Customer Reviews

Death at the Bar

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I've just started reading Ngaio Marsh's mysteries, so I don't know if this book is a "typical" Marsh mystery, but I certainly hope so. The characters were well-drawn, and the plot quite brilliant. A man dies while playing darts, because it appears that a dart daubed with cyanide sticks in the back of his hand. Almost everyone has a motive, and the evidence at hand can point to almost any of them. Reading this novel is like threading a conch-shell. You slip in a piece of string and it snakes through various chambers and entries until it finally comes out at the end. I was a big Christie fan, but now I think I'll be moving on to Marsh.

One of Marsh's most tightly-knit jobs. Victim a famous K.C., poisoned with KNC in the private taproom of a Devon inn while taking part in a demonstration of darts-throwing; plenty of good circumstantial detail leads to supposition of impossible crime. Alleyn, called in both by publican and by local police, does a splendid and fast (24 hours) job of discovering murderer, whose identity is a masterly demonstration in diverting suspicion from the most likely person. Method ingeniously simple, and hence convincing: a very neat job. Virtuoso display of logic at the end, including a delightful false solution propounded by a most amusing Chief Constable.

Perhaps not one of her more richly written efforts, but buoyed by a marvellous mystery plot, set in a wonderful English pub. Darts and beer, a fatal combination.

I am a fan of Ngaio Marsh and I'm trying to read all of her stories, but DEATH AT THE BAR was way below a Marsh standard. There was no mystery, from the moment the characters were introduced the reader knows who will die and who is the killer.
The other characters who populate the bar are shallow and repulsive.
DEATH AT THE BAR may have been an early manuscript that had been around collecting dust for want of a publisher that should have stayed in the bottom drawer.
If you enjoy Ngaio Marsh you should read it, but I can not recommend it.
Nash Black, author of TRAVELERS.

This is one of the longest Marsh novels of the 25 I've read so far (of the 32). She has lots of style. This one includes Inspector Fox but not the others in Alleyn's usual crew. The additional characters are well-drawn & intriguing IMHO, including an actor (Marsh has many stage-oriented novels--cf. Curtain Calls: Three Great Mysteries; Enter A Murderer; Night At the Vulcan; Killer Dolphin), an artist (she also has art-oriented ones such as Artists in Crime & Alleyn's wife Troy is a celebrated artist), a Barrister (the victim), & numerous country folk. The setting in a country inn adds charm to the novel as well. But, the best part is the mystery itself. Lots of motives, of course, & a supposedly impossible crime. The finger points to different suspects in cycles--very clever. I did guess part of it, but not the main part. The only drawback to me was the seeming serendipity of the storm & lights going out--and the rapidity of the culprit's movements. Poetic license I presume. My favorite lines in it are: p. 9: "His cousin had a trick of saying things that sounded a little like quotations from an interview with himself" & p. 293: "as conspicuous as a pitchfork in Paradise." It's a delightful book--I'm torn between giving it 4 or 5 stars.