GoodReads meta-data is 299 pages rated 3.75 by 1,829 litizens.
Genre: Krimi.
Verdict: Chapeaux!
After a small private late evening reception at Windsor Castle, duties done, Her Majesty the Queen (HMQ) retired for the night only to discover next morning that one of her nocturnal guests has croaked in a castle bedroom … by accident. Bad. (Was the food that bad?) The police arrive and see suicide. Worse. (Was the room so depressing?) The coroner has a look: murder. Worst. (Who dun it?)
Thames Valley plod, the Life Guards, the Security Service, Special Branch, the Met, MI6, and other Secret Squirrels descend on the stately pile tripping over each other in the rush to investigate while decorously not disturbing HMQ, and spend most of their time, as observed by HMQ, disputing the turf. Needless to say, per the McKinsey management manual there is no sharing of information among these game cocks.
HMQ concludes most of these investigators are more interested in claiming the turf with the accompanying prestige and an enlarged budget and promotions to go with it, than with a speedy resolution that would reveal how, why, and who. If justice is to be done, well, the monarch will have to see to it, while these investigators have their pissing contests. One must do what one must do.
There are many etched scenes, as when HMQ summons the Assistant Private Secretary (APS), a woman newly hired, and makes a point of by-passing the long-standing Principal Private Secretary (PPS) who is so correct that he squeaks like a robot when he walks. The APS wonders why she has been selected, and, slowly, she finds out. HMQ says to the APS, ‘I want you to do something for me,’ followed by a long pause. So long is the pause that the APS thinks before she replies, realising that it is ‘for me,’ Elizabeth, and not for the sovereign. This assignment will not go into the duty diary. Indeed, much of the fun and drama in the book lies in what it is not said. That will put off most of the GoodReads crowd.
HMQ proceeds, softly, softly by indirection and implication to find out quite a lot, while the police sort out their turf wars.
There was a big hole in the plot: I could not fathom how the singer had become a trained assassin, and then a victim all in an instant. The resolution was by smoke and mirrors, despite all the foregoing procedural.
I particularly liked the characterisation of the much-maligned Prince Phillip, who in these pages is a thick-skinned, affable, and garrulous man who treats HMQ like a person, not an icon. He is so direct that it is a refreshing change from the ever so subdued approach of any and everyone else. He alone does not cosset her, knowing she is smart, tough, and game.
While I was surprised that there was no demonstration of tying a necktie with a Windsor knot, or at least a school-boy half-Windsor, I pressed on, though I did, and still do, wonder why the knot is called that. Wonders never cease!