Crimson (January)

Equally pleasant company of a January evening are Phryne Fisher and Jane Marple. Whether in silk or tweed, frightfully clever, casing St. Kilda villas or St. Mary Mead manors, their opinions spry then blunt, lives never dull, minds razor-sharp. Weekend parties and tennis matches, time for tea and oh dear time for crimson. Inevitable really, given their proximity, a trickle in the bath, a gash in the cranium. Frightful, but we who shriek at sight of blood, wince at roadkill under wheels, widen eyes at unpleasantness behind glass. The Sixth Commandment keeps the narrative moving, suspects many, clues distractingly increasing.