Death in Holy Orders: An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery: 11

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This is one of the best mysteries I've seen in a while, perhaps because it reaches beyond being a simple whodunit and becomes a complex, personal drama. Sure enough soon enough there has been more murder most foul, as the Archdeacon gets his head bashed in. Another quotation: 'Father John confessed to abusing some young boys in his choir. That's the word they used, but I doubt there was much real abuse.' And James clinches her support for her 'gentlest... kindest' of sexual offenders by offering up that old chestnut that while he may have illicitly fondled the first two boys, the others who came forward with evidence were just lying.

I don't want to give any of the plot away. The drama is set in the East Anglian coast at a Theological College, where men train to become priest. Adam Dalgish is called to investigate, after the death of one of the students and after the boy's wealthy Father insist on knowing what happened to his son. No sooner Adam Dalgish arrives, there are more murders.I remembered the setting & the characters Father Martin, Father Sebastian and Eric from my first read. Book takes place at an Anglo-Catholic theological college, Saint Anselm's, on the isolated, wild and windy East Anglican coast. Setting was 5 star & most of the characters were very well drawn. This time around I was bothered though by the very sympathetic portrayal of one of the characters, Father John, a convicted pedophile. There are some hints that perhaps he wasn't guilty at all, certainly there's explanations that he was only accused of fondling, but somehow, today, this is hard to justify. I assume James is trying to portray moral ambiguity, the grayness of guilt in her characters. An elegant work about hope, death, and the alternately redemptive and destructive nature of love.” — The Miami Herald Despite that, everyone except the 'baddie' who is murdered loves him, including Dalgleish himself and his new love interest so James makes it very clear that we as readers are supposed to side with them: as one character says 'He pleaded guilty to misbehaviour with two young boys. He didn't rape them, he didn't seduce them, he didn't physically hurt them' - so in James' world and that of the book, a bit of covert fondling and illegal touching of young boys is perfectly fine - he might not have 'physically' hurt them, but any psychological trauma from being assaulted by their priest is airily waved away. to the mystery, not the subplot? - 70% Murder of certain profession? - students/teachers Misc. Murder Plotlets - "All in the family" murder - Big focus on forensic evidence Kind of investigator - police procedural, British Kid or adult book? - Adult or Young Adult Book

Commander Adam Dalgliesh, who had spent three summers at St. Anselm's in his youth, offers to poke around. The novel was adapted for television in 2003 as a two-part BBC mini-series, and also released on DVD. Many authors certainly write with confidence, but it is generally misplaced confidence; not so with James.) In this story, Dalgliesh is asked to go to a seminary near Norfolk to look into a previously closed death. A young ordinand had been found dead at the base of a cliff. The death is deemed to be death by accident. The young man's father wants Scotland Yard to investigate. Since Dalgliesh is about to go to the area on vacation so he agrees to look into the case. It also turns out that as a child, his father being a parson, that Dalgliesh spent time at St Anselms and it becomes somewhat a visit into his past. The end result is a sombre, serious novel about guilt, remorse, responsibility and death. (...) She believes that, just as the strict sonnet form can contain great poetry, a traditional detective novel can bear the weight of a serious moral theme. I think so, too, and found this one absorbing and provocative. But it's not light entertainment." - Jessica Mann, New Statesman

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This is not a madman moved by evil passion to commit terrible acts, but a psychologically complex person about whom Dalgliesh wonders how he will endure his imprisonment and “was he even now looking from his barred windows and wishing that he, too, could smell the sweetness of this spring day?” So there are two deaths that Dalgliesh looks into, wondering if they are related? At the same time the Arch Bishop responsible for St Anselms is coming for a visit. He is most unlikeable and wants nothing more than to close the seminary. There are also other visitors to St Anselms and there are links between them all. Another death, this time a murder, brings all of Dalgliesh's team into the case; DI Piers Tarrant, DI Kate Miskin and DS Robbins. The solutions -- and the various explanations of the other oddities and unusual behaviour and events -- are all quite well handled. The first is that of Ronald Treeves, a student at the college -- and the adopted son of wealthy industrialist Sir Alfred Treeves.

