The Case of the Late Pig: Albert Campion series, #9 (Albert Campion Mystery)

Description

Felony & Mayhem's Vintage category mystery

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Customer Reviews

May be the best Allingham
For me this one and "Police at the Funeral" are the best Allinghams.
Which one is best is a moot point. I believe the "Pig" has still
more originality, pace and fine irony.It's a delightfully "lean" book,
everything she put in it is important for the story (and for the fun).
She manages to create a story and an ambience that are both surreal (the odd aproach) and plausible at the same time.
This was also the Allingham where I found Lugg to be genuinely
amusing.

2008-11-27 (Portugal) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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Quite a different Albert Campion.
This book is quite different from the others in the Campion series. For one thing it is written in the first person (as if AC is writing his account for a book or a narrative). Secondly, it's a mystery more than a thriller. Most of the books in this series are thrillers, but this one has a genuine mystery to it. As with other Campion stories, the plot has many twists and turns, but with this one the plot really hurries along. Campion attends a funeral of an old school chum at the beginning of the book, but then five months later he hears that this same person has just been recently murdered. He has to go down to East Anglia to investigate this one! How could old "Pig" Peters be dead twice? While he and Lugg are trying to unravel the mystery, they find they are both in grave danger. Although the book is a short one, it still has Margery Allingham's wonderful style and prose. These are really "thinking man's mysteries".

2005-01-07 | romonko (alberta canada) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 4

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Not for Newcomers to the Campion Series...
First published over 65 years ago, this entry in Allingham's long-running Campion series didn't do much to enthuse me to investigate other of Campion's adventures. It starts with the detective attending the funeral of an old schoolmate, who was rather widely despised. Several months later, Campion is called to the country to investigate a suspicious death, and the victim appears to be the same schoolmate. Wacky antics and murky mystery ensue. A kind of unsatisfying blend of P.G. Wodehouse and Agatha Christie which is unlikely to interest those who aren't already fans of the series. The one bright spot is Campion's valet, who is kind of a rough "anti-Jeeves".

2003-05-29 (Washington, DC) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 2

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Suffolk Barbecue
The Case of the Late Pig was originally part of the Mr. Campion Criminologist collection. The novelette took on a life of it's own, however. Quite short, it is ideal for audiotapes, large print novels, and even the telly.

What is most unusual about the Late Pig is that it is told by Campion in the first person. If anything, Mr. Campion's version of the crime outdoes Margery Allingham, herself. The shift is viewpoint is refreshing, and it is a shame Allingham did not try this more often.

Invited via an anonymous letter Campion attends the funeral of Pig Peters, his school bully, only to find himself invited six months later to assist in a murder case - and the victim is the very same Pig Peters.

The dead Mr. Peters has shown up under another identity in a Suffolk Village. His efforts to turn a charming country house into the 30's version of a strip mall earns him the enmity of the owner, Poppy, and all the residents of the local village. So it is no surprise when someone siezes the opportunity and drops a 300 pound flowerpot on him. Campion is called in to assist the chief constable in saving the day (and to defend the innocent).

What follows is a classic Allingham comedy of manners, full of delightful characters and unpredictable events. We have two estranged lady friends (Campion's and Pig's), the overly amorous vicar, the bored physician, the mild mannered whippet, and the mysterious mole. And there is the inevitable climax, in which Campion hares over the fields of Suffolk in an effort to save the indomitable Lugg.

All of this action helps to distract us from the somewhat thinly disguised murderer. The relative shortness of the book prevents Allingham from throwing up enough confusing red herrings, so you should be able to make a good guess in the first forty or so pages. Don't let this stop you from reading the book, though. It certainly doesn't detract from the overall fun of the novel.

2001-02-24 | The Noh Hare™ (Warren, MI USA) | Helpful Votes: 7 | Rating: 4

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A first person account of a detective and a late pig
Albert Campion, Margery Allingham's gentleman detective, presents 'The Case of the Late Pig' in the first person, recounting his progress in the whimsical voice so accurately captured by Peter Davision in the BBC adapations of a decade ago.

Campion is invited to a most peculiar funeral, at which an old school-fellow, Roland Isidore 'Pig' Peters is the guest of honour, joined by a cast of extraordinary characters, whom Campion observes and, in his turn, dismisses. Several months pass uneventfully, then Campion is called upon by an old friend, Sir Leo Pursuivant, to investigate a death at the local country club. To his surprise, Campion finds not only that the corpse is none other than 'Pig' Peters, whom he had believed dead, but that the cast of the funeral from months before have returned to the stage, all with parts to play. As the death toll begins to climb, Campion must sort truth from fiction, not to mention determine the identity of a mysterious mole...

