Coming home from the Canaries

Many thanks for your comments whilst I was away - apologies again for the delaying in publishing them. I'm now back in Britain, and as I look out of the window, there is fog, ice and traces of yesterday's snowfall. All a far cry from life last week, when I was on a cruise around the Canaries and it was about 25 degrees warmer.

Islands fascinate me, but I've never visited the Canaries before, and I can't recall coming across a book set there. There must be one, surely? Or more, given that Tenerife and Lanzarote are such popular destinations? If you know of any mysteries set in the Canaries, please do let me know.

I'd also be interested to know recommendations generally of good mysteries set on islands. My own list would be topped by And Then There Were None. It's a long time since I read The Skull Beneath the Skin by P.D. James, but I did find it less satisfying than her best books. Panic Party by Anthony Berkeley has its merits, and of course Ann Cleeves, with her Shetland Quartet, has captured the fascinating yet sometimes claustrophobic nature of island life very effectively. A very clever and little known book by Eileen Dewhurst, Death in Candie Gardens, has a splendid setting in Guernsey, where Eileen used to stay with the widow of the late thriller writer Desmond Bagley. And Chris Ewan is soon to publish a new book set on the Isle of Man, which I will feature here before long.

Other ports of call included Agadir, in Morocco, a place I found interesting but less so than Marrakech. Of the Canaries, I think my favourite was Lanzarote, with a trip to some fascinating places designed by Cesar Manrique, including the amazing grotto (second picture from the top; others feature Lanzarote, Tenerife, Gran Canaria, the lovely La Palma and Agadir.) But the stand-out destination was one I'll mention in a separate post tomorrow.

Forgotten Book - Panic Party

My choice for today's Forgotten Book is a 1934 title from the pen of Anthony Berkeley. Panic Party, aka Mr Pidgeon's Island, was the last novel to feature Roger Sheringham - one of the great Golden Age amateur sleuths, even though his career lasted less than ten years.

The book begins with Berkeley’s riposte to the challenge Milward Kennedy set him in Death to the Rescuea and which I mentioned last week:

“You once challenged me, in public print, to write a book in which the only interest should be the detection. I have no hesitation in refusing to do anything so tedious, and instead take the greatest pleasure in dedicating to you a book which is precisely the opposite, which breaks every rule of the austere Club to which we both belong, and which will probably earn my expulsion from its membership.”

In fact, the novel does not break all the Club’s rules by a long stretch. Sheringham joins a yachting party organised by Guy Pidgeon, an Oxford don who has come into the money. The group finds itself marooned on a desert island, and Pidgeon announces that their party includes a murderer. His 'murder game' has a predictable outcome – soon he is found dead.

When I first read this book years ago, I felt rather dissatisfied with it. On a second reading, I was more sympathetic. It's an interesting experiment. almost a forerunner of Lord of the Flies. And, as usual with this author, there are some witty passages as well as several darker ones.