Book Review: Magpie Murders

Anthony Horowitz is no stranger to unusual narrative choices, and Magpie Murders is no exception. It's a whodunit-within-a-whodunit that transports the reader to the 1950s English village of Saxby-on-Avon, where the twin deaths of Mary Blakiston and her employer Sir Magnus Pye within a span of two weeks leads German private sleuth Atticus Pünd to dig deep and unravel the mystery in true Agatha Christie style. The only difference? This is all a work of fiction and is part of a series written by famous crime novelist Alan Conway, whose vintage tales of murder have landed him on the bestseller lists. The fictional work captures something of "the golden age" of British whodunits with a country house setting, a complicated murder, a cast of suitably eccentric characters and a detective who arrives as an outsider, but just right before the big reveal, Conway's editor, Susan Ryeland, finds herself in the middle of a mystery of her own: not only are the last few chapters missing from the manuscript, Conway takes his own life, leading her down a rabbit hole that will see the fictional and real worlds collide. The nesting doll structure of wrapping a story in another is a fiendishly clever conceit and allows Horowitz to embellish the plot with red herrings and wicked twists, building the narrative to a thrilling close. Not to be missed!