In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet up once a week to investigate unsolved murders.
But when a brutal killing takes place on their very doorstep, the Thursday Murder Club find themselves in the middle of their first live case.
Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves.
Can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer before it’s too late?
Genre: Crime, Thriller & Mystery
Number of Pages: 400 pages
Date of Publication: 13/05/2021
Author/Illustrator/Publisher:
The author of this book is Richard Osman and the book has been published by Penguin Books.
Rating: 4.5
Review:
It was such a delight to read this debut novel by Richard Osman, I was expecting a crime story but all the different elements that this book contains has just made it one of my favourite crime novels. The characters were all very well written with personalities that played off each other perfectly and relationships felt extremely deep and real. I’m still thinking about the reasons and motivations of the main characters, who are all retired, to get involved in the events of the book and I really wish I could join their Thursday Murder Mystery club.
The plot is well planned and written and it is full of twists and unexpected situations. For this reason, as well as the engaging and believable characters, I couldn’t put this book down and I just wanted to keep reading it. The story is set in Coopers Chase, an upmarket retirement villa where our main characters Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron and Ibrahim live and where unexpected events happen. The dialogues between the characters were well balanced and many of them were very funny while others were just so heart-warming.
One of my favourite features of this book is that the main characters are older people and the author plays with the advantages of their wisdom and life experiences against the realities of age and frailty in a way which just feels so real.
I am so looking forward to reading ‘The Man Who Died Twice’ which is the next book in the series.
Final Note. I wasn’t aware who Richard Osman was so I read this not realizing it was written by a ‘celebrity’ as I actually got recommended it to me by a bookseller. I know a lot of people expect celebrity authors work to be fairly average and for their fame to be expected carry sales but I really found this book well written.
Availability: The book is available in all good bookshops.
Shelf Life 
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