Some readers consider 'the Late Pig' to be one of Margery Allingham's least successful Campion novels. I cannot agree with this opinion. To my mind, this is one of the most amusing and clever of the Campion books, and well worth the time of anyone who has enjoyed any of the other pre-war stories.

2000-04-10 | williamnedblake (Kansas City, MO, United States) | Helpful Votes: 7 | Rating: 5

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Sweet Danger (Felony & Mayhem Mysteries) (Albert Campion Mysteries)

Description

After centuries as a Balkan backwater, the sleepy town of Averna has -- overnight -- become a stunningly valuable port, thanks to an earthquake that rejiggered the regional topography. But to whose coffers will that value accrue? Albert Campion, that interesting young man, has a hunch that the answer is to be found in a tiny Suffolk village, where a peculiar -- and dead-broke -- family may be able to lay claim to the Averna fortune, provided they can produce the requisite proof of lineage. The proof? Nothing terribly difficult. Just your average ancient riddle, stolen drum, long-lost bell, priceless crown, and, oh yes, a necklace of disappearing rubies.

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Customer Reviews

Detestable Deception
Once again, while searching for some clue to what a book on Amazon is about, I've found that the volume in question is in fact a book that was previously published under a new title, a fact nowhere acknowledged by Amazon or by the publisher. This time I stumbled on the evidence by checking the "Look Inside" feature, which displayed the earlier edition and title. Repackaging books in this way is surely an attempt to delude readers into making an unnecessary purchase. Customers should be wary, and publishers should be ashamed.

2009-08-31 | happyending (Home Office, CT USA) | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 2

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My favorite Campion Mystery
Action, drama, suspense and mystery: all wrapped up in the person of Albert Campion, Allingham's famous solver of mysteries. He's not a detective or the police, just someone who is always there to get you out of a jam. Sweet Danger gives you romance, which after Biddy's marriage, seemed a forgone part of Albert's life. Young fiery red-headed Amanda is there to change all of that! A Campion mystery you can't miss reading!

2009-07-06 | Grace (Alabama) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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Sweet Danger
A delightful romp with an interesting array of characters. It's more than it initially seems as a mystery and the same may be said with regard to Mr. Campion, Ms. Allingham's Detective.

2007-09-10 (Houston, TX United States) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 4

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A lovable classic from the Golden Age
This book is assuredly a period piece from about 1930, and the plot is definitely far-fetched for a modern reader - but I loved it. Albert Campion is at his deceptively foolish best, and he is matched - in more ways than one - by Amanda Fitton, an intelligent and engaging young lady engineer. The phrase "light-hearted adventure" sums up the book fairly well.

So what is this plot? There's a small but potentially important territory in the Balkans that should belong to the Earl of Pontisbright - the trouble is that the last Earl apparently died decades ago without leaving an heir. Campion gets his mates to help him sort things out, and prove that Amanda's brother is the rightful Earl.

' "Look here", said Guffy, "what exactly are we looking for?"...

Campion apologised "I'm sorry ... I ought to have explained this before. There's three things without which the Powers-That-Be don't consider they could possibly get a favourable decision at the Court of The Hague. The first - it's rather like a fairy story isn't it - is the crown which was made for Giles Pontisbright in the reign of Henry Fourth..." '

So Campion tries to find a crown, and solve two other puzzles, and fend off Brett Savanake, who is a rather nasty but impressive millionaire industrialist who wants the territory for himself.

The scene where Campion first meets Amanda is a delight, and the book is filled with lots of really good minor characters such as "Honesty" Bull the local publican. There are plenty of twists and turns in the plot.

If you like mysteries from this era, give it a try. If you want to tackle the Albert Campion series, this is a good place to start.

2005-08-25 (Rayleigh, Essex United Kingdom) | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 4

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A Ringer of a Campion Romp!
This book is one of the most madcap and dangerous Campion adventures. In it Campion and three of his friends as well as the irrerepressible Lugg are on the hunt for treasure in a tiny village called Pontisbright. They are all thrown in with a perfectly delightful local family (descendents of the manor people in this tiny village). Campion, his companions and the local family all band together to solve an ancient treasure hunt complete with riddles and lots of red herrings. Our intrepid hero, Campion actually meets a young girl who is his match in every way, and you can bet she has his measure from the get-go. This is a wonderfully written story, that has lots of surprises mixed in with madness, nastiness and murder. Read it and have a ball.

