My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Magpie Murders is one of favorite books and it was with that expectation that I started The Word is Murder. I wouldn’t say I’m disappointed but kind of OH-HUM! Maybe my expectation was bit too much.
The Word is Murder by Anthony Horowitz is a story where the author himself plays a character. He’s approached by an ex-detective Daniel Hawthorne to write a true-life crime that has boggled the minds of the police officers. By a bizarre coincidence, a woman plans her funeral and is strangled to death hours later. There are not many suspects and Hawthorne is called to make sense of the murder.
The mystery is intriguing and the words flow easily to keep the reader captivated but we don’t get much sense of the main character. Like the author himself trying to convince Hawthorne that a detective book requires more of the detective’s life story, there’s only bare details provided that doesn’t give much sense of the man he is. And since the author is as himself in the book there are times when there’s an overload of his thought process that becomes tad boring after a while.
On the whole, I wouldn’t mind continuing the series for it’s complex mysteries and the easy storytelling.



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SHE PLANNED HER OWN FUNERAL. BUT DID SHE ARRANGE HER MURDER?
Buried secrets, murder and a trail of bloody clues lie at the heart of Anthony Horowitz’s new detective series.

A wealthy woman strangled six hours after she’s arranged her own funeral.
A very private detective uncovering secrets but hiding his own.
A reluctant author drawn into a story he can’t control.
What do they have in common?