Richard Osman can write, and The Thursday Murder Club is a jolly good romp of a read. You’ll know already that it’s set in a posh residential ‘home’ or clubhouse for the elderly but spritely of mind, and a nicely-controlled, diverse mix of men and women have formed themselves into a little sub-club for solving pretend mysteries when lo! There’s a small crop of real murders to investigate.
Using a selection of voices to set the scene, unfurl the mystery (and there’s a good mystery and a nicely achieved twist) and demonstrate a pre-Covid moment of relative sanity in a certain kind of middle-class society, Osman creates a compelling narrative that keeps you happily turning the page and enjoying small bursts of revelations about Joyce, Elizabeth, Ron and Ibrahim and the regulation police characters, as well as a nicely-displayed set of possible murderers.
As the author is some way off the ages of his Club-members, it’s pleasing to feel the empathy enfolding the elderly and their quirks and foibles about technology, or their still-potent powers of stirring up a demo (Ron, the ex-Miner’s TU leader) or reaching into the Deep State to get vital clues (Elizabeth – ex MI5 it would seem). He’s dedicated the book to his Mum, and I guess that’s the ideal reader-demographic, but I think anyone who enjoys a good Kate Atkinson (and I envy him her resounding endorsement of the book) would take pleasure in this novel.
Izzy Brown 