2004-10-08 | romonko (alberta canada) | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 5

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The China Governess

Description

Timothy Kinnit is rich, handsome and well-bred. He seems to have everything. Then, on the eve of his elopement, he learns that he was adopted, and he is desperate to know who he really is. Someone seems no less keen to stop him finding out. Violence, deception and death bedevil the post-war housing estate that has grown from the ashes of the notorious Turk Street Mile, and the shadow of a long-forgotten murder hangs over it all — until Luke and Campion are finally able to dispel the darkness.

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Customer Reviews

sigh...coming to the end of the series..
Sadly, this is one of the last books of the Campion series; I'm going to really miss these books when I've finished. Sigh. Oh well, I suppose that's why I keep these things forever so that someday I can go back and reread them. In the prologue, a council flat is vandalized to such an extent that it gives one of its occupants a fatal stroke upon her discovery of the damage. Then on to the main part of the novel: Timothy Kinnit and Julia Laurell are a young couple engaged to be married. Both are from upper class families, and are happy as can be. However, Julia's father decides that the marriage will not happen, due to rumors that are being passed along about Tim's parentage. Although Julia does not care, Tim is determined to seek the truth about his identity, but as he investigates he runs up against several obstacles -- and needs the help of Albert Campion. Once again we find Campion in the background, not as active as in the earlier part of the series -- here lending his cool-headedness and deductive prowess. However, the story was quite good, but then at the end I got a bit confused and had to backtrack to figure out what it was I missed. I love these books, but sometimes they can get bogged down with dialogue that detracts from the main part of the story. I'd recommend it to classic mystery fans, those who like British mysteries and those who are considering the series. However, to the latter I say do NOT start with this one, but go back and start with the first one so you can watch the development of Campion's character. Personally, I liked him better in the older books.

2008-08-24 (hobe sound fl) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 3

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a bittersweet goodby for me anyway
This was the last Margery Allingham book that I hadn't read, and it took a bit of trouble to find it, but it was worth the effort. I have loved Margery Allingham and her Albert Campion for years and this book did not disappoint, I am only sad now that I have finished reading her work. Miss. Allingham is truly one of my all-time favourites and her books never disappoint. I would highly recommend that if you love good mystery writing, then do not pass this author up. In this book Campion and his wonderful friend Charles Luke are on the trail or what looks to be a very evil person who pursues destruction with cold-hearted efficiency. We are also introduced to a bunch of wonderful new characters and Mrs. Broome is one of the best Allingham creations yet. We also have two appealing star-crossed lovers and a search for identity that lands these two into a heap of trouble. But Campion comes to the rescue and he unravels the many mysteries.

2005-12-18 | romonko (alberta canada) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 5

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Who am I?
Young Timothy Kinnet is all set to marry the girl of his dreams, when he finds out that he's not who he thought he was. He had always believed that he was an illegitimate relation of the Kinnets, taken in when the Blitz destroyed east London. But he finds out that he was in fact, a foundling. So he sets off to uncover his true identity.

But Allingham's books are never that simple. When Timothy becomes the chief suspect in a housebreaking and later a suspicious death, his fiance enlists the help of Albert Campion. This is Allingham at her best. Nothing is ever quite as simple as it seems, but the gang is all here--Lugg, Charlie Luke,--only Amanda is missing. But the story goes at a fast pace and is a pleasure to read.

Highly recommended and worth searching for.

2004-04-24 | cmb (Orem, UT USA) | Helpful Votes: 6 | Rating: 5

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More Work for the Undertaker (Albert Campion Mystery)

Description

Apron Street, a quiet little London thoroughfare, is home to the eccentric Palinod family. At first glance, the Palinodes appear to be entirely at odds with the Apron's almost aggressive respectability, but Albert Campion isn't so sure. After all, he has friends in low places. And rumor has it that even London's toughest criminals are afraid of Apron Street.

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Customer Reviews

Not my favorite in the series . . .
I'm reading Allingham's Campion series in order, and this was next on my list - interesting, but I had a hard time getting into it. I think it was because of the Palinode family, around whom the mystery (such as it is) evolves. I kept getting the impression I was supposed to find them charming and whimsical, but I just found them rather pathetic and obnoxious (made it hard to be sympathetic to them as characters, needless to say).

