Murdering Americans [Large Print] [Paperback]

Ruth Dudley Edwards (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2007

Academia (n.): a profession filled with bad food,
knee-jerk liberalism, and murder...

Being a member of the House of Lords and Mistress of St Marthas College in Cambridge might seem enough to keep anyone busy, but Baroness (Jack) Troutbeck likes new challenges. When a combination of weddings, work, and spookery deprives her of five of her closest allies, she leaps at an invitation to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor on an American campus.
With her head full of romantic fantasies inspired by 1950s Hollywood, and accompanied by Horace, her loquacious and disconcerting parrot, this intellectually-rigorous right-winger sets off from England blissfully unaware that academia in the United States is dominated by knee-jerk liberalism, contempt for Western civilization, and the institutionalisation of a form of insane political-correctness.
Will the bon viveuse Baroness Troutbeck be able to cope with the culinary and vinous desert that is New Paddington, Indiana? Can this insensitive and tactless human battering-ram defeat the thought-police who run Freeman State University like a gulag? Does she believe the late Provost was murdered? If so, what should she do about it? And will she manage to persuade Robert Amisswho describes himself bitterly as Watson to her Holmes and Goodwin to her Nero Wolfeto abandon his honeymoon and fly to her side?

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Dudley Edwards's provocative, humorous 11th Robert Amiss mystery (after 2004's Carnage on the Committee), the outrageous Baroness "Jack" Troutbeck—Mistress of St. Martha's College, Cambridge, and member of the House of Lords—experiences culture shock as a distinguished visiting professor at Freeman State University in New Paddington, Ind. With Horace, her loquacious parrot, perched on her shoulder, the conservative academic arrives in the Midwest to find a campus where political correctness has taken over, threatening to destroy Western Civilization as she knows it. Jack has her suspicions about the previous provost's death, and no trust in the left-wing current provost and the university president. She launches an investigation and convinces her partner-in-sleuthing, Robert Amiss, to cut his honeymoon short and help expose Freeman State's corruption, crime—and shoddy knee-jerk liberalism. Dudley Edwards wittily satirizes political correctness in this fast-paced academic romp. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

The fun in the eleventh Robert Amiss and Baroness "Jack" Troutbeck novel starts on the very first page and doesn't stop until the very last. When Baroness Troutbeck decides to pay a visit to an Indiana university, little does she anticipate the American obsession with political correctness. Luckily, she is distracted by a murder, and soon she and Amiss (Watson to her Holmes) are doggedly pursuing the killer. But the brutally blunt, brook-no-nonsense Lady Troutbeck can't quite escape the surreal clutches of political correctness. The Amiss/Troutbeck novels are comic mysteries in the cozy style: small casts, small settings, big laughs. Edwards doesn't let a single opportunity to poke fun pass her by, and it's the small moments, such as the baroness' futile attempts to enjoy a drink after a long flight, or her acid-tongued critique of a hotel breakfast (and let's not forget her interrogation by Homeland Security because of something her parrot said at the airport) that put a broad smile on our face. The story is enjoyable, but it's the way Edwards tells it that makes the tale--and the series--such a resounding success. David Pitt
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 376 pages
• Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press (July 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590584147
• ISBN-13: 978-1590584149
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,020,461 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars stop the lecturing!, November 13, 2007

By 

Mystery Fan - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Murdering Americans (Baroness Jack Troutbeck) (Paperback)

The Amiss series began most amusingly, with well-aimed and appropriate digs at political correctness run amok. Baroness Jack Troutbeck, free thinking, cigar chomping, bisexual academic, used to be good for enormous laughs at the expense of stuffed shirts and PC police. There were actual mysteries to solve, whether in the offices of Whitehall, the editorial room of a magazine clearly meant to be The Spectator, the dean's office of a cathedral, or campus of an all-women's college at Oxford. But with each book in the series, the level of mystery and plot diminishes and the level of diatribe increases. Carnage on the Committee, about the machinations that go on behind the scenes for a literary prize, is already losing the balance into editorializing. Murdering Americans seems to be nine-tenths banal diatribe about political correctness on US campuses (and bad food, and dumbing down of education, etc. etc) and only one-tenth mystery and amusement. Get a grip, Miss Dudley Edwards. We get it. Now tell us a story.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars worst 'mystery', September 18, 2007

By 

D. Grasel (FL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Murdering Americans (Robert Amiss Mysteries 11) (Hardcover)

Worst mystery without a mystery ever read. Author tries to be cute about the American culture yet she sounds like she has no knowledge except from some English newspaper headlines. Characters are superficial & talky but don't say anything. Did not build - was strung out at the end - just skim the last few chapters to get the idea.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Too offensive for words, November 28, 2007

By 

angusmacscottie "RJB" (Fishers, IN USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Murdering Americans (Baroness Jack Troutbeck) (Paperback)

I guess I just wasn't into it. I was unable to finish this book, even though I am a voracious reader. Maybe it was just my wounded sensibilities as an American who feels deeply the pain of the last 7 years, but I just didn't like the continuing jabs at the "PCness" that we, as a nation, have adopted. In these times being politically correct may be all we have left of our integrity. It is a dubious way of exhibiting our shrinking humanity, I admit. In any case, I just can't recommend this book as a thrilling or suspenseful mystery. The author seems more bent on pitilessly, inexpertly, and I might add, incompetently, exposing human weaknesses than engaging the reader in a whodunit.