If Agatha Christie is the Queen of Crime, PD James is certainly the princess, or the heir apparent. Which is ironic because PD James is now an octogenarian (she was 85 when she wrote this book).
Anyway, "The Lighthouse" is set on an imaginary island of the Devon coast, where a writer, his daughter, and his copy-editor go for a sabbatical of sorts. Their arrival is not taken well by some other guests and inhabitants of the island, and the it is to almost no-one's surprise that the writer is found hanging from the lighthouse on the island. PD James' darling investigator Adam Dalgliesh is sent in to solve the case.
It's a well-written book (especially for an 85-year-old! but I'm not ageist) and each character and their pasts are delved into quite thoroughly, giving lots of sublplots which help plump up the main one. It's even up-to-date - two characters in the book get stricken with SARS, which was a big concern in 2005 (and still is). However, I think that SARS thing was a bit unbelievable, plus the fact that Dalgliesh sort of solved the mystery while he was having dreams from the fever made it look like she was just using it as a means to an end. Just a small hiccup though. A good book to read, but if possible, read her earlier books and get to know the detective Dalgliesh first. Then you'll appreciate this book more.
Rating: ***out of 5
