with the characters and her teasing acknowledgement of her genre. I would recommend this to any reader of Christie and Marsh as its a classic cozy mystery at its best. ( )

For some reason, I had a difficult time getting into this one. Once I did, it flew on by. But there was something about the cast of characters in the beginning that made it hard for me to really grasp onto the plot. Maybe it’s that there were too many similar characters and I had a hard time following it. Anywho, once I figured out who everyone was and what they were doing, this was a delightful little mystery — I mean, there’s a dancing footman. That never happens.

Read my full review here: http://letseatgrandpa.com/2011/12/01/november-snippet-book-reviews/ ( )

Superior character development makes this memorable and touching as well as a gripping whodunnit. Snow interest.

This had some entertaining parts, but generally I felt underwhelmed by this. It's a country house mystery pre-World War II when some people think there will be war, and some don't. The country house party in question is even more artificial than usual - the host assembles a group of people whom he believes will not get on with each other at all, with the hope of some combustible incident occurring, whilst at the same time trying to be terribly polite. It's not so much a case of will there be a murder, as when and who will kill whom? Of course snow falls so no-one can save face by leaving..... Quite a few of the characters are thoroughly unlikeable. One or two are busy accusing each other of murder. The dancing footman and the wireless trick were pretty ingenious, but otherwise seemed rather lacklustre. Overall it felt a bit creaky, but possibly it's showing its age and my lack of patience at the time of reading. ( )

While the writing itself seems flatter than in her previous books and the going feels as turgid and difficult as the driving through the snow described in the book this Marsh holds a special place of fascination for me as the author (and the characters) attempt to understand and justify the time and effort spent on one murder when in the background WWII awaits -- still in the false peace stage but with everyone aware that it is about to break out in its full level of destruction. ( )