Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1201829 in Books
• Published on: 2004-10
• Format: Large Print
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

From AudioFile
Caudwell's far-fetched story is given credibility by Haddon's realistic narration. When scatter-brained Julia Larwood decides to leave her tax worries behind and take a luxury trip to Venice, tragedy befalls her. Through her letters, friends back in England try to unravel her problems. Julia and her friends live lives of high drama in which everything is thoroughly dissected. Subtly ironic humor is slipped in when things get too serious. Haddon splendidly meets each challenge as she effortlessly glides from presenting action via letters, speaking in international accents, and illuminating the story's stereotypical characters. This title isn't for everyone, but those who appreciate a complex plot will revel in the odd romance. S.G.B. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Ingram
Fleeing from tax-related worries, Julia Larwood indulges in a holiday, unaware that the fellow tourist she falls for is an Inland Revenue employee, who turns up dead in her bed with her copy of the Finance Act nearby. Reprint. PW.

Customer Reviews

delightful, wodehouse style
Having read two of Sarah Caudwell's books so far, I have decided that Hilary Tamar is a man. In fact, I would cast Sir Derek Jacobi as Hilary in the MYSTERY series of the books--should they ever make one.
I find the mysteries delightful in their anachronistic style, and I wish Sarah Caudwell had lived to write ten or twenty more!

Loved it!
Although all of the novels in this too-short series are delightful, this one is by far the best. Professor Hilary Tamar leaves Oxford to visit a group of his former law students practicing in London. One of the group, the preoccupied yet endearing tax barrister Julia, has taken a holiday to Italy, where her weakness for pretty young men has landed her in the middle of a murder.

There are no knitting old ladies (or even in-bred villages) in this book, but it is nonetheless a very British story. The tone is wry and witty but much slower-paced (and less violent) than modern American mysteries. If you're looking for something to read between Sue Grafton and Patricia Cornwell mysteries, this is not the book for you. On the other hand, if you are a fan of Dorothy Sayers and P.G. Wodehouse, you will find yourself right at home.

N.B. As an attorney, I can tell you that a disorganized, preoccupied tax barrister at a prestigious firm is a completely plausible character. The fact that the general public is not aware of such people only means that the firms do a good job of hiding them in libraries, writing opinions about the latest changes to the tax code.

A worthy contemporary of P. D. James
I'd never before heard of author Sarah Caudwell until I saw her latest novel, "The Sybil In Her Grave", in a local bookstore. Intrigued by the Edward Gory-illustrated book jacket, I took it down & read that it was one of a series, if you will, of books containing the same characters. Not being one to start in the middle of something, I discovered that the book I'm reviewing now, "Thus Was Adonis Murdered", was the first one in her all-too-short series featuring Professor Hilary Tamar et al. Casting about for a new mystery author (and having consumed P. D. James' latest, "Death In Holy Orders"), I decided to give Prof. Tamar a try.

I just finished the book and I found it most delightful. It contains a very brilliantly-constructed conundrum of the "whodunnit" variety. Julia Larwood, one of a group of young barristers who are friends with Prof. Tamar, goes to Venice on holiday, only to wind up in bed with the corpse of the young man she's fancied throughout the trip and finally managed to engage in a one-afternoon stand. (Of course, when she first got into bed with the young man, he WASN'T a corpse, which makes his subsequent dispatch all the more distressing ...) Naturally, members of the Venice police force don't take kindly to this set of events, particularly when Julia's personally-inscribed copy of that year's Tax Finance Act is found lying next to the stiffening body ...

From London, then, Prof. Tamar and Julia's other friends at 62 New Square (Selena, Cantrip and Ragwort - all intriguing personalities in themselves) attempt to help solve the mystery and spring Julia out of jail. What follows is an erudite, often hilarious, web of intrigue, frustrated passion and outright chicanery told in VERY tongue-in-cheek style by Prof. Tamar himself ... or herself ...

Come to think of it, you never know the sex of our intrepid narrator. Ms. Caudwell has neither Tamar or his compatriots refer to him/her in any way that might reveal the Professor's sex. And that's just one of the subtle plot contrivances that make "Thus Was Adonis Murdered" a delightful read.

Sadly, Ms. Caudwell died recently, so her series turned out to be all-too-short. Therefore, I'm beginning the second novel, "The Shortest Way To Hades", featuring the elegant professor and the barristers of 62 New Square, quite slowly, so as not to finish all the books in the series too quickly and to savour the wonderful prose and imaginative situation I'm very likely to find there.