Also, the previous two installments of the series ("Traitor's Purse" and "Pearls Before Swine") had rather heroic, James Bondesque plots with the monolithic menace of World War II overshadowing the action, and it felt as if Campion's action (or failure to act in time) would lead to some horrific, unspeakable event. Here, Allingham takes us to Apron Street, a tucked away corner of dreary post-war London. Mysterious deaths can't be explained away by Scotland Yard, so Campion and a very welcome Lugg are recruited to move into a boarding house and infiltrate the locals. Colorful characters abound, and Allingham's ability to make you feel a sense of place is truly remarkable, and one of the main reasons I read and collect her mysteries. My favorite scenes in any of her books are inevitably those between Campion and his former cat burgler cum butler/valet/mentor Lugg; having said that, I just couldn't sink my teeth into this one! Other reviews I've read have pointed out the rather esoteric conversation of the Palinodes as the reason some readers might be put off; I didn't have a problem comprehending them and their crumbling sense of entitlement and class-consciousness, I just didn't find them very engaging characters.

2010-06-09 (Greensboro, NC United States) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 3

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A bit of background
There is little one could add to the excellent, highly detailed reviews above. However, I will try to give the potential reader a review of the style of Margery Allingham, a writer with whom most in the States will be unfamiliar. First, Allingham is a very good technical writer, her stylistic English is excellent; economical, accurate, and timeless. Then, her characterisation is as good as Dickens, the master. One weakness may be that none of her characters seem ordinary, it's as if the world is composed of eccentrics. I just find that adds to the interest of the books. Her greatest strength is in creating an evocation of place. You feel you are there; you see London before, during, and after the Blitz in many of her greatest novels. You experience life in decaying Edwardian splendour, the London art scene, rural Suffolk before we all had cars .... The genre is mystery, not detective story, although there are puzzles to solve. I've been reading these over again since I was about 10, 50+ years, and enjoy them just as much now as then, even though I know "who dunnit". That's a measure of Allingham's skill as a writer. A unique feature of the Campion novels is the humour, which is very English - faintly ridiculous, almost cruel yet self-mocking - and used with wonderful skill to illuminate the subtlety of the characterisation. So, in More Work for the Undertaker, Csmpion's hired hand, cum butler, cum friend, cum bodyguard, cum mentor, the magnificent cockney former cat burglar, before losing "my figger", Magersfontein Lugg (named after a battle in the second Boer War!), sums up his undertaker brother-in-law, one Jas Bowels, as "Bowels by name and bowels by nature"!

2009-08-22 (Sidmouth, England) | Helpful Votes: 5 | Rating: 5

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Maybe not everyone's cup of tea
American readers of the 21st century may find this 1949 mystery based in London to be just a little "abstruse." It takes quite a bit more effort to read than novels we find on today's best seller list, partly because of the linguistic differences and partly, probably, because of the setting and the time. Also, this is the first Allingham book I have read, so the characters were all new to me.

That said, I found the book worthwhile, with respect to learning new things, about London, about the way people spoke in that day and age and in that locale, and about their customs (still driving a horse-drawn hearse, for example), customs which seem pretty unusual today. The book is set in post-World War II years, so it's about concurrent with the publication date.

If you like literary references, you'll find a few here. The character action is muted, compared to today's novels, and only really picks up at the end, when there's a short rise to the denouement and a quick rush to the end. Instead of performing many actions, the characters do a lot of talking, and that's when you get your lesson in Briticisms and cockney accents.

For a book written in 1949, this one holds up relatively well, even for readers like me, used to reading contemporary crime fiction (as opposed to mysteries). Diximus.

2004-05-06 (Oxnard, CA) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 4

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More Work for the Undertaker
More Work for the Undertaker (Margery Allingham, 1949) is, with The Case of the Late Pig, with which it shares certain themes, one of Allingham's most bizarre books-a story ingenious and unusual, if somewhat cluttered-"a fascinating case ... one of the classics of its kind".

The story takes place in Apron St., "a strange decayed sort of neighbourhood", Dickensian London-at once entertaining and disquieting, due to Allingham's unique gift for making place as vivid as character, the atmosphere one of frozen time, unchanged since the Victorian era, London described as a series of villages in which the Palinodes act as squires-although, this being Margery Allingham, character is equally vivid, characters "[taking] shape like a portrait under a pencil", the reader, like Albert Campion, "impressed by the graphic quality of ... every movement ... all done by fleeting lights and shadows"-both feel "invigorated, as if life was coming back to a long-numbed corner of the mind."

The most vivid characters in the book are at the centre: the eccentric Palinode family, "queer brainy people, all boarding privately in what was once their own home. They're not easy people to get at from a police point of view, and now there's a poisoner loose among `em." Allingham sketches in the strange culture of the Palinode family as effortlessly as she did the family in Police at the Funeral. The eccentricity of the Palinodes can be gauged by their habit of speaking in crosswords-"If the Palinode `family language' consisted of references to the classics, a good memory and a comprehensive dictionary of quotations should go a long way."

