CLOSE TO DEATH
Anthony Horowitz
Screenwriter for Midsomer Murders, creator of Foyle’s War and the teen spy Alex Rider series, the incredible Mr Horowitz once again plays Watson to ex-DI Daniel Hawthorne’s Holmes, when loud, brash Giles Kenworthy is shot dead with a crossbow in a gated close in leafy Richmond. It had to be an ‘inside job’, and the neighbours have all been given grief by the Kenworthy tribe. But who, among the genteel and civilised residents, could possibly have perpetrated such a cold-blooded deed?
What does each of them have to hide? You sense the author having great fun with his avatar, expounding on the ‘locked-room’ subgenre, the choice of third-person narrative, and the crafting of a good whodunnit, even as he sweeps you up in the mystery of it all. Such chutzpah!