An Inspector Lynley Mystery, by Elizabeth George

I don't normally read genre fiction. I haven't admitted this before, for fear of being thought a snob.  At last, however, I must come out. I am a raging literary snob.  I don't read crime fiction, science fiction, detective fiction or Chick Lit.    I am not even sure whether there is generally seen to be a distinction between crime fiction and detective fiction.  I hazard the theory that in crime fiction, the vile deeds are the central focus of the story, whereas in detective fiction it is the character and relationships of the key detective which are the main theme, and the crime is just a scenic backdrop against which these relationships are played out.

Terrible things are going on at my office in Cambridge.  The Board have literally cut the staff salary budget in half at a stroke, without any consultation, and the staff are still waiting to be told exactly where the axe will fall.  My daily trip to the Charity Shop at the end of the road has become an even more essential lunchtime therapy than before.  I HAVE to buy something each day.  It assuages my pain.  Previously I have only bought books, but in these difficult times I have started hoovering up bric-a -brac as well.  It provides a brief moment of anodyne pleasure, compounded by the knowledge that it is all in a good cause. I've bought three brooches, a calculator, a plant pot holder, a cream jug and matching sugar bowl.  I have had to physically restrain myself from buying a mantel clock and some faux pearls.

In this new spirit of abandon, I moved away from my ususal choices -the classics and Booker prizewinners - in the endless cornucopia of the book section, and ventured on a prize-winning detective author, Elizabeth George.  Apparently, many of her Inspector Lynley stories have been made into television series.  I wouldn't know, as I am a terrible TV snob as well, restricting my viewing to those well-known classics "Downton Abbey" and "The X-Factor".

The book was good train reading, being 550 pages long and easy to pick up and put down.  I don't think I'll read another, though, even if things go from bad to worse at the office.  The overall effect can be compared with eating a large, cheap meringue.  It's nutty, crunchy, and full of things to chew on.  At the end however, it all just crumbles away to nothing, and I was left with a dry, dusty taste in my mouth.

The characters were many and varied, albeit given the most ridiculous names.  This author is American and set "Careless In Scarlet" in Cornwall.  She gives her local, working-class Cornish characters names like "Cadan", "Madlyn", "Kerra", "Benesek", "Dellan" and "Santo". 

The characters all have something major wrong with them, and a theme running through the book is that of parents finding it difficult to connect with their adolescent offspring.  This is so common that it almost seems like a cliche by the end of the book.  The murderer is never caught, at the end, which left me unsatisfied.

So, back to my preferred area, books that almost no-one else has heard of.  My next book, dinner-table reading as it is an old hardback, and therefore not to be taken on a train, is a memoir by Barbara Wootton, called "In A World I Never Made".

"Started Early, Took My Dog" by Kate Atkinson

Nearly all the books I buy are second hand (or much older than that). I get them from charity shops or from Amazon, both utterly inexhaustible treasure-chests of delight.

Occasionally, though, I can't wait for the latest best-seller to turn up in the Salvation Army shop. 

Last week I bought the latest novel by Kate Atkinson, whose first book, "Behind the Scenes at the Museum" was set in York, my alma mater.  That was prize-winning literary fiction, a one-off and hard to repeat, and in fact the author has never been able to repeat that strange, deep and eccentric genius, so this talented writer has more recently turned to detective fiction.

I bought this book from Sainsbury's on a "two-for £7.00" offer, and I paid for it with my Nectar vouchers so effectively it was free.  I don't know why I feel compelled to share that information.

Just like the last four books of hers that I've read, I found this a completely compulsive page-turner. I read it in a little over 6  hours.  I can be specific, because I read it on three return journeys by train, plus a few pages at the end finishing off at home.

Just like all her other books except the first, which was really quite mystical, this one left me feeling like you do after you've compulsively gobbled your way through a box of medium-quality chocolates.  Stuffed, slightly depressed, and somewhat sick.  Cheap chocs you don't finish, very expensive ones you can take in small doses and they don't leave you feeling any the worse.  This is the range in between. 

You feel sick because there are so many murders in the book, and so many really quite ridiculous co-incidences.  Why keep on reading?  Because of the story, you really want to find out what happens next.  And because of  the throw-away lines about modern Britain throughout the book, which keep you engaged, keep you waiting for the next one.  This is really what it's like in UK in 2010, you think, I so recognize that.

Almost all KA's books have the murder of a child at the heart of the story.  You would like to think that's unrealistic, but oh, no, it is all too easy to see echoes of so many real-life child victims ..  dead children and lost - little Madeleine McCann and Shannon Matthews as well.

Quite a few deaths in this story, oh, no, not too far-fetched at all. I heard a real-life story from the factory manager at work today which matched one of the characters almost exactly - a man strangled his awkward ex-lover.  In the real life case, the children had already lost their father to cancer, so they are now orphans.  Just like the book.

KA leaves a marker for her next book at the end, as a third lost child is never explained, and we will have to wait to find out her story.  I will no doubt buy this one new as well.  Some books are worth it.