Magpie Murders

A Novel

By: Anthony Horowitz

Narrated by: Samantha Bond, Allan Corduner

Narrated by Samantha Bond

Don’t miss Magpie Murders on PBS's MASTERPIECE Mystery!

""A double puzzle for puzzle fans, who don’t often get the classicism they want from contemporary thrillers."" —Janet Maslin, New York Times

New York Times Bestseller | Winner of the Macavity Award for Best Novel | NPR Best Book of the Year | Washington Post Best Book of the Year | Esquire Best Book of the Year

From the New York Times bestselling author of Moriarty and Trigger Mortis, this fiendishly brilliant, riveting thriller weaves a classic whodunit worthy of Agatha Christie into a chilling, ingeniously original modern-day mystery.

When editor Susan Ryeland is given the manuscript of Alan Conway’s latest novel, she has no reason to think it will be much different from any of his others. After working with the bestselling crime writer for years, she’s intimately familiar with his detective, Atticus Pünd, who solves mysteries disturbing sleepy English villages. An homage to queens of classic British crime such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers, Alan’s traditional formula has proved hugely successful. So successful that Susan must continue to put up with his troubling behavior if she wants to keep her job.

Conway’s latest tale has Atticus Pünd investigating a murder at Pye Hall, a local manor house. Yes, there are dead bodies and a host of intriguing suspects, but the more Susan reads, the more she’s convinced that there is another story hidden in the pages of the manuscript: one of real-life jealousy, greed, ruthless ambition, and murder.

Masterful, clever, and relentlessly suspenseful, Magpie Murders is a deviously dark take on vintage English crime fiction in which the reader becomes the detective.

Magpie Murders is terrific!

I really enjoyed this mystery within a mystery. The inner mystery is a Christie-type village murder of an obnoxious aristocrat whom everyone disliked. The framing mystery is the murder (or suicide) of the best-selling, equally disliked author. Both stories are compelling. Both have plausible resolutions.

The Best - Beyond Description it is so good

I won't give anything away because it is so clever and different with twist after twist. If you enjoy an Agatha Christie / Poirot type story, this is even better. I loved it and dreaded getting to the end of the story. I haven't felt that way about a book in a long time.

Did I guess the outcome? No way, but the solution made sense and I was very satisfied with the outcome.

If you love a good whodunit, police procedural, you have to get this audiobook. Beautifully narrated.

Too long?

I say too long only because it is hard to remember details. Too many off shoot back and forth. By the end, it comes together but by then.....oh well....

thought I was going to love it but then.....

This story should have been better because it had all the "fixins" to make it great- great characters, great setting, English countryside, reluctant female detective- the meta fictional device of a story within a story, wonderfully talented narrators....but then the author decided to put in one more story, so that it became a story, within a story, within a story. That is where Anthony Horowitz lost me and I got bored. Sometimes by trying to be too clever and do something unique a writer ends up being boring and predictable. Too bad because I really wanted to like love this!

Interesting ideas but...

It started well and I thought it was promising. The first part of the book that was the whodunnit was interesting. The action keeps the listener captivated.

Once Susan jumped in, I started to get impatient to go back to the whodunnit itself. Many long descriptions, that I felt could have been removed from the story and we would not miss it! It would have been a couple hours shorter if her love life wouldn’t have been added to the story.

In an attempt to be different, intricate and interesting by mixing an amateur detective within the whodunnit, it became long and boring.

Too much is like not enough.