The Remorseful Day

I can't believe that it has taken until now for me to read a Colin Dexter book. It just goes to show how much there is out there still to be read!
This is another of those books to which I have come via the television. John Thaw did an excellent job of portraying my second favourite detective fiction (Sorry, but Daziel and Pascoe shades it - both televisually and in literary format), and, I think, that my enjoyment of the screen version delayed my perusal of the pure written form. I did not want to find too much different to the version of the detective that I knew. I need not have worried. Morse is exactly the same character as played by Thaw, the only difference being that in novel form, we are able to get deeper into the psyche of the show more main characters. This is particularly true of Strange, a bit part on TV who is much rounder in the book.
If one is going to dip a toe into the original material, where does one start? In my case, at the end with a poor quality book club version of the last book in the series. There is no logic to this, just a statement of fact.
Dexter is a superb writer. Almost like a poet, every word appears to be carefully chosen and, whilst I admit to reaching for a dictionary several times during my journey through the book, I never got the impression that he was advertising his greater vocabulary. The story is suitably tangled and keeps one on the verge of a solution from an early stage, but never quite arriving until the last few pages - just as any good whodunnit should. The book examines the human condition in an entertaining manner and was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Whilst, of course, a certain suspension of disbelief is required, the story flows with credibility and, I'll admit to joining Lewis in a few tears as the curmudgeonly detective breathed his last. Definitely one to read again at some point. show less

This is the last of the Morse series and again another excellent novel, and another excellent narration by Samuel West.

Morse met Yvonne Harrison when he was in hospital last and he fell for her, and she for him.
Her murder comes when he is involved in another case and he initially won't take on the case and is fully aware of a conflict of interest. But he continues to take an interest in it, and when a second murder happens he agrees to become involved.

Lewis finds Morse's attitude hard to fathom and he worries about how involved Morse actually was with Yvonne Harrison, particularly after he discovers part of a letter that Morse sent to her.

This was also virtually the last of Colin Dexter's novels although he remained involved in the show more television series Lewis and Endeavour. Like the earlier novels in the series, it gave Dexter the chance to display his erudite knowledge and literary skills. These are not just police procedurals but display complicated interweaving of plot threads and character development.

Colin Dexter died in 2017. He won many awards for his novels and in 1997 was presented with a well deserved CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger for outstanding services to crime literature. I think he raised crime fiction writing to a real literary level. show less

The last book in the series ... and the best. I've only recently realised that these aren't detective stories, so much as character studies of Chief Inspector Morse: with that, I've changed my attitude and it's been richly rewarded with my appreciation peaking at the same time as Dexter's craft.

Strange (Morse's boss, coming into focus more sharply, and now mirroring the TV series portrayal) directs Morse to take on a case hard on the heels of Morse recovering from ill health. Morse is reluctant, and complications regarding his involvement with the murder victim are highlighted. Lewis is caught in the middle of the interplay between Morse and Strange, but the bond between Morse and Lewis seems ever deeper. More murders follow, and the show more plot is just as convoluted as always. The ending - as befits the last in the series - is less ambiguous than that of some of the others, but has significant punch.

My previous dissatisfaction with earlier works was not present on this excursion, and I happily went along with the baffling twists and turns in the investigations as suspects are flagged up and then removed from the plot. I ignored the red herrings and dead ends, and concentrated on the interplay between Morse, Lewis and Strange as they each moved towards different parts of their lives and/or careers. Dexter's use of cultural snippets to presage the events in each chapter is something I've always been happy with, and he still drops in words that baffle me. That mannered writing style does mean that it's not transparent, and that you have to concentrate rather than just let the words wash over you. For this reason, I can't give the book top marks.

So, a fitting conclusion to the series and I'm glad I stuck with it after the shaky start. As to whether I'd recommend it ... Well, for a fan of detective stories it is a must, but if you're going to tackle the series on the basis of the TV stories then I'd say that you need to treat them as separate things: if you don't get along with the first few books in the series then - even though they get better - the series will still turn out to be a slog. As for me - this final story made it all worthwhile. show less

Excellent writing. I love the Morse character, who had become real for me, having watched John Thaw bring him to life in the TV series and had never wanted to read this last story or see the last episode of the series and watch him die. Still, it was a pleasure to read this book, so well put together. I never wanted to put it down, even though I knew that I would be left very sad at the end.

Not the best of the Morse books, definitely not the first to read in the series. Feels more like a pastiche, or parody even, than a full work of Colin Dexter; Lewis, Morse and Strange have become caricatures rather than the interesting characters they were.

I read a reviewer who said that fans of Inspector Morse should not be put off in reading this book just because it is the last one, and Dexter kills Morse off at the end. I was one of that crowd, but I finally got around to the book. The story involves an old case of murder of a woman with whom Morse may, or may not, have had an affair and in the light of which he may, or may not, have interfered in some way with the original investigation even though he was not directly assigned to it. All of this causes Lewis to question Morse's honesty and objectivity, and he only finds the truth after Morse's death. The story is vintage Morse with a case that no one else seems able to solve, with all sorts of twists and turns and false leads but show more through which Morse, with his intuitive thinking and curmudgeonly style finds the threads that finally come together. Morse is not in good shape at the beginning of the novel and at the end he suffers a heart attach which does not kill him immediately, but which puts him in the hospital where he lingers for only a few days.

Dexter pulls no emotional punches. At the end, Morse has one more sip of scotch from the nurse, and then:

For just a little while, Morse opened his eyes and looked up at her.
"Please thank Lewis for me..."
But so softly spoken were the words that she wasn't quite able to catch them.

And then, in a more universal appreciation of what it means when a life is extinguished, Lewis is at the morgue:

The eyes were closed, but the expression on the waxy face was hardly one of great serenity, for some hint of pain still lingered there. Like so many other contemplating a dead person, Lewis found himself pondering so many things as he thought of Morse's mind within the skull. Thought of that wonderful memory, of that sensitivity to music and literature, above all of that capacity for thinking laterally, vertically, diagonally – whateverwhichway that extraordinary brain should decide to go. But all gone now, for death had scattered that union of component atoms into the air, and Morse would never move or think or speak again.
Feeling slightly guilty, Lewis looked around him. But at least for the moment his only company was the dead. And bending down he put his lips to Morse's forehead, and whispered just two final words: "Goodbye, sir."
(Sept/00) show less

I still find it difficult to like the Morse novels (where the essentially romantic Morse of the TV veers towards the leery and prurient - not to mention patronising), but this is better than the earlier ones and the detective story itself is intricate and well designed..