The Case of William Smith

I like the Miss Silver books. They are nice easy listening even if she is a bit like Angela Lansbury in Murder She Wrote. This one I thought was an exceptionally good one.

The Miss Silver mysteries are fun to listen to. They have just enough detail to keep you interested. I listen while doing dishes or other housework not requiring a vacuum.

This is my favorite Miss Silver so far, and I've listened to a bunch of them. "William Smith" comes back from World War II with a head injury that left him with no memory of who he actually is. The ID tags thrust on him in Germany gave him a name, but it's clear (because of class issues, as always in classical British mysteries) he is not the William Smith of the tag. This psychological mystery is surprisingly creepy as William gradually recovers his memory, the moment of truth playing out in a sort of mental time travel back and forth for hours that gave me goosebumps -- very effective writing. The episode of the apple honey gift was also creepy and suspenseful. This is a complex and tightly plotted mystery.

Miss Silver helps out because her upper-class policeman, Frank Abbott, actually knows our William ---- but can't remember his name. And because for no obvious reason, somebody keeps trying to kill him, over and over, too often succeeding with other victims by mistake. William Smith is a charming and responsible young man with a lot of talent, and a new girlfriend who teams up with him surprisingly quickly --- but who is he, really? Miss Silver will help him find out.

I really enjoyed this unusual plot line. Great narrator . Looking forward to the next "Miss Silver" mystery.