Untimely Death

In an attempt to lay the ghost of a traumatic event in his childhood, Francis Pettigrew travels to Exmoor and the site where he found a dead body 50 years previously only to find another one. By the time he reaches help and returns to the spot with police, the body has gone. I found the book slow moving, and the humour was a tad annoying but overall I enjoyed it, particularly the legal aspect.

I can't remember why I picked this one up, especially seeing it's the end of the series. That said, it was a fun and quick murder mystery that largely takes place in a court room. I'd say the cover is a big spoiler though.

I didn't much care for this narrator. He didn't put much emotion into it and the straight read made it hard to determine who was who sometimes. Interesting mystery, with a great conclusion!

This is the last in the series and I'm getting the hang of 'Whodunnit' - I guessed the method and timing of the murder and was feeling quite pleased with myself until the real murder was revealed! Again details of law were involved but not as obscure as in previous entries in this series.

Hare's lawyer detective and his young wife return to stay in a farmhouse on the edge of Exmoor where he had stayed as a boy. While out riding a pony, he sees what appears to be a corpse; his pony bolts, when he returns the corpse is gone --but he recalls having seen a body in the same place many years before. Meanwhile other mysterious events are happening --a man is paying a late night visit to the daughter of the couple who run the farm. Note this story is dedicated to Michael Gilbert, another skilled writer of British legal mysteries I like.

Francis Pettigrew finds a dead body on the moor while he and his wife are on holiday at Exmoor. However, the body is gone by the time he gets back with help. Another dead body is discovered on the moor two days later, but this person had died just that morning.

The mystery of just exactly when did the deceased die is linked to a inheritance of a nearby estate.

I am sure that I have read this before (say 25-30 years ago) but I had no inkling of a memory during this reread. I was glad to see Inspector Mallett, now retired, in this final book.