Carnage on the Committee (Robert Amiss Mysteries) [Paperback]

Ruth Dudley Edwards (Author)

Book Description

Series: Robert Amiss Mysteries | Publication Date: October 1, 2006

As the judges of a literary prize chip away at the author list,
someone else is chipping away at them....
When the chairperson of the prestigious Knapper-Warburton Literary Prize dies in suspicious circumstances, Robert Amiss (the token sane member of the judging panel) wastes no time in summoning Baroness "Jack" Troutbeck to step into the chair.
Speculation that a killer may be targeting the judges worries the baroness not in the slightest - it's the prospect of immersing herself in modern literature that fills her with dread. But noblesse must oblige, even when it means joining the ranks of the superciliati sitting in judgement of the literati.
With the baroness at the helm, the judges resume the task of whittling away at the short-list. But the killer, too, has resumed work and is whittling away at the judges one by one.

Editorial Reviews

Review

In deplorable taste and wickedly funny, this, the tenth in the Robert Amiss series, will consolidate the author's reputation for scurrilous humour. Sprightly, saucy and ingenious. -- Sunday Times

Dudley Edwards is an equal opportunities satirist. She's rude to every persuasion. -- Daily Telegraph

Marvellously entertaining and iconoclastic series of satires on the British establishment. Ruth Dudley Edwards is a crime writer whom we should treasure -sharp, intelligent and gloriously politically incorrect. -- Mail on Sunday

About the Author

After being a Cambridge postgraduate, a teacher, a marketing executive and a civil servant, Ruth Dudley Edwards became a full-time writer. A journalist, broadcaster, historian and prize-winning biographer who lives in London, her recent non-fiction includes books about The Economist, the Foreign Office, the Orange Order and Fleet Street. The first of her ten satirical mysteries, Corridors of Death, was short-listed for the CWA John Creasey Memorial Dagger; two others were nominated for the CWA Last Laugh Award. Her two short stories appeared respectively in The Economist and the Oxford Book of Detective Stories. Targets of her satirical crime novels about the British establishment so far include the civil service, gentlemen's clubs, academia, the House of Lords, the Church of England, publishing, the literati and, above all, political correctness. Visit her website at www.ruthdudleyedwards.com

Product Details

• Paperback: 219 pages
• Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press (October 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590583124
• ISBN-13: 978-1590583128
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,333,699 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oh, so delightfully politically incorrect., July 11, 2010

By 

Jill Meyer (United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Carnage on the Committee (Robert Amiss Mysteries) (Paperback)

Irish author and scholar Ruth Dudley Edwards does not write fiction for the faint-hearted reader. Her mysteries all feature English civil-servant Robert Amiss, as well as a cast of supporting characters. Her best known supporting character is Lady Ida "Jack" Troutbeck, a booze guzzling, cigar-smoking, bi-sexual, un-"PC", head of a woman's college at Cambridge. Jack Troutbeck says what she thinks, and what she thinks is often at odds with Britain's "New Labour", which was in power when Dudley Edwards wrote and published "Carnage on the Committee".

The "committee" is the "Knapper-Warburton Committee", a Booker-like committee, whose nine members - including Robert Amiss - are charged with getting together to select one novel as that year's honoree of the prize. And the clever Dudley Edwards has made the eight members caricatures of the prevailing literary elite who people the real prize selection committees. Several murders occur and Robert Amiss enlists Jack Troutbeck's help by taking over the committee's chairmanship, left vacant by one of the murder victims. Dudley Edwards does not stint in poking fun at the pompousness of the literary insiders nor at the worthlessness of the books under consideration for the Knapper-Warburton. There are several laugh-out-loud scenes, for those who enjoy the un-PCness with which Dudley Edwards writes. Dudley Edwards has long satirized the British Establishment - brilliantly in "Publish and be Murdered", another Amiss/Troutbeck mystery, set a the "Wrangler", a suspiciously "Economist"-like magazine.

But if Dudley Edwards satirizes, she also points out truths. Her two page piece in her latest book, "Murdering Americans", gives the most beautiful explanation of America and her place in history and in the world I've ever read. Please seek out Dudley Edwards' fiction. She writes wonderfully, and often has some wonderful "truths" in her work.