FINISHED READING - A Masterly Murder by Susanna Gregory

The sixth novel in the Chronicles of Matthew Bartholemew sees Susanna Gregory returning to the familiar rivalries and nefarious machinations going on between Cambridge colleges, and of course town with gown.

With the fifth in this series, A Wicked Deed, she took a welcome diversion away from this usual setting. This did seem to prompt a greater degree of inventiveness in plot twists and resolution. It made the return here with A Masterly Murder to Cambridge and environs, seem a bit of a retrograde step.

The plot finds Mathhew worried about who will replace Michealhouse's Master Kenningham, who is about to retire. He is alarmed when the unpleasent John Runham wins the vote, and proceeds to sack or conspire to remove many of the existing faculty, including Matthew.

In a rival college St Bene't's something has already gone 

seriously awry. There have been a sequence of unexpected deaths, they appear on the surface to be accidental or a suicide, but Matthew is not convinced. But before he can more closely examine their corpses the bodies are buried.  

Runham begins an expensive, but hurried, project to build a new courtyard for Michealhouse. This causes tensions with St Benet's, because Runham lures workman from there to work on it. One fateful evening this half completed courtyard and scaffolding collapses, and Runham is found dead in his rooms, murdered by suffocation. Matthew and Micheal have yet another sequence of riddles to resolve.

There is nothing particularly glaringly wrong with this medieval murder mystery. It's quite efficiently written, moves at a pace, has its red herrings and plot twists all cleverly laid out. And even resolves itself with a great deal more effective brevity than previously, thank god. Whilst it holds your attention, there is something about her style of writing that fails to completely grip you emotionally. You are rarely left eagerly wanting for more. I could quite contentedly walk away from it without not knowing what happens in the end. 

Good, but no cigar then.

CARROT REVIEW  - 4/8