| Description | Nicholas Blake penned The Corpse in the Snowman in 1940, apparently just before major British-German engagements began, certainly before the Luftwaffe bombing of London. At one point Charlotte Restorick of Easterham Manor even asks, "I wonder when the war is really going to start in earnest".
Nigel and Georgia are asked to come in midwinter to Easterham Manor under the pretense of investigating a psychic incident. Shortly after their arrival, the rather notorious, strikingly beautiful, Elizabeth Restorick is found dead by hanging. Nigel uncovers evidence of murder, and he soon finds himself once again working with his friend, Inspector Blount of Scotland Yard.
The Corpse in the Snowman is a first rate puzzle with sufficient red herrings to supply a fish market. Nigel as usual focuses more on psychological elements while the plodding, yet superbly capable, Inspector Blount compiles physical evidence. Nigel weaves one theory after another, only to have them unravel as new information and evidence emerges.
The conclusion to this well-crafted, psychologically complex mystery is logically consistent, entirely fair, and not unreasonable, and yet the psychological motivation (and some of the science) is now less convincing than it would have been some seventy-five years ago.
Includes handwritten notations by Exton |