It is into this strange boarding-house inhabited by eccentrics that Mr. Campion enters, posing as the nephew of the house-owner Renee Roper, who first appeared in Dancers in Mourning. Faced with these eccentric yet impractical geniuses, Campion "felt that, intellectually speaking, he was having a conversation with someone at the other end of a circular tunnel, and was in fact standing directly back to back with her. On the other hand, of course, it was possible that he had become Alice in Wonderland." The effect is the same on the reader, who steps into a world in which the unusual is commonplace, and in which everything normal is twisted out of recognition into some new mathematical perversion, so that the reader, like Alice in Through the Looking-Glass, finds himself stepping through the door-and ending up back where he started, utterly confused-a maze, amazed. Like Lewis Carroll's classics, the book is at once humorous and disturbing, the whole approach summed up in the following dialogue:

`If you hear any thumping it's just the undertaker.'

`The ultimate reassurance, said Campion.

Humorous and hilarious-but the undercurrent of something wrong, of death, of insanity, of things not being quite right, is vividly tangible. London suburbia is transformed into something rich and strange, a world in which the sordidness of gangsterdom is contrasted with the bizarre symbolism of the means they use to escape the law--somehow involved with the shady undertaking business of Magersfontein Lugg's brother-in-law Jas. Bowels, a symbol of the unpredictability of the book's approach-"an unreliable interment hardly bore imagining". The whole culminates in a surreal chase of a coffin brake through London by police squad cars-the real world has fused with the world of the bizarre-the mad world of the Palinodes.

The solution is perhaps rather cluttered, with the villain's professional criminal activities successfully carried out on one hand, his bungling amateur murders on the other. Yet the criminal's desire to "stop the clock"-a motive corresponding to the fact that the book's Dickensian approach is "an impressive anachronism, unlikely and nearly as decorative as a coach-and-four"-is well-conveyed, suiting the impression of the character the reader has received from his description and profession-character takes the place of clues, although the clues that are there are well designed, one of glasses in particular being well-hidden yet stressing the idea of frozen time, old habits dying hard.

More Work for the Undertaker is one of Margery Allingham's best-a book which lingers in the mind, filled with unforgettable characters and scenes, and with a plot bizarre and baroque, a rich triumph of the imagination-the reader can only applause and say, "Oh, very good, very good indeed... Nicely told and very good work."

2001-12-06 | Helpful Votes: 12 | Rating: 5

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Going Up Apron Street
The Palinode clan defies description. They are extraordinarily bright and eccentric, there are a fair number of them (siblings Evadne, Lawrence and Miss Jessica, plus niece Clytie) and they are extremely poor. They live in the old Palinode home as tenants of Renee Roper, its new owner and an old pal of Campion's. And, for no apparent reason, someone seems to be trying to kill them off. Campion, to the rescue as always, moves into Renee's boarding house, while Lugg, his factotum, moves in with Jas Bowels the undertaker down the road.

Subplots abound. The police suspect something is rotten in Apron Street, but aren't sure what. A coffin belonging to Bowels and his son keeps appearing and disappearing, a pharmacist dies unexpectedly and Clytie's boyfriend takes a hard bash on the noggin. Confusion is endemic and the Palinodes sit at the center of the storm calmly writing crossword puzzles and cooking recipes from a book entitled "How to Live on One-and Six."

Even though murder is a grim subject, Margery Allingham once again manages to turn it into a perfect comedy of manners. "More Work for the Undertaker" will have you snickering as the antics of the Bowels and struggling to understand Palinode quips. Nowadays there is altogether too much noir fiction. It's a great relief to settle down with one of Allingham's lighter novels and return to a London as far away as Alice's Wonderland.

A special treat in this novel is the first appearance of Charlie Luke, a Divisional Detective Inspector, as Campion's partner in detection. Now that Stanislaus Oates has become old, important, and a bit stuffy, Allingham seizes the moment to introduce Luke. His bluff and animated personality is a perfect contrast with Campion's. He will go on to be a regular in Allingham's stories from now on, taking his place with Lugg and Amanda.

