Earlier this year I read Richard Oman’s first novel and thoroughly enjoyed it, so it really was only a matter of time before I got to the second one. This continues the story of the four residents of a senior citizens residential village who originally got together to discuss unsolved murders and have now moved on to solving various current crimes, invariably including murder but not exclusively. One of the things I really liked about this book was the development of the characters from their first adventure, we gain quite a lot of new information on everyone, especially former spy Elizabeth who we now know as Dame Elizabeth Best, the title implying that she was even more senior in the service that previously suggested and from other comments that she had a reputation as one of the finest in her field. Fiery ex trade union leader Ron gets to show his gentle side as his grandson comes to stay, as well as becoming a highly effective ‘field operative’ for the Club and Joyce is braver and more intuitive than previously expected, although still so innocent that she chooses a combination of an old nickname and the year her daughter was born giving @GreatJoy69 as her Instagram user name, fortunately she can’t work out how to access her private messages. Her diary is again used as a mean of filling in story as she can review the days occurrences it’s a clever use of first person narrative in largely alternating chapters throughout the book. Ibrahim, the semi-retired psychiatrist, gets seriously mugged and kicked in the back of the head early on in the book and this puts him off leaving the retirement complex, or even his flat there, for a large part of the book. But it also drives the others to come up with a way of exacting revenge on his mugger in a way only they, and certainly not the police, could.

The remaining three have their work cut out dealing with £20 million worth of diamonds, the American mafia, an international crime go-between, a drug dealer, Elizabeth’s old employer MI6 or possibly MI5 it’s not made clear, and even Elizabeth’s ex husband whom he hadn’t seen for twenty years amongst others. Like the first book the plot is fast paced, full of twists and turns and the body count is surprisingly high for a book about four pensioners. We also find out more about the two local detectives who seem to have been seconded by the Club, Donna and Chris; along with the ever useful Polish builder Bogdan who has certainly gone up in the world since he killed off his main local rival in the first book and therefore got a lot more lucrative work. The book is full of humour as well, again not laugh out loud jokes, but humour nevertheless, it really is a fun read which is probably why less than twenty four hours after starting a 444 page book (I have the Waterstones edition with the extra chapter) I have finished it and am writing this blog.

The fifth book in the series came out last month and is of course already a bestseller, it seems that Osman can do no wrong with his septuagenarian detectives, although Ibrahim at least is now in his eighties and I hope to read many more books about them all. By the way I checked out the Instagram account and it is registered as belonging to Joyce Meadowcroft from the book, well done Richard Osman or possibly Penguin Books for not only having the account but posting pictures of her dog Alan and trips out exactly as I would expect Joyce to do. Much more sensible than Douglas Adams who used his own phone number in the first Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy book and had to get his phone number changed when people started ringing it.

Whilst browsing the shelves of the local charity shop I spotted this book and picked it up immediately as I had been told several times that I would like it and the various people who recommended it were quite correct as I read the 377 pages over the space of two evenings. I probably would have read it in one go but there is a natural break point at page 172 and I decided to follow the structure of the book and reflect on what we had been told so far and the latest surprise murder that had just occurred.

Richard Osman himself helpfully summarised the four members of The Thursday Murder Club and what the club is all about in his notes for American reading clubs:

I am writing to you from England, home of Agatha Christie, Hugh Grant, and books about being murdered in quaint country villages.
Welcome to ‘The Thursday Murder Club,’ a group of very unlikely friends in their mid 70s. There is Joyce, a quiet but formidable former nurse; Ron, a retired Labour activist, still on the look out for trouble; Ibrahim, a psychiatrist and peacemaker, and Elizabeth, a . . . well no one is quite sure what Elizabeth used to do, but she seems to have contacts in very high places.
Once a week our four unlikely friends, all residents in a luxury retirement community, meet up to investigate old unsolved police cases—usually accompanied by friendly arguments and many bottles of wine.
One day the peace of their community is shattered by a real-life killing, and ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ decide they are just the people to solve the case.

For a murder mystery it’s quite funny with the interaction between the various characters being beautifully written as an example there is one murder where the victim was injected with Fentanyl whilst in close proximity to sixty odd residents of the retirement village and Joyce says ‘It would have to be someone with access to needles and drugs’ only to be told ‘That’s everyone here’ by Elizabeth, simply pointing out that due to age a lot of the residents are self medicating for diabetes amongst other conditions and what would normally be seen as a clue in this case definitely isn’t. But there is a lot of wisdom and experience in our team of self appointed detectives and with Elizabeth’s range of contacts all over the place they can do things the Police can’t either because they would be too obviously looking into things or because it would be either illegal or nearly so. Chris and Donna, the police officers assigned to the original murder gradually come to respect the Thursday Murder Club and their effective, if unorthodox, methods of getting information. The clues range from decades old gangland killings to links with Cypriot criminal families and always the club members are at least one step ahead of the police. I don’t want to say more in case I accidentally say too much but I heartily recommend The Thursday Murder Club and I suspect that recommendation would also apply to the subsequent novels that Osman has written about them.

This was Osman’s first novel, which he wrote over ten months whilst keeping the fact he was writing it a secret from most of the people who know him. But when he revealed its existence to publishers there was such a bidding war that he had a seven figure advance from Penguin Random House to get the book for their Viking imprint. Until the smash hit of his Thursday Murder Club series of books Osman was better known as a television producer, initially for Hat Trick Productions and then as Creative Director of Endemol. During which time he created the TV quiz Pointless for which he ended up the other side of the camera for the first time as the co-presenter after taking the role in the demonstration version for the B.B.C. and then worked with Alexander Armstrong on the programme for twenty seven series before quitting to concentrate on writing.