While waiting for my ride in the lobby of the condemned dorm where our department offices currently reside, I checked out the contents of the dean's loaner shelf. It is in the same general vicinity as the freebie table, but the principle is slightly different - "read and return" rather than "you like it - it's yours." I found about twenty books which I had erroneously written off as Reader's Digest Condensed Books. These are twenty-plus year old volumes from the Detective Book Club. Some most respectable names appear on the bindings, such as Ellis Peters (well, duh) and Ralph McInerny (of whom more later, when I finish his book). Of course, I suppose many of the names on the bindings of Reader's Digest Condensed Books are respectable as well ...
Most of my reading of Ellis Peters has been the Brother Cadfael books. I had read a couple of the Inspector Felse books, but never considered them quite as much fun. Can't say this changed my opinion about the fun part, but this was well constructed and she didn't cheat at all with the clues.
Some of my observations of this one are going to call for some orderly rereading. The story opens from the point of view of a young schoolmaster at the local boys public school and runs there for long enough that I was almost surprised when Inspector Felse entered the scene. Did she do that all along?
The "witch" is the daughter of the house where the schoolmaster lodges, and who has a striking effect on a good number of young men - including the schoolmaster. Unfortunately, with the current popularity of the occult, some might pick this up assuming that sense of the word and be greatly disappointed to find that it is used in the sense of a "bewitching" beauty --- no evil and satanic rites on the Hallowmount.
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