The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman
In this latest book in the Thursday Murder Club series, our retired friends from Coopers Chase are once more tracking a murderer. Defying the tragic encroachment of Alzheimer’s, Elizabeth’s husband Stephen manages to help.
Among the chief delights of reading Osman’s work are his fresh turns of phrase and flights of fancy. Chris, the local policeman is bitter after being ruthlessly sidelined by the high-handed SIO Jill Regan of the National Crime squad.
Hoping to solve the murder ahead of SIO Regan and the Thursday Murder club, he worries that retired MI6 officer Elizabeth and her intrepid pensioner friends will “start a gunfight in a hollowed-out volcano.”
Retired psychiatrist Ibrahim is counselling a prisoner. Fond to a fault of giving long erudite explanations, he’s annoyed to be cut off “in the foothills of an observation,” before he can “really get into high gear.”
Ibrahim’s ability to focus is legendary. One minute he’s reflecting on how the “overwhelming stimuli of the modern world,” have led to the “attention deficit in today’s society.” The next, he emerges from his reverie on full alert to observe two drug dealers under questioning and determine who is lying. By the time he’s offered another slice of cake, he’s ready to “bet his [precious] Petworth parking space” neither is telling the truth.
Black police officer Donna is unsurprised when she’s rudely ignored by a businessman while her male partner is made much of. Philosophically, she reflects that “if given the choice between men who pay women no attention and men who pay them too much attention, Donna will always take the former.” Although she’s wearing plain clothes of this occasion, a more pressing concern is that “someone she’s arrested will walk through the door and recognize her. After all, it is the football.”
Ron, the ex-union organizer, is still tough, but his son Jason gets a bit worried when asked by his father’s sleuthing friends if he’s heard who’s selling heroin on the south coast.
“Jesus, Dad,” he says, laughing nervously. “You and your friends are starting drug wars now. I used to prefer it when you wrote letters to the council complaining about the bins.”
Meanwhile, Hanif has just flown in from Afghanistan to track down some missing heroin. Staying at Claridge’s, in the heart of London, he’s enjoying the amenities: a butler, a pool, and a grand piano. “Hanif can neither swim nor play the piano, but they look good on his Instagram.”
As the bodies pile up, Elizabeth and Joyce agree on the value of a tried and true ploy. As Joyce comments, “Give them enough rope, was what we used to say, but ‘Let’s see who kills whom next,’ was how Elizabeth actually put it.”
When a drug kingpin combs through the rubbish in search of a valuable object Joyce innocently claims she threw out, the reader is reminded of the dump-crawling scenes in Slumdog Millionaire. The poignancy of our hapless criminal’s position is reflected when he “steps on a doll that says ‘Love me’ in the slow deep voice of a toy with low batteries.” As he keeps climbing, “the wind blows a KFC box in his face.”
The final word must be given to Connie Johnson. Even as she orchestrates crimes on the outside from her comfortable prison cell, she keeps getting “images of Ibrahim, his kind eyes and his gentle soul. His belief in her. She tries to concentrate on guns, and drugs, and chaos, but Ibrahim’s kindness is stronger.”
Well done, Ibrahim and Connie. May the real world follow your lead on the healing journey we humans so badly need. And well done Richard Osman, for sharing your kind and often hilarious inner world, making us readers smile, and offering a modicum of hope.