J M Gregson - Body Politic HarperCollins £14.99
One of the challenges faced by anyone who seeks to write a
traditional whodunit is that the victim must be someone whom several suspects might have a
plausible reason to kill. In this book, J.M. Gregson finds a neat solution to that
particular problem. The person who winds up dead is a Member of Parliament.
Raymond Keane is an ambitious and upwardly mobile Conservative
politician who has no shortage of enemies. They include his past and present lovers, his
business partner and a disgruntled constituent. He disappears over Christmas and when an
exuberant boxer puppy finds a corpse in a woodland pond, it is evident that the
government's majority has been reduced yet again. The detecting is done by Gregson's
regular team of policemen, Superintendent Lambert and Sergeant Hook and in the end they
unmask a culprit who had adopted a neat and unusual method of seeking to avoid justice.
(The dust jacket blurb of the book, incidentally, includes too ostentatious a hint as to
the solution for my taste.)
Despite the political background, this is in essence a conventional
domestic murder story. In the opening pages there is quite a sharp description of a Tory
social gathering, but thereafter - to my mind, unfortunately - this element fades away.
The policemen are competent and likeable, although personally I could have done without
the chit-chat about golf (a game which is evidently the author's passion). A sub-plot
concerning the illness of Lambert's wife is sensitively handled.
Not so many years ago, solid if unspectacular mysteries of this kind crowded the library
shelves, frequently appearing under the Collins Crime Club imprint before it finally
disappeared soon after celebrating its diamond jubilee. Recently, fashions in crime
fiction have been changing.
Tough thrillers have gained in popularity and books described as
"cosy" have tended to receive the critical cold shoulder. But Gregson is one of
a number of HarperCollins writers - Anthea Fraser and Emma Page are amongst the others -
who have continued to turn out books which give a good deal of quiet pleasure to readers
in search of a reliable and well-crafted detective story. Long may they
continue to do so. Martin Edwards
