Pamela Dorman Books
368 Pages
When a book is being turned into a popular movie, sometimes it’s hard to grab the book from the library and read it in time to watch the movie. That was the case with The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. Critics were saying that it was going to be a great movie, and that it was well-worth reading the book ahead of time. Apparently several people who are patrons of the Lockport Public Library watched or read the same news that I did. It took months for me to finally be able to check out this book. At long last, I was able to finish this book the same day the movie was released, which I then watched about half.
The Thursday Murder Club is a group of retired folks getting together at their retirement facility to discuss cold cases from the files of one of their charter members. That member, Penny, was a former police investigator, but was now in terminal care elsewhere in the facility. A fortuitous seminar by police constable gives the foursome of the Thursday Murder Club an avenue by which to involve themselves in the murder of one of the founders of the home in which they live. As more bodies turn up, the relationship between the elderly novices and the seasoned police investigators strains and then strengthens. Will they get to the bottom of not one murder, but four of them? Will everything they’ve held dear come crashing down around them?
The Thursday Murder Club has four members, two women and two men, all with wildly different personalities. Elizabeth is the defacto leader of the group, with deep secrets of her own. Ron is a former union heavy who longs to relive the heady days of his youth when he instilled fear into his opponents. Ibrahim is quiet, a professional who contemplates before acting, leading his co-conspirators to push him relentlessly through their aggravation. Joyce is the newcomer, invited to sit in Penny’s slot. A nurse by trade, she’s empathetic by nature. Together, this combination of personalities brings together a formidable group of amateur sleuths, eager to prove their mettle with the authorities.
Frankly, I thought this book was going to be far funnier than I had imagined after reading and listening to the news about the forthcoming film. While it wasn’t as funny as I expected, there is plenty of humor gracing the pages, most of it unintended by well meaning characters bent on solving crimes at any cost. This was a well thought out mystery that was pleasant to read. As the bodies pile up, they scurry amongst themselves to bring justice to those who have fallen.
I thought that The Thursday Murder Club was going to be somewhat of a comical parody of modern mystery novels. Upon reading it, I found that it was so much more. It was slow in a few spots, but I loved that Richard Osman was able to give each of the four main characters distinctive voices and personalities, and that these shone through the pages. This is the first book of the series, and at the time of writing this review, I have obtained a copy of the second novel. I hope it is as intriguing as the first.
As an aside, I watched the movie the same day that I finished the book. Even though it had a bevy of incredible actors, I could not make it all the way through the movie. Instead of following the formula of humor evident in the book, it played on humor that detracted from the story that was trying to be told. Books to movies are often disappointing to those of us who read a lot. This movie was definitely a disappointment. Don’t let that deter you from reading a good book. The entertainment in the pages is usually better than the nonsense shown on the screen.
Craig Bacon has often thought about writing a detective noir story, but the cigarette smoke, heavy in the air, made it impossible to see who it was who knocked on his office door.