2001-05-19 | The Noh Hare™ (Warren, MI USA) | Helpful Votes: 13 | Rating: 5

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Look to the Lady (Felony & Mayhem Mysteries) (Albert Campion Mysteries)

Product Details

• ISBN13: 9781933397573
• Ready: New
• Notes: BUY WITH Belief, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and help to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

Description

Some objects just cry out to be stolen, and an obliging ring of international thieves stands ready to heed the cry. Their current target is the Gyrth Chalice, a priceless goblet that the Gyrth family has for centuries held in trust for the British Crown. Kept in a windowless chapel, and protected by a fearsome curse, the Chalice should be impervious to thievery. But this is 1930, and the crooks have all the advantages of the modern world. Chief among these is the craving for publicity, to which at least one member of the Gyrth clan has succumbed. Her careless chatter about the Chalice seems to have called up all manner of misfortunes - of which larceny is just the beginning - and the vague, bespectacled Albert Campion doesn't look like he'll be much help against them. But looks can be deceptive.

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Customer Reviews

Allingham is tops!
Margery Allingham wrote wonderful Brit mysteries....Albert Campion is her detective, but these stories are really about Britain in the first half of the twentieth century and about the ways in which information and meaning are communicated among people....funny, absorbing. The book arrived in excellent condition and on time.

2010-07-20 (upstate NY USA) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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Shivery and Funny
This is one of the hardest Allingham mysteries to find. I am so glad that Felony and Mayhem has brought it back into print. The ancient family has secrets, many secrets. There is a coming-of-age ceremony that is about to happen. And it is an honest-to-goodness rite. The family has a friend in Albert Campion. And then the secret and sacred chalice has been photographed. This sets off the mystery and detecting. I don't think that it is accidental that there are definite echoes of a "grail" secret in this book. It is also reminiscent of the classic Sherlock Holmes story The Musgrove Ritual. While Allingham is usually more "lively" than John Dickson Carr, this is almost like a John Dickson Carr in having a locked room mystery and the definitely creepy tower. The family secret is worth reading to discover--and saved until the final pages of the book. Allingham is a treat. This is one of her best.

2010-02-09 (New Orleans) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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Grail Legend
A mystery without a murder, Albert Champion's 3rd quest is to prevent a crime. LOOK TO THE LADY, by Margery Allingham is a fresh delight away from grizzly murder and mayhem. This title is my first experience with Albert and Lugg, it won't be my last.
Ms. Allingham's take on the Grail legend and the quests it entails is funny, adventurous and an outstanding puzzle. All the elements of a great mystery without a murder. The current name for this genre is cozy, but there is a movement afoot to change it to "classic" mystery.
If you've never read Allingham, pick up one today and you'll be a fan of the solution, the quest, the characters, the location and the writing. All of which are what keeps her title in-print so many years after her death.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

2008-05-06 | Troubadour (Jamestown, KY) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 5

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'I see you take the long road...'
Look to the lady.
- response to Lady Macbeth's fainting fit, MACBETH, act II, scene 3

"We can't fight a ring like this forever. It's incredible; they're too strong."
"There is the point which resolves the whole question into a neat 'what should A do?' problem. We've got just one chance, old bird - otherwise the project wouldn't be worth fighting and we should not have met. The rules of this acquisitive society...are few, but they are strict. Roughly, what they amount to is this. All members' commissions - they have to be for things definitely unpurchasable, of course - are treated with equal deference. The best agent is chosen for the job; unlimited money is supplied; and there the work...ends until the treasure is obtained...However - and this is our one loophole - should...the owner of the treasure in question kill [their agent] to save it - then they leave well alone, and they look out for somebody else's family album."
"Who is the agent employed to get the Chalice?"
"That's the difficulty. I don't know...so you see what a mess we're in."
- Val Gyrth and Albert Campion

While the U.S. title - THE GYRTH CHALICE MYSTERY - is easy to associate with the events of this book, it's something of a misnomer; this is more an adventure story or a thriller than a mystery, and in a way, it's the reverse of a mystery. Campion's ultimate goal isn't to *solve* a crime, but to prevent the theft of a national relic by any means necessary, beginning with unearthing and joining forces with Val Gyrth, the estranged only son of the family devoted to protecting the Chalice on behalf of the Crown. Val - destitute to the point of being out on the street in the wake of a failed marriage - is to come of age in a few weeks time and be initiated into the Gyrths' deepest family secrets, and has become a target of the anonymous society of wealthy collectors whose current target is the Chalice. Campion and his valet Lugg together manage to locate Gyrth, establish that he hasn't been corrupted, and explain the danger to the Chalice in an extended sequence that alternates between comedy and suspense, beginning with Val escaping arrest as a vagrant on his own doorstep, identifying himself by the tailor's label in his decrepit suit, and dodging an unsuccessful kidnap attempt before fetching up at Campion's flat in response to a mysterious trail of messages.