Review notes: Roy Hattersley tells us "Dalgliesh, as a boy, spent a summer at the college", even though P.D.James has Dalgliesh say: "I stayed there as a boy for three summers." The story starts in the past with the original discovery of the boy's body by Margaret Munroe, an elderly woman who works at St Anselms. This part of the story is told through the means of Margaret's diary. She ends it with a statement that the death concerns her and that it reminds her of something that occurred in her past. Margaret is discovered dead the day after this last entry. A suspenseful, professional-grade north country procedural whose heroine, a deft mix of compassion and attitude, would be welcome to return and tie up the gaping loose end Box leaves. The unrelenting cold makes this the perfect beach read. In this novel, Dalgliesh meets and begins a relationship with Dr Emma Lavenham, a visiting teacher from the University of Cambridge. Commander Adam Dalgliesh of New Scotland Yard has been asked by Sir Alred Treeves to take a closer look into the suspicious death of his adopted son Ronald, who suffocated under the cliffs near St. Anselms by an avalanche of sand. Was it an accident, suicide, or murder? Dalgliesh, the son of a rector, has former ties to the school - as a young teen, he spent several happy summer holidays there among the priests and ordinands.Though one can enjoy the author's sharp-eyed portrayal of domestic interiors, which goes hand in hand with an acute dissection of character and personality, and cannot but appreciate the uninhibited manner in which she sets about her pet aversions -- the two most prominent are the modernisation of the Church of England and the Macpherson Report -- the book is far less satisfying as a detective story." - T.J. Binyon, Evening Standard I also wasn't sure I believed the murderer's motives at the end. There were so many red herrings in this novel. The book starts with finding the dead body of Ronald Treeves, a young theology student at St Anselms. Ronald died climbing a sandy cliff which fell suffocating him. The coroner deemed his death as suicide, Ronald a prominent man is not happy with the ruling and asks Adam to investigate. Making his eleventh appearance, Scotland Yard Inspector Adam Dalgliesh is planning a vacation visit to St. Anselm’s Theological College on England’s East Anglia coast, where he spent time as a boy; prior to leaving London, he is told to look into the recent death of a St. Anselm ordinand (seminarian), the son of an important industrialist. Though the coroner ruled it an accident, Scotland Yard has received an anonymous letter that raises the specter of foul play. Dalgliesh—an introspective poet-intellectual who epitomizes the Criminal Investigation Division (CID) operative—finds the St. Anselm community upset by the young man’s death. They are also wary of the imminent arrival of Archdeacon Crampton, a trustee who wants the small seminary to be closed because, despite its endowment, it is not self-sufficient and requires too much financial support from the Church. The priests and others who work and reside at St. Anselm’s have many reasons for thwarting Crampton’s intent, though under its founding charter, when the school property (including valuable art holdings) is sold, the four resident priests will share the bounty. Even before Dalgliesh gets to the school, James has built the framework of a typical mystery novel: a restricted community, anxiety-filled characters, complex personal relationships, a suspicious death, an isolated setting, the prospect of inherited wealth as a possible motive. Her novels normally are longer than most mysteries, concerned as she is with theme as well as event, but the leisurely pace enhances the narrative and makes her characters more three-dimensional and realistic.

Among the issues of concern is what will happen to the college after its closing: the will of the founder, Miss Agnes Arbuthnot, anticipates the possibility, leaving the property to be divided between "any direct descendants of her father, provided such descendants were legitimate in English law and communicant members of the Church of England". The only main theme one can pull from this rather pretentious little novel is that pigs do not stink. It seems as though the author is a pig enthusiast and can't bear the thought that so many people think they have an unpleasant odor. Secondly the entire motive for the murderer doesn't make a grain of sense. This person had no regard for the person he was benefiting by committing the murders as he made perfectly clear on a number of occasions. That being so, why murder anyone?James prefaces Dalgliesh’s first interview with Father Sebastian by describing the warden, his clothes, and his office: I hate to offer a negative review - but someone has to stand up and say something for children who have been sexually abused - particularly by clergy! It is amazing that anyone, seeing heartbreaking stories of sexual abuse of young people, would allow such an apologetic to be published. It will give Jerry Sandusky and the like something to read while in prison. This is a multilayered story with wonderful characterizations thanks to the script and cast, including the handsome Jesse Spencer, Alan Howard, Clive Wood, and Poirot's old partner in crime, Hastings, Hugh Fraser. The apparent suicide, the certified natural death, the brutal murder -- there was a cord which connected them. Dalgliesh visits Saint Anselm's in a semi-official capacity to follow up the death of a student some time previously as the student's father was not satisfied with the verdict. Whilst there, a visiting archdeacon is murdered. Dalgliesh is assigned the investigation, summoning DI Miskin and DI Tarrant from London to assist, as well as local officers. Initial suspicion falls on one of the priests who run and teach at the college, as the archdeacon was known to be recommending the closure of the college.