Author J R Lancaster visited the blog on July 4th, and she supplied an exclusive excerpt from her novel, Someone's Always Watching. You can read that post Here.
Having read the extract, I was intrigued and couldn't wait to start reading the whole book for myself. What a great story it is, too.
Set in a small English village somewhere towards the south coast and Brighton, it has everything it needs to fit into the Cosy Crime genre. The author prefers to think of her book as a classic mystery and this story also lives up to that description, too. But, give it a try and make up your own mind.
The central character, Basil, has some personal issues which he is trying to cope with, and one solution is to remain indoors as much as possible. He has been a recluse for around ten years at the opening of the story.
But the death of Basil's next-door neighbour comes as a great shock, and it is sufficient to galvanise Basil into some action. When Dowden Thornhill, the detective in charge of the case, turns up on Basil's doorstep, it becomes even more important for Basil to rejoin society. There are some striking similarities between the death of Basil's neighbour and that of his mother some ten years previously.
An unusual alliance is formed between Thornhill, Basil and an old school friend, Poppy, that carries the rest of the action forward and the investigation to a satisfying conclusion.
I found the narrative flowed well, and the characters were well-drawn, if a little eccentric at times! The story has pace and humour, and the twists and turns in the plot kept me guessing. If you like a classic murder mystery, I would not hesitate to recommend this story to you. I shall keep a look out for the next in the series because it seems quite clear to me that Basil and Thornhill will be back!
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