This is less a single book review than a reflection on the 17 (seventeen) novels by Elly Griffiths that I´ve read in the last eight months. The books span two series, five decades and (essentially) three counties. I´ve spent time with Griffiths in 1960s Brighton in the company of magicians and in 21st Century Norfolk with archeologists. What the stories have in common - besides a policemen investigating murders - is wit and charm and an easy writing style that made them impossible to resist.
The journey started in August when I grabbed a paperback off a shelf as I was leaving for a road trip. I don´t recall buying The Crossing Places, the first book in the Ruth Galloway series of books, but it must have been on the shelf a fair while. I finished it in less than 24 hours, and within another day had finished book two, The Janus Stone, an emergency Kindle purchase. It´s difficult to keep that sort of pace up when there is work to be done, but I finished the 11th and (then) final book of the series in late September. I don´t think I´ve ever gone through a series so quickly.
So how did I come to fall under Ms Galloway´s (or Ms Griffiths´) spell? Well I guess it´s pretty simple. Pacy writing, credible, likable characters and strong plots are a combination that will always work. Here they match the somewhat unlikely combination of archeology and policework, along with perhaps an even less likely love illicit love interest between archeologist Galloway and gruff local detective chief Nelson. On top of that that the storylines are underpinned by a little science, mythology and history that give them real substance. And finally much of the action takes place in North Norfolk, an area I have some affinity with (having become engaged on the beach between Old Hunstanton and Holme-next-the-Sea where some of The Crossing Places is set).
In the end, getting into each book was like settling into a conversation with old friends. In some instances I knew exactly what Ruth Galloway was going to say or think before she said or thought it.
So it felt like a long wait for book 12, The Lantern Men, which was published last month. Here we find Ruth Galloway displaced from her cottage on the Norfolk salt marshes, having made a career change and moved to teach at Cambridge University. But when bones are unearthed in North Norfolk, and DCI Nelson needs help, there is only one expert for him, and Ruth suddenly finds herself pulled back into her previous orbit. It´s another well plotted and well executed mystery with a healthy dose Griffiths´ trademark emotional drama (Ruth´s love life does not run smoothly).
For something different, Griffiths also wrote a five book series based in Brighton and featuring mysteries solved by another unlikely combination: Detective Inspector Edgar Stephens and his friend Max Mephisto, one of the most celebrated magicians in the age of Variety.
The two men served together in the war in a secret outfit known as the Magic Men, an intelligence unit using deception to try to fool the Germans.
It took me a little longer to get hooked on this series - a full six weeks to read the five books - but once I´d picked up the rhythm of them thoroughly enjoyed them also, not least for perhaps the most colourful cast of characters I´ve come across in a crime novel.
Happily Griffiths is a prolific writer and there are still more books to discover, not least four romance novels written under her real name, Domenica de Rosa. And why not...