This is a medieval-ish murder mystery in an isolated (And Then There Were None-type) setting, based around Poe’s The Masque of the Read Death. I haven’t read Poe’s original piece, and I can’t comment on whether that would have enhanced this read or not.

The story is told through the point of view of Thomas, the one remaining serving boy. The prose was clean, and I didn’t notice any obtrusive typos. The other characters had their roles and positions. However, I had difficulty appreciating them as characters/personalities, and that might be the reason I didn’t keep track of which one had generated/found/commented on which clue. I also had some difficulty getting my head round the layout of the castle, and therefore I didn’t really get a sense of how all the “clever tricks” were set up. Perhaps this is something that would work better in a visual medium such a film, or at least with some floor plans or diagrams.

Overall, this was a convoluted read for me. I don’t think this was helped by the various proposed solutions coming out in back and forth conversations, which somehow felt static. The different puzzles were certainly clever, but I didn’t feel quite so engaged with the story.