Campion, with Val and Lugg in tow, is soon installed as a guest at the Tower at Sanctuary, the Gyrth family home in Suffolk, Val's quarrel with his father only having dragged on this long through his own stubbornness. Not that there isn't plenty of conflict and excitement to spice up matters when the Chalice almost immediately goes missing from its supposedly burglar-proof niche in the family chapel. That turns out to be a fairly clever move on the part of one of the family, though it almost immediately backfires (only the first of several such reverses in the story, which is full of alternating comic and dramatic episodes).

"'...it's like a Welsh rarebit nightmare with you as the hero.'
'With me as the *rabbit*,' said Mr. Campion feelingly."

As for the original U.K. title of LOOK TO THE LADY, the story has an unusual number of women in supporting roles, such as: Val's foolish aunt Diana (New Age and fancies herself as a patron of the arts, with a number of suspect hangers-on); his charming and tough sister Penny and her best friend Beth Carey (daughter of an American professor eager to study the Chalice); Mrs. Dick Shannon, an obnoxious local horse-breeder whose shadier racing associates are becoming obtrusive; and Mrs. Sara, an old friend of Campion's who with her family are part of a large group of gypsies camping out near the Tower. Blessedly, none of the players are saddled with ridiculous cooing dialogue as are some of the characters in such stories as THE CASE OF THE LATE PIG.

I highly recommend the unabridged recording narrated by Francis Matthews, who does an amazing job with Lugg and the varying Suffolk accents of the Gyrths' neighbours, though he has a tougher time with the New England accents of the Careys. In either written or audio format, the story is a romp, a comedy and a thriller by turns; just don't expect it to be a conventional mystery.

Drive-in totals:
- Two deaths.
- Three kidnappings with unlawful imprisonment.
- Two riots.
- One "secret room" with family "secret", the existence of which is actually common knowledge, though not the details.
- Two alternate identities of Campion's, complete with their own names.
- One of Allingham's "darkest England" episodes, involving some creepy bits of local superstition (with some *very* funny reactions by Lugg, who disclaims any belief in such stuff despite his obvious discomfort with it). There are also some very moving scenes involving the Gyrths' secrets and their devotion to the relic.
- Some very entertaining and enlightening exchanges between Lugg and the Gyrths' butler Branch, an old acquaintance with an only slightly more respectable background. "You'd be doin' me a service, Mr. Lugg, if you'd refrain from referrin' to me as number 705."

2006-01-02 (Kingdom of the Mouse, United States) | Helpful Votes: 6 | Rating: 5

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Allingham stands alone in this genre.
Allingham is without a doubt, the best mystery/suspense writer that ever lived. I don't say this lightly. There is absolutely no one that can compare to her and to her hero, Albert Campion! I had read most of the Allingham stories a very long time ago, but when I checked there were some that I missed, so I decided to make up for that oversight. The Gyrth Chalice Mystery is one that I somehow missed. I am very glad that I made up for that oversight now. If you have not read an Allingham mystery, then you do have a treat in store for you. I heartily recommend that you begin to read them all as soon as possible. How else can we have a benchmark to grade the authors that have come afterwards. As far as I'm concerned, Allingham is in a class of her own. Her books are thrillers really more than mysteries, but what wonderful stories they are! In this book Albert connects up with a young kinsman of his to help protect an ancient relic that the young man's family has been responsible for for hundreds of years. We also are treated to large doses of the wonderful Lugg - Albert's man of many talents. I'm not going to say any more about this wonderful book. You must read for yourself, and be prepared to be awed!

2004-08-10 | romonko (alberta canada) | Helpful Votes: 9 | Rating: 5

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Flowers for the Judge: #7 Albert Campion mystery

Product Details

• ISBN13: 9781934609125
• Environment: New
• Notes: BUY WITH Certitude, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and appointment to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

Description

The Barnabas publishing dynasty is no stranger to mystery; after all, the founders nephew is legendary for having disappeared in broad daylight. Yet the discovery of one of the Barnabas cousins, dead for some days inside a locked basement, throws the entire clan in disarray. As police suspicions settle on a member of the family, the Barnabas cousins have no choice but to ask Albert Campion to step in and salvage their reputation. But everywhere he turns, Campion finds more questions than answers. Just what was the deceased Barnabas doing in that basement in his evening clothes and bowler hat? Why is his secretary acting so strange? And the original disappearing nephew-where, exactly, did he disappear to?

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Customer Reviews

Some families have all the luck....
and in the Barnabas family lately that luck has turned all bad.

