Moonflower Murders is the second Anthony Horowitz novel to feature Susan Ryland, a book editor for Random House Publishing, based in London.
His first novel was the successful Magpie Murders, where Susan famously solves the case. Book two finds a frustrated Susan living on a Greek island, running a hotel with her boyfriend Andreas. She is visited by the owners of a British hotel where a murder took place in 2008. The case is supposedly closed, and the culprit residing in prison. At least, that’s what everyone thought - until Cecily, one of the owner’s daughters goes missing.
Cecily had read one of Atticus Pund’s novels, edited by Susan, and set in the same hotel where the original murder took place. The late Pund was known for his 1950’s murder mystery books, riddled with clues, anagrams and hypotheses. Cecily claimed to know who had done it, and then she just vanishes. The owners ask Susan to come and help them find their daughter, and in doing so determine what happened in 2008.
What makes the book such a different read, is that you have a mystery within the mystery itself, as Susan (and therefore the reader as well) finds herself rereading Pund’s book to spot the clues he left, and what they mean. A nested book, a whodunnit, within a whodunnit, which results in two intriguing reads in one go. The reader’s mind must work to connect the inner books clues, with the events of 2008, and the current day disappearance, to solve the crime (s).
An excellent read, written by an accomplished author, that is hard to put down, until you have reached the end, and worked it all out, admittedly after some back and forth page turning just to make sure.
Anthony Horowitz, OBE (2014, for Services to Literature) was born in 1955, and is an English novelist and screenwriter specialising in mystery and suspense. He says that he “loves” to write, and always knew what he was going to do when he grew up. To date he has written over 50 books. He has written several series (including the Alex Rider series) for children and young adult readers, and his adult range of books encompasses crime, mystery, and suspense books. His screen work has included Midsomer Murders and Foyles War.
Some of the other books by Horowitz are Magpie Murders, Forever and a Day and Trigger Mortis.
Moonflower Murders is published by Penguin Random House UK – 2020. ISBN: 9781529124347 – Christine E Hann
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