Absolutely delightful, frequently laugh-out-loud, exceedingly clever and ultimately twisty and unexpected. Four friends who live in Coopers Chase, a luxury British retirement community, gather on Thursdays to look at old case files and try to solve murders - and then, a murder case drops into their laps when the developer/owner of Coopers Chase is killed. As Elizabeth, Ron, Ibrahim, and Joyce dig into the case, joining forces and sharing information with the actual police force - Donna, from London, and Chris - they also discover a skeleton in the cemetery that shouldn't be there, opening up another mystery. Are the two deaths related?

Joyce chronicles their adventures, Watson-style, in short sections between chapters. Elizabeth pulls strings, relying on contacts from her mysterious past. Union radical Ron's son Jason is implicated in the murder, and former psychiatrist Ibrahim takes everyone's measure and helps the group stay methodical. They are a very good team, even when their ideas of justice and fairness, and ends and means, differ slightly.

Quotes

"You seem a bright lad, Bogdan."
Bogdan shrugs. "Well, I speak fluent Polish." (25)

But this place brings people together. (Joyce, 69)

Elizabeth has a way of making you want to tell the truth. (Joyce, 84)

Donna has always been headstrong, always acted quickly and decisively. Which is a fine quality when you are right, but a liability when you are wrong. It's great to be the fastest runner, but not when you're running in the wrong direction. (125)

Always look where the action isn't, because that's where the action is. (Elizabeth, 150)

People without a sense of humor will never forgive you for being funny. (Joyce, 155)

"Impatience is all I got," says Ron. "It's my superpower." (175)

"Too much change, yes. There comes a time when progress is only for other people." (Ibrahim agreeing with Ron, 202)

"Some people love their children more than they love their partner," says Ibrahim, "and some people love their partner more than their children. And no one can ever admit to either thing." (266-267)

Whatever they say about time healing, some things in life just break and can never be fixed. (Matthew Mackie, 284) ( )

The Thursday Murder Club is written by Richard Osman.
It is Book 1 of the series - A Thursday Murder Club Mystery.
I am new to the series and am very glad the title was recommended to me. I just started
Book #2 The Man Who Died Twice.
I thought the book was excellent - funny, endearing, interesting characters and a
well-written plot.
“ In a peaceful retirement village , four unlikely friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room
to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves The Murder Club.”
**** ( )

Totally devoured this sweet, funny and clever cosy. 100% recommend to anyone wanting something to help them feel a bit better about the world, without it being cloying or overly twee. Am eagerly awaiting the second in the series! ( )

If, after you've read the first few chapters, you are really enjoying this book, I strongly recommend you secure a copy of Book 2 so you can start right in after you've finished this one. The Club's shenanigans begin in 2 immediately after 1 ends.
I personally loved this book. The characters are so engaging and fun, and the banter is delightful. The plot is solid as is the writing.
Read it in one sitting, easily. ( )

The developer of an upscale retirement community is murdered, but luckily this retirement community has a hobby club just for investigating murders. It consists of Ibrahim (a psychiatrist), Ron (a labor union leader), Joyce (a nurse), and Elizabeth (if she told you what her career was she would literally have to kill you). They buddy up to the cops, analyze all the clues, and play senile to uncover whodunnit.

There is a lot here that I liked and some that I didn’t. The writing style is very interesting - very short chapters switch perspective quickly, from main characters to police to victims to minor characters, including first-person diary entries from Joyce. The chapters overlap a lot, showing the same scene from different points of view, which can be annoyingly slow but as the book went on it either happened less or I was less bothered. This is a very expensive retirement community which limits the diversity of the characters, though I did appreciate that several of them are working-class but supported by wealthier children. Ibrahim was noticeably backburnered compared to the other club members; I hope that he will get a bigger role to play in subsequent books.
While it was nice to read about characters who are not the same age one usually reads about, I did not find their elderly antics as cute as it seemed like they were supposed to be, particularly pretending to be senile and the flippant treatment of assisted suicide (I’m in favor of assisted suicide in general, but using it to get out of consequences for a crime is not great, and using it on someone else is just regular murder). The huge quantity of red herrings in the murder investigation was very fun, and I enjoyed the non-murder-related misdirect of the older male cop ending up with the young female cop’s mom instead of the young female cop herself but I really did not like the fatphobic treatment of the older male cop throughout. Overall this genre is still not really for me but I can see the appeal and will probably read at least one more. ( )