The Man Who Died Twice: (The Thursday Murder Club 2)

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In this one it was Elizabeth’s turn, as we learn a little more about her past and uncover just how good she probably was at her job and how good she continues to be, despite being retired now.

So too is the new found friendship between Ron’s grandson Kendrick and the ex psychiatrist who needless to say both prove invaluable in the race to discover the missing diamonds. Elizabeth's heartstrings are being pulled by her ex, naïve Joyce is a hoot, Ron lets his heart show as he strongarms his way through whatever needs to be done, and battered and devastated Ibrahim is the best friend a little kid can have. So a large part of the book is devoted to making sure the person who wronged Ibrahim pays for the crime and the other part is devoted to Elizabeth’s former…colleague and his conundrum with twenty million dollars in missing diamonds and various people who might want to kill him because of that. Largely limited third person, it jumps around in all the major players' heads--and I do mean all: Elizabeth, former M15 agent, DCI Chris Hudson; Ibrahim the psychiatrist; Connie Johnson, drug dealer; Martin Lomax, broker; PC Donna; Douglas Middlemiss, M15 agent; Ron, professional gadfly; Bogdan Jankowski, Polish builder and man of many abilities; Patrice, teacher and girlfriend; Stephen, Elizabeth's husband; and probably a few others I'm skipping. I’m spacing them out a little, because I have so many other books to read and because I feel like a lot of series’ get a bit repetitive when you read them too close together.

The plot and pace of this marvellously mad caper is much faster than the first one, there’s more danger and a higher body count. oh, and Joyce trying to figure out Instagram (I dare you not to laugh when you find out her username).

With lots of laughs alongside all the drama, o thoroughly enjoyed my next visit to Coopers Chase and look forward to reading more.It’s cosy, so he lives to fight another day with the Thursday Murder Club but he goes through it and it was kinda heartbreaking! Chris and Donna are carrying out surveillance on local drug and crime queen pin, Connie Johnson, but she is running rings around them, leading to them being helped by more 'experienced' London detectives. I like how underneath all the comic capering Richard Osman isn’t afraid to touch on the type of problems associated with old age such as dementia (Stephen) and how easy it can be to lose one’s confidence following an unexpected turn of events (Ibrahim). When people close to the events and in cost contact with her colleague start turning up dead, Elizabeth enlists the help of her friends Ron, Ibrahim and Joyce to decipher the numerous and rather elaborate clues her colleague has left for her to solve the crimes. Jake Kerridge of The Daily Telegraph wrote that "Osman manages to keep the novel rooted in truth by focusing on his central characters' everyday concerns as well as their hair-raising adventures: Elizabeth's heroic stoicism in the face of her husband's encroaching dementia; Joyce's circular rows with the daughter she'd die for but doesn't much like.

Joyce continued to share her HUMOROUS observations with us in her journal, and I really enjoyed seeing Elizabeth SHINE as she puts her MI5 skills to use to solve this case in real time, with new “partner in crime” Joyce!Richard Osman fulfils the promise of his quintessentially English offbeat and comic crime debut, Thursday Murder Club (TMC), with this cracking sequel. In this one in particular, there's a bit of violence and a number of dead bodies and I just felt like, well, I don't think real people would continue to go along. The pre-booked (no pun intended) franchising of book serials produces too many weak series and/or series that get progressively worse each book, the flipside when a series is written well, it becomes bigger than the sum of its parts, welcome to the Thursday Murder Club mystery series :) Club member, Elizabeth's past comes to her retirement complex as drug dealing, mugging (singular), theft, murders (plural) and more shake up (or is that stimulate) the lives of the four elderly Club members, their local police allies and everyone's favourite builder Bogdan, when her former employers Military Intelligence (and her former husband! Altogether a great read with an interesting mystery, lots of humour, delightful characters and a perfect ending.

It was fun to reunite with the members of “The Thursday Murder Club” from book one of the series, (as well as many of the other supporting characters) and I strongly recommend that you get acquainted with them by reading or listening to the first in the series-to better appreciate the growth of the relationships in this installment. This one is not quite as cozy as the first, with some new baddies, a mafia angle, stolen diamonds, cryptic messages, a lady drug dealer, spies and a perplexing double murder! This has the same charm and appeal of the first one and I feel like with each book, we’re going to peel back another layer for some of these characters.Though it took its time getting started, leisurely leading us to the murderous moment, once we get there it's off to the races.