Shallow Grave, by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

Seventh "Bill Slider" book. A woman's body is discovered in a hole that's being dug in a building site. Turns out it's the builder's wife, who everyone knows has had a string of affairs. It's obviously the husband that did it.. although...

A criticism of this one was that the plot felt a little bit over-structured: the way that the investigation proceeded was driven by the way a new witness would conveniently turn up once a particular avenue of investigation had gone as far as it could. And each witness provided just a little bit more information to advance the story just a little bit more. If the final witness had been found first, the book would have been a lot shorter.

But as always, it wasn't so much the whodunnit that made this readable, and so I didn't particularly mind.

So, another good one: I'm not getting tired of them. Learned at least two new words when reading this: propinquity and costive.

Completed : 22-Apr-2012

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