"The Beckoning Lady", by Margery Allingham

Novel, 1955

Essentially, a country house whodunnit, but with mercantile and business characters and some fairly typical moral and other ambiguities popping up here and there. This is a soothing read which handles a large cast of characters and rather fizzles out just as things threaten to really get going. Enjoyable, though neither oddball, tense or mysterious enough to fully grip the attention. The book's almost exclusive country setting and its eccentric couple's party lend very much to the sense of familiarity, though some moments of enjoyment and strangeness with glimmers of wonderful imagery and description.

"The Case of the Late Pig," by Margery Allingham

Novel, 1937

Lively novel combining crime and mystery, with the familiar characters Campion and Lugg on the side of good, with an unfolding set of events and circumstances which lead to an ever-increasing sense of the inhuman and the grisly. The dead seem to come back to life, local police are found wanting in capability and there are other twists and turns en route. This is a light read mixing dappy behaviour with the macabre and jolly entertaining into the bargain. Nothing hugely compelling, but excellently diverting, all the same.

"Traitor's Purse," by Margery Allingham

Novel, 1941

A tangle of a whodunnit in which there's no corpse and the super sleuth starts the piece far from either super or sleuth-like. While the plot trips over itself a little at times, the pacing and evocation are excellent. There are, in places, excellently evocative passages, and when bits and pieces slowly come together, there's a pleasure in discovering through the eyes of Campion. And a rather strange set-up too, revealed right at the end of the book, which works more effectively than if it had been put in at the beginning.