Death in Holy Orders: An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery: 11

Product Information

This is relevant to the present situation in that it shows that Dalgliesh has a prodigious memory, that he is a keen observer with a penchant for details, and that he has a sensibility that facilitates his development of relationships, perhaps even with potential suspects. James’s detective is not at all the two-dimensional sleuth of most mysteries, a caricature composed of a bundle of idiosyncrasies. He is a self-effacing professional, secure about his position and happy to have aides make crucial, enlightening discoveries. When asked if he is happy, widower Dalgliesh replies: “I have health, a job I enjoy; enough food, comfort, occasional luxuries if I feel the need of them, my poetry. Given the state of three-quarters of the world’s poor, wouldn’t you say that unhappiness would be a perverse indulgence?” I can’t help but think of Matthew Arnold’s Dover Beach. In that poem the sea of faith is a withdrawing roar revealing the shingles of the world, a metaphor for loss of faith in the modern world. Here the sea is the world eroding the foundations on which St Anselm’s sits, with it’s demise, and thus that of “clever faith”, inevitable. In this story, Dalgliesh is asked to go to a seminary near Norfolk to look into a previously closed death. A young ordinand had been found dead at the base of a cliff. The death is deemed to be death by accident. The young man's father wants Scotland Yard to investigate. Since Dalgliesh is about to go to the area on vacation so he agrees to look into the case. It also turns out that as a child, his father being a parson, that Dalgliesh spent time at St Anselms and it becomes somewhat a visit into his past.

Well thank you for coming to see me, Father. I always appreciate your visits. But, sadly, sex is the last the thing on my mind right now." To tell the truth just having Adam Dalgleish as the main character makes it a good read for me. I love the fact that he is intelligent, calm, organised, kind and that he thinks before he acts. He is the English version of Armand Gamache. You can always tell the characters you can trust in the story because they are the ones who like him the most.

Media Reviews

Despite that, everyone except the 'baddie' who is murdered loves him, including Dalgleish himself and his new love interest so James makes it very clear that we as readers are supposed to side with them: as one character says 'He pleaded guilty to misbehaviour with two young boys. He didn't rape them, he didn't seduce them, he didn't physically hurt them' - so in James' world and that of the book, a bit of covert fondling and illegal touching of young boys is perfectly fine - he might not have 'physically' hurt them, but any psychological trauma from being assaulted by their priest is airily waved away. My only two criticisms are a subplot that made me rather queasy, and the actress who played Inspector Kate Miskin (very, very smugly). If an officer walked around looking at criminals that way in real life, he or she wouldn't make it to Inspector. I don't want to give any of the plot away. The drama is set in the East Anglian coast at a Theological College, where men train to become priest. Adam Dalgish is called to investigate, after the death of one of the students and after the boy's wealthy Father insist on knowing what happened to his son. No sooner Adam Dalgish arrives, there are more murders.

However I had two major issues with the book. Firstly there is a indefensible defence of a paedophile whose life has been ruined by the vendetta a certain character had against him, with the intention of getting him convicted - which apparently involved finding dubious characters willing to perjure themselves in court and lie that he had seriously assaulted them. However, the fact that he had in reality "only" fondled choirboys is presented as relatively minor and something that should not have counted against him.

Reader Reviews

Janet Maslin writes about "the will of Clara Arbuthnot, who left the building to the church", when in fact Clara is a more recent Arbuthnot -- the lesbian who dumped her illegitimate son on the doorstep of St. Anselm's as an infant; it was Agnes Arbuthnot who founded the college and penned the confounding will. Dalgliesh, James’s master detective who rises from chief inspector in the first novel to chief superintendent and then to commander, is a serious, introspective person, moralistic yet realistic. The novels in which he appears are peopled by fully rounded characters, who are civilized, genteel, and motivated. The public resonance created by James’s singular characterization and deployment of classic mystery devices led to most of the novels featuring Dalgliesh being filmed for television. James, who earned the sobriquet “Queen of Crime,” penned 14 Dalgliesh novels, with the last, The Private Patient, appearing in 2008. The setting is St. Anselm's, an elite theological college at an isolated location on the coast of Suffolk. In this novel, Dalgliesh meets and begins a relationship with Dr Emma Lavenham, a visiting teacher from the University of Cambridge.