Tea on Sunday by Lettice Cooper

With a book entitled Tea on Sunday, what can you do but post your review on a Sunday, featuring photos of your own little tea party? Thankfully, ours was murder-free!

I had a great time reading Lettice Cooper’s Tea on Sunday. The book was not doing anything ground breaking. As it was originally published in 1973, Lettice Cooper did not push the limits for the murder mystery genre at the time. If anything, this book felt a bit dated. Even after I had checked to see when it was originally published I had to go back periodically to remind myself that the book I was currently reading was in fact that British Library Crime Classic that had been originally published in the 1970s. But, you know what? Not every book has to be doing something new and different. Sometimes new and different can be a bad thing, like when it is not doing it well, or when it is just being new and different for the sake of it. And Lettice Cooper does old and reliable very well indeed. This homage to vintage crime might not be the fabulous bit of writing one would expect from a Persephone Books author (not that I’ve read any of her other books), but it is a very satisfactory way to spend an afternoon. 

The story opens with a prologue, which begins…

There were eight cups on the tray. Alberta Mansbridge added the ninth, her own, the dark blue and gold Rockingham cup that her father had used till the day of his death. “As I hope to do till mine,” Alberta had said to Mrs Bramley on her first morning there. “So I shall always wash it up myself, then it will be no one else’s fault if it gets broken.” (17)

Well, we know what’s going to happen, don’t we? Before the guests arrive, Alberta Mansbridge will be murdered. As she would have needed to let the person in, and as she is nervous of being alone for the afternoon—which is in part why she always has people over for tea on Sunday when her tenants are out—she must have known her killer. It is quickly decided by the police that the killer must have been someone invited to the afternoon gathering. They must have arrived early, killed Alberta, left, and then returned later to huddle on the stoop with the others, waiting to be let inside. But of course, they wait in vain, because Alberta lies dead inside.

Set on a snowy February afternoon in London, this would be a great one to read in winter. Although I read this book just a week ago, we were experiencing a snowstorm at the time, so the setting couldn’t have been more perfect. Because I always enjoy when books have descriptions of nature, especially when it is of snow, I must share this passage. Alberta is gazing out the window, waiting for her guests to arrive.

She walked across to the window and looked out at the Square. The usually pleasant water-colour prospect was, on this February afternoon, either white or drab. The sky was drab, the pale stucco houses looked drab; the snow that had begun to fall at midday had already melted to a drab-coloured slush on the pavements and in the street, but in the Square garden the lawn was still iced with it; the bushes were rounded white beehives; every branch of a tree delicately supported three times its own thickness in half-frozen snow. (18)

Without having read the blurb on the back of the book, I had expected this one to be mostly set in Yorkshire, because the stunning cover is an old travel poster for the Yorkshire coast. The inspector in charge of the investigation, Inspector Corby, does travel to Yorkshire to get some answers into Alberta’s past and about the family business interests that have Alberta travelling back to her home town of Hithamroyd on a semi-regular basis. But Corby takes the overnight train and the trip does not take up much of the book, only 38 pages of the book’s 269. I only mention this because I had an expectation about this book that was not fulfilled, and at the time, I was a bit disappointed. My mum was born in Yorkshire and as I have not yet been, I always take a particular delight in reading about the place she grew up. If I had known at the outset I would be reading a mystery set in London, I wouldn’t have minded a bit. But as I said, I didn't read the back cover. I almost never do. If I had, I would not have had the expectation of a Yorkshire setting. The blurb mentions London twice and only refers to Alberta's "Yorkshire roots". That'll teach me for judging a book by its cover! Now, I’ll stop dwelling on what this book is not, and get back to what it is. 

Perhaps, the most interesting aspect of the story are the characters. Alberta’s eight guests are a motley crew, including her accountant, an ex-convict she was helping, her family doctor, the manager of her father’s company, an Italian playboy she was also helping, and who appeared to be moving in—both figuratively and literally—in hopes of helping himself to her money, her once good friend Myra with whom Alberta had recently had a falling out over that same Italian man, and her nephew and his awful, but very entertaining, wife. 

But I have to say that my favourite character in the book is Inspector Corby, who travels to Yorkshire himself, though his boss is always encouraging him to get the juniors to do the legwork. He suspects it is his tendency not to strictly follow the rules that landed him with Sergeant Newstead when his partner of five years went off to head a North London Station of the C.I.D.

To start on a case with Bob had been like slipping into gear. Newstead, Corby had already found out, was an efficient detective; thorough, accurate in his observation and painstaking. But costive; he seemed to have swallowed the book of words whole and got a permanent stiff neck from it; so far no fun in him. Oh well, it was early days yet. (37)

We know from the start that we are in for some fun with Corby, though! Newstead’s serious nature sets off Corby nicely, and he does prove to be a reliable partner.

