Last Bus to Woodstock is the novel that began Colin Dexter’s phenomenally successful Inspector Morse series.‘Do you think I’m wasting your time, Lewis?’ Lewis was nobody’s fool and was a man of some honesty and integrity. ‘Yes, sir.’ An engaging smile crept across Morse’s mouth. He thought they could get on well together . . .’The death of Sylvia Kaye figured dramatically in Thursday afternoon’s … dramatically in Thursday afternoon’s edition of the Oxford Mail. By Friday evening Inspector Morse had informed the nation that the police were looking for a dangerous man – facing charges of wilful murder, sexual assault and rape.But as the obvious leads fade into twilight and darkness, Morse becomes more and more convinced that passion holds the key . . .Last Bus to Woodstock is followed by the second Inspector Morse book, Last Seen Wearing.
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First of the Inspector Morse series.
On an October evening, two young girls decide not to wait for the bus to take them from Oxford to Woodstock. A few hours later, one of them is found bludgeoned to death in the courtyard of a local inn. What happened to Sylvia Kaye after she walked away from the bus stop? Chief Inspector Morse tries to answer that question in the first book of this classic British detective series.
This is not your typical mystery. It’s not a typical police procedural or gritty crime novel. The story trickles out in dribs and drabs, a hodgepodge of hints and barely referenced information that later proves to be crucial. Inspector Morse is not your typical detective. He is alternately maudlin and razor sharp. He drinks, flirts, abuses and coddles his sergeant, and winds his way through the entire case like he’s taking a stroll. Then, he takes the odd bits collected on the bottom of his shoe, puts it all together, and catches the killer. Or something like that. The reader is not given a straightforward plot. Instead, we are treated to the inner workings of Inspector Morse’s mind, vignettes in the lives of the suspects and their wives, children and friends, and observations made by colleagues. Then we must sift through those things to find what is relevant and discard what is not.
This is a thinking person’s mystery. First published in 1975, it is wholly British and wholly male. Morse is a misfit, a poor policeman who is a cracker jack detective, but the reader is never quite sure what he is going to do. He’s as likely to tumble over drunk in a ditch as he is to catch the murderer. He could go haring off on a search for an obscure book or sift through the detritus of the crime scene and discover the exact clue needed to make all the pieces fit. From the outside, Morse seems erratic and cagey. From the inside, he seems bewildered by everyone else’s lack of common sense. He is unconventional, prickly, and strangely vulnerable all at the same time.
Last Bus To Woodstock was written in a time of rigid expectations for men and women, when conventional morality still governed daily life and none of the modern sensitivities towards race, class, gender, etc. existed. It is full of colloquialisms that Americans may not understand and attitudes some might find offensive. It is also completely brilliant. It is impossible to describe what happens in the book without giving away too much of the plot. All I can say to modern readers is don’t go into this book expecting it to be like modern day cozies or crime novels, or even like classic British mysteries. The writing is eclectic, almost archaic at times. It is difficult to follow but also difficult to put down.
You won’t like Inspector Morse. You won’t understand or appreciate Colin Dexter’s style. But don’t let that put you off reading this book. If you want a mystery that is a total mind trip while at the same time a whole new education in detection and crime solving, you will like Last Bus To Woodstock. And, like me, you will be scrambling to find the rest of the books in the series as quickly as possible.