In the 19th century Jacoby Barnabas founded a publishing house, one that prospered and, in due time was passed along to his decendents who, for the most part carried on the business quite conventionally. The third generation was a different matter. One grandson refused to enter the business at all, another was 'to be looked after' and his brother simply disappeared. The rest managed to entangled themselves in love affairs and murder!

Enter Albert Campion (not his real name), friend of the family and amateur detective (and perhaps in line to the throne) has dropped by to take tea with the family but before the evening is over one of the family is found dead with the prime suspects being his wife and his cousin who apparently have become 'quite fond' of one another. As Campion begins to look into the matter he uncovers all sorts of things, office scandals, a long-time mistress and just how a proper businessman can vanish while walking down a London street in broad daylight.

This is the seventh in the Campion series and at this point Albert is emerging from the shadow of Lord Peter Wimsey, the character Allingham patterned him after. Albert is becoming more down to earth and focused, developing more of his own persona, although Allingham is not above making a sly reference to 'Denver' - Lord Peter's family estate.

This is a thoroughly enjoyable mystery, particularly for those who are fans of this series or of mysteries of this era. The characters are well done, the plotting is clever, and the clues are all there fairly laid out for the reader to follow.

2006-04-22 (Trapped in the Midwest) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 5

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Excellent mystery; watch the English words/French.
This is a most excellent mystery, written by one of Britain's premiere writers. Beginning with a murder (naturally) and a missing person, Campion and his companion (with the barely pronounceable first name) Lugg, set to uncover what happened. Some of the old "English/British" expressions might send one to the closest OED (Oxford English Dictionary, of course) and a line of "French", literally, at the end of the last chapter might require a "French" dictionary (for those who, like me, did not take the language in school). Otherwise, a fine book. I wish they would put the video (PBS) version of this book out, as it (the title character, Campion) was well played by Peter Davison of Dr. Who fame.

2003-12-24 (St. Louis, MO) | Helpful Votes: 6 | Rating: 5

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Disappearing Inc.
With "Flowers for the Judge" Margery Allingham signals the change in her writing style which was first hinted at in "Police at the Funeral." Campion has matured a bit and changed from a hapless zany to someone just a bit more like a friend of the family. Still occasionally fatuous, but, more often, showing flashes of brilliance. In keeping with this, the stories themselves are shifting away from adventure tales and becoming more typical of detective stories. While Allingham is rarely very good at keeping secrets, there really are mysteries and inexplicable clues to puzzle out.

The mystery in "Flowers for the Judge," is who murdered Paul Brande in the cellar lock room of Barnabas Limited. Brande is one of the owners of this respectable publishing firm, along with his cousins John Widdowson and Michael Wedgewood. Paul, noted for running off without notice, and being a bit hare-brained to boot, leaves behind his wife Gina. He had proven himself somewhat lacking as a husband and Gina was in the process of trying to divorce him. To make this even more suspicious, her relationship with Michael, while not exactly improper, is a bit too close to be considered a simple friendship.

When the police discover that the murder weapon was Michael's car, which was used to pump carbon monoxide into the lock room, suspicions blossom. With Michael unable to produce an alibi, the result of the inquest is a forgone conclusion, and Michael is remanded over for trial. Gina and Ritchie Barnabas (another cousin) turn to Campion for help.

The case is complicated by other events and hints of scandal, yet provides Campion with only fragmentary evidence with which to track down the truth. Driven by the need to exonerate Michael rather than simple get him released, Campion's task seems impossible. He leaves no stone unturned in his efforts, and, in the end, risks his own life to reveal the true murderer.

I rather like the new Campion. And the change in writing style introduces considerable depth and emotional content than was present in the more light hearted romances of the past. Characters are more developed and accessible, as well. Not only is "Flowers for the Judge" a great story in it's own right, it is also a portent of more wonderful tales to come.

2001-04-14 | The Noh Hare™ (Warren, MI USA) | Helpful Votes: 9 | Rating: 5

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classic golden age English detective story
Albert Campion, universal uncle and amateur detective, is invited into the family circle of staid British publisher Barnaby. There he finds an enmeshed family system, and a series of mysteries. Twenty years before one of the brothers vanished into thin air, while walking down a London street. Now Paul has been found dead in the manuscript vault. His cousin Mike (who is fond of the widow) is prime suspect. It was his car, left running outside the vault room's ventilator, that caused Paul's death of carbon monoxide poisoning. Cousin Ritchie, the reclusive manuscript reader, offers his eccentric assistance. A wonderful surprise ending to all this, which will be welcomed by anyone who's worked in a stuffy publishing house, or endured an asphyxiating family firm.

2000-07-13 | Helpful Votes: 7 | Rating: 5

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