While this was not my absolute favourite Crime Classic—that would has to be Christianna Brand's London Particular, which I recently reviewed—I did read this book remarkably fast, in just a couple of sittings. This one is slow-paced but so well-written that I sped straight through it, right to the climactic finish.

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of Tea on Sunday for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

This blog post contains affiliate links for Blackwell’s. As a Blackwell’s Affiliate, I may receive a small commission, at no additional cost to you, if you decide to make a purchase through one of the links on my website. I recommend Blackwell’s because I use them myself. This helps support me in sharing—what I hope is—valuable content. Thank you for your support!

London Particular by Christianna Brand

London Particular by Christianna Brand may just be my new favourite book among the British Library Crime Classics. While, as Martin Edwards suggests in his introduction, it is up for debate whether Brand strictly follows the rules of a ‘fair play’ puzzle in this book, this was the author’s own favourite among her books for good reason. I do think the murder is solvable for the reader, but it would take someone who is exceptional at discarding the superfluous. And apparently, I do not fit into this category. But I’m fine with that, because this one kept me guessing right to the last sentence.

Dr. Edwin Robert Edwards, lovingly referred to as Tedward, and Rosie Evans, the younger sister of his colleague, are out on a typically foggy November night in London, trying to find their way to a dying man. After receiving a strange phone call from Rosie’s house by Raoul Vernet, a dinner guest visiting from Switzerland, urging the doctor to come quick, he has been hit by a mastoid mallet. They arrive to find Raoul Vernet is dead.

Rosie enlists the help of family friend, Inspector Cockrill, to aid the police in their investigations, because as dear Cockie is soon to find out, there are only seven suspects and all belong to the Evans family or are close friends of theirs.

There are so many things about this book that I enjoyed. Let’s talk about the setting first. As suggested by its title, this novel begins on a night ravaged by the soot laden fog that was typical of London in the 1950s. In December of 1952, the same year this book was published, London experienced severe air pollution from the combination of cold weather, an anticyclone (high pressure air close to a land mass with lower pressure air surrounding), and windless conditions which trapped airborne pollutants, creating a deadly smog, which killed as many as 4,000 people and made thousands more sick. Coal was mainly to blame for the great quantity of pollutants in the air and the Clean Air Act of 1956 came about in direct response to the event that came to be known as the Great Smog of 1952. All of this is to say that the fog described in this book would have been thick yellow, green, or black fog often referred to as a ‘pea-souper’.

It may be hard for today’s readers to imagine how dense London fog would have been during this time period. The title London Particular, is a reference to chapter three in Charles Dickens’ Bleak House. A character says, “This is a London particular” in response to a new-comer to London asking if there was a fire, because “the streets were so full of dense brown smoke that scarcely anything was to be seen”. By referencing a novel published one hundred years earlier, Brand suggests that this is the same dense, pollution-filled, fog that Londoners had been suffering since Dickens’ time, and no doubt even earlier than that. (Here's my short and sweet review of Bleak House.)

Earlier this month I read another book set during the 1950s, Patti Callahan Henry’s The Story She Left Behind. In it the Great Smog of 1952 is well-described from the perspective of an American tourist who is not accustomed to a London particular and is unaware that the London air is not always so toxic. This novel is not entirely set in London, the characters quickly flee to the Lake District for their health, but if you enjoy historical fiction I cannot recommend this one enough. The brief description of London’s landmarks veiled in thick fog were of particular interest to me, as I have not read anything else set during this historical event. (You can find my review of that book on Instagram and Goodreads, if you are interested.)

But back to London Particular… Brand describes the family dynamics with vigour and humour, breathing such life into the house that it seems a shame to sully it with the ugliness of a murder.

Tedward strolled out after her, laughing. ‘Never mind, Til! You cope with the old girl, I'll see myself out.’ Gabriel followed him, barking gaily, under the chronic delusion that anyone in an overcoat was necessarily about to take him walkie-palkies, and Annaran, the Siamese cat, who was very sillily called after the film Annaran the King of Siam, poised ready to dart out to certain death under the traffic wheels of Maida Vale. ‘Gabriel! Annaran!’ shouted Matilda in despair above the din. The telephone rang, Emma reached boiling-point, Rosie screamed out from her attic that if that was Damien on the phone she would come down and speak to him, and out of a first-floor window flew a long-sleeved woollen nightie. A strong smell of burning pastry arose from the basement. ‘My God, what a house!’ said Tilda. From the hall came a last shrill yelp of disappointment as Tedward shut the door in Gabriel’s face; followed by a squall as it closed upon Annaran’s shining tail. The fall of the nightgown had been followed by a heavy silence in Mrs Evans’ room. Today of all days! — Granny was always at her most impossible, after Worse than Death. (45-46)

I had to include that hilarious glimpse into the Evans’ household at its most chaotic. It actually made me laugh out loud while reading, which is something I rarely do.

