All Shall Be Well [Hardcover]

Deborah Crombie (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1994

Perhaps it is a blessing when Jasmine Dent dies in her sleep. At long last an end has come to the suffering of a body horribly ravaged by disease. It may well have been suicide; she had certainly expressed her willingness to speed the inevitable. But small inconsistencies lead her neighbor, Superintendent Duncan Kincaid of Scotland Yard, to a startling conclusion: Jasmine Dent was murdered. But if not for mercy, why would someone destroy a life already so fragile and doomed? As Kincaid and his capable and appealing assistant Sergeant Gemma James sift through the dead woman's strange history, a troubling puzzle begins to take shape -- a bizarre amalgam of good and evil, of charity and crime . . . and of the blinding passions that can drive the human animal to perform cruel and inhuman acts.

--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Written with compassion, clarity, wit and precision, this graceful mystery amply fulfills the promise of Crombie's debut novel, A Share in Death. "Morphine coats the mind like peach fuzz," thinks Jasmine Dent, a 50-year-old spinster born in India who is dying in London of lung cancer. Her death resembles suicide but leaves her friend and neighbor from the flat above, Scotland Yard Supt. Duncan Kincaid, uneasy. The postmortem he orders reveals an overdose of morphine, prompting him and his sergeant, hot-tempered, copper-haired Gemma James, on a thorough investigation. Suspects include 30-ish, disheveled Meg Bellamy, a timid friend with whom Jasmine had considered suicide, and the downstairs neighbor known as the Major, a veteran of the Muslim-Hindu clashes in Calcutta in 1946 and an avid gardener with whom Jasmine had often sat "like two old dogs in the sun." Others include Meg's stunningly handsome, bullying beau Roger, who urged that she help Jasmine end her life; Felicity Howarth, Jasmine's faithful home-care nurse who slaves to keep her brain-damaged son in an institution; and Jasmine's weak-willed brother Theo, owner of a village junk shop who has failed at every venture he's tried. Helped by Jasmine's journal and a visit to a mental hospital, the clues finally click into place to reveal the culprit. Meg makes a decision that promises hope for two people, while Gemma and Duncan, both unlucky in love, move closer to each other.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

This American author follows the successful debut of A Share in Death ( LJ 1/93) with another Scotland Yard procedural featuring Supt. Duncan Kincaid and Sgt. Gemma James. When the autopsy of Duncan's terminally ill neighbor indicates a drug overdose, Kincaid must determine whether the death was murder or suicide.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 358 pages
• Publisher: Thorndike Pr (September 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 078620298X
• ISBN-13: 978-0786202980
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,691,964 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Deborah Crombie grew up near Dallas, Texas, but from a child always had the inexplicable feeling that she belonged in England. After earning a Bachelor's degree in Biology from Austin College in Sherman, Texas, she made her first trip to Britain and felt she'd come home. She later lived in both Chester, England, and Edinburgh, Scotland, where she failed to make as good a use of being cold and poor as JK Rowling.

It was not until almost a decade later that, living once more in Texas and raising her small daughter, she had the idea for her first novel, a mystery set in Yorkshire. She had no credentials other than a desire to write and a severe case of homesickness for Britain. A Share in Death, published in 1993, was short-listed for both Agatha and Macavity awards for Best First Novel and was awarded the Macavity.

Crombie's fifth novel, Dreaming of the Bones, was a New York Times Notable Book in 1997, was named by the Independent Mystery Booksellers as one of the 100 Best Crime Novels of the Century, was an Edgar nominee for Best Novel, and won the Macavity award for Best Novel.

Subsequent novels have been published to critical acclaim and in a dozen languages. Crombie's fourteenth novel featuring Metropolitan Police detectives Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Inspector Gemma James, No Mark Upon Her, will be published by Harper Collins in February 2012.

The author still lives in Texas but spends several months out of the year in Britain, maintaining a precarious balance between the two, and occasionally confusing her cultural references.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A mystery series find!, December 16, 2001

By 

"[e-mail]" (Massachusetts) - See all my reviews

This review is from: All Shall Be Well (Paperback)

Because of this board I found Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James mystery series by Deborah Crombie. This author is from Texas but writes like a British author. This is my second in the series and am I glad to have found it. I am adding her to my collection of P. D. James, Minette Walters, Ngaio Marsh and Elizabeth George and Dick Francis. Excellent story - you can feel the British landscape, smell the aroma of hot, brewing tea. A comfortable read. On to the next installment..

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very enjoyable book, May 30, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: All Shall Be Well (Paperback)

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel and was very impressed with the author's ability to develop her characters in such a way that the reader is almost distracted from the "mystery" and becomes involved entirely with the characters. She also is very descriptive and insightful in even the smallest details of the story. I will definitely seek out her other books.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars All is Well INDEED!, August 14, 2003

By 

Dewfactor "bibliophile" (California, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: All Shall Be Well (Paperback)

I've read all of Deborah Crombie's novels about Duncan Kincaid to date, and this is probably my favorite. It's the second in the series, and it's the one in which you really will get attached to Duncan and Gemma, and the one that will make you read all the rest.
Crombie is very good at weaving together elements of character, emotion, plot, and setting, and this novel is a shining example of her writing abilities. Warning: you'll find it hard to put down, so block out a big chunk of time for it!