The tranquility of Cambridge is punctured when Cousin Andrew of the illustrious Faraday family disappears without a trace. No time is wasted in summoning Albert Campion and his sleuthing skills away from the bustle of Piccadilly to investigate – but little does he expect to be greeted by a band of eccentric relatives all at daggers with each other.Soon there are as many dead bodies as there are … there are red herrings, and Campion must uncover the secrets of the Faraday dynasty before another victim falls…
This is a stand-alone title within Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion series. However, if you wish to read the books in the order that they were written please follow the link below to have a look at the order of publication:
‘My very favourite of the four Queens of crime is Allingham.’ – J K Rowling
‘Margery Allingham has precious few peers and no superiors.’ – The Sunday Times
“The best of mystery writers.” – The New Yorker
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Margery Allingham is one of my favorite writers, and this is, I think, one of her best books. A haunting theme running through many of her books is nostalgia for the vanished Victorian world, which when Allingham was writing in the thirties had been obliterated by the First World War. Several of her stories feature old families in decline and ancient matriarchs clinging to the strictures of a bygone time.
In this one, Albert Campion is called in by a friend from his Cambridge undergraduate days to allay the concerns of the friend’s fiancee, who is serving as companion to her great aunt, an elderly grande dame presiding over a gloomy Cambridge household peopled by her son, two daughters and a nephew, all unsuccessful older adults trapped in a toxic miasma of rivalry and arrested development. The fiancee’s fears that something is afoot are borne out when the nephew is found floating in the river with a bullet in his head. At the request of the old matriarch, who approves of Campion’s aristocratic bloodlines, he moves into the creaking old house to keep an eye on things and insulate her from the intrusions of the common plods from Scotland Yard who come poking about. Further sinister incidents increase Campion’s foreboding as he tries to unravel the tangle of petty malice and ancient family secrets before the next victim falls.
It’s atmospheric, clever and executed with Allingham’s sly humor and deft style. Also a great title: Police at the Funeral says it all.
This one got a bit more convoluted than other Campion stories.
I’m just finding my feet with these inter-war Margery Allingham mysteries – this is number four (1931) in the ‘Albert Campion’ series, of 18 novels in all.
‘Police at the Funeral’ is largely set in a substantial Victorian villa in the university town of Cambridge, where elderly members of a dysfunctional family appear systematically to be murdering one another.
For the most part it is a tedious narrative – indeed, at one point the hero himself makes the observation that he is losing the will to live (I paraphrase). It is as though the author were apologising for the hole she had dug.
I listened to the audiobook version, and somehow stuck with it; I suppose you just have to know whodunit – but when the apparently simple plot did eventually unravel it revealed itself to be one of the more convoluted and improbable explanations I have yet encountered.
If there is a redeeming feature it is the endearing amateur detective and adventurer Albert Campion, who is a real gem – and his singlehanded efforts will have me coming back for more.
However, should you be thinking of doing the same, but have a mountainous to-read list, this is one you could safely skip.
I am over half way through the series and I love them
One of my favorite books by Allingham, such fun to read.
Another classic from the Golden Age of Mystery. Albert Campion is a man worth knowing and this is a clever story.
Went back at bought book #1 in the series. Am now reading my way through…Absolutely delightful.
Slow to catch the readers attention. The characters were stereotyped and inflexable. The ultimate solution to the crime was innovative, but not worth the amount of reading you had to go through to get to it.
As a long-time mystery devotee, I’m embarrassed that it took me so long to “discover” Albert Campion. Love the writing, the plot, the characters. A great read!
Great mystery with many twists & turns
Excellent characters with excitement
I love the looks at between the Wars England, as do so many fans of these books. Why else would we keep buying and reading them.
I like British novels and mysteries.
Albert Campion is a classic sleuth – one of my favorites. The title is misleading – story concerns a publishing house in which one of the partners is murdered. Enjoyable.
Hey, you either like these old mysteries or you don’t. I do. Readers who like this genre won’t be disappointed. The Campion mysteries are all eccentric and atmospheric. This one boasts some excellent characters – the character-building for the non-protagonists is extraordinary.
One of Allingham’s best, featuring the inimitable Albert Campion. I love this entire series.
Good example of Allingham’s witty classic British mysteries.
If you like intelligent mysteries without creepy characters or unnecessary violence, then I recommend Margery Allingham. Her books always entertain without keeping you up at night.
While I enjoy reading the work of new mystery writers, periodically I like to read (and sometimes reread) that of established writers like Margery Allingham. The plots are original, progress at a fast pace, and keep the reader guessing up to the end. The characters possess just the right amount of idiosyncratic features , the setting and time period are described in detail but as these relate to the plot and characters. A nice collection of unusual murders or attempted ones that add to the mystery further move the plot along. Allingham is one of those gifted writers who can communicate the horror of an event in a minimum number of words. Not a book for those who enjoy a lot of gratuitous violence or detailed descriptions of blood and guts, but I find it refreshing.
It’s Albert Champion brought to glorious life, again, by Margery Allingham. What else need be said?
If you are a fan of Agatha Christie, then you will love these books.