The other thing I really enjoy about this book is Brand’s writing. The plot is so finely tuned that she continues to play with reader expectation throughout. She even teases the reader by foreshadowing events to come. 

In the long, white firelit drawing-room the victim bowed and smiled and reeled off his devoirs before the serious work of the evening should begin; within the radius of one fog-bound mile, were these seven people, one of whom was very shortly going to murder him. (56)

Again, she teases what is to come when early on in the investigation, Cockie is questioning some suspects for the first time.

A little fish of doubt swam into Cockie's consciousness and hung about there for a moment waggling its fins at him; but he was more interested in Thomas than in Melissa Weeks and so he passed on and never knew how much trouble and tragedy might have been saved if he had noticed it. (77)

Although, I usually find this type of blatant foreshadowing is too heavy-handed for my liking, I think Brand makes the technique work because it is both carefully placed, and used sparingly.

Despite Brand’s skill at creating finely-tuned plots full of twists, this does not feel like a plot-driven novel. Everything that happens in this book is driven by believable decisions made by the characters. Even with a number of characters confessing to the crime, it does not feel like some sort of ploy to confuse the reader. It does of course add confusion, but each of the confessions are believable in the moment because there is some truth behind each confession, and because all of the suspects are so closely linked, there is always someone who is trying to protect someone else. 

Speaking of characters, Cockie appears in six other novels by Brand, five of which have been republished by the British Library, including Green for Danger, Suddenly at His Residence, Death of Jezebel, and Tour de Force. London Particular is the fifth book in the series and Tour de Force, which I read before reading this one, is the sixth. (Here's a link to my review of Tour de Force.) Although, an earlier case is mentioned in this one in which Inspector Cockrill crosses paths with Inspector Charlesworth, the police inspector who is officially working on the case in this book, there are no spoilers for that novel. I had no problem enjoying the books in this series out of order.

While there are some aspects of this novel that date it, there are other aspects that make it feel ahead of its time. We find out early on that Rosie is pregnant and is very open about seeking an abortion. Abortion was not legalised in England until 1967. I’m willing to bet that Rosie referring to her unwanted pregnancy as “a most frightful muddle” and seeking an abortion from the family doctor, while continuing to unashamedly give in to her passion for men, must have shocked some readers when this book was first published. Perhaps all the more so because Rosie is a delightful and charming character, who is living her life unapologetically, and is more intelligent than she makes herself out to be. After all, it was her idea to ask Cockie to investigate, and you cannot help but like and approve of Cockie. 

I cannot recommend this one enough! It has an atmospheric setting, twist, after twist, likeable characters—all of which you will be rooting for, even though one of them has to be the murderer—and some really solid writing. Oh, and no clunky explanation at the end. Thank heavens!

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of London Particular for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

This blog post contains affiliate links for Blackwell’s. As a Blackwell’s Affiliate, I may receive a small commission, at no additional cost to you, if you decide to make a purchase through one of the links on my website. I recommend Blackwell’s because I use them myself. This helps support me in sharing—what I hope is—valuable content. Thank you for your support!

Murder as a Fine Art by Carol Carnac

After reading Murder in Vienna, written under Edith Caroline Rivett’s pen name, E.C.R. Lorac, I approached Murder as a Fine Art with eager anticipation. But I have spent much of my reading time lately feeling tired, which may explain why this one published under her lesser known pen name, Carol Carnac, at first, failed to grab me. However, I prevailed, got some sleep, and by the midway point I was really enjoying this classic mystery set in March.

After the first and second Minister of Fine Arts died shortly after taking up the position, Humphry David is the third in line. It is his job to get things in order, despite the fact that he thinks the whole idea of a Ministry of Fine Arts is rubbish. In fact, when the idea for the Ministry had been broached, David had voted against it. 

Regardless of personal opinion, he must do the job he has been given. When David spots some irregularities in the Ministry’s correspondence, which lead him to suspect there may be some forgeries in their collection, he invites Henry Fearon, one of the experts from Scotland Yard who specialise in forgeries, to investigate. But before Fearon can get to work, Scotland Yard is called in on a more pressing matter. A civil servant has been found crushed beneath a marble bust. The bust of the last Earl of Manderby is generally hated by the staff. The civil servant was not exactly a favourite either.

On one topic, the Minister and the dead man, Pompfret, were of similar mind and that is regarding that marble bust.

“The thing is too utterly revolting. It offends one's sense of values, and the sheer virtuosity of the treatment renders it the more deplorable. It should not be here at all. It labels us as Philistines.”

“It’s a work of art,” said David unhappily. “One mustn’t let personal prejudice intervene..."

“I’ve often wondered if it would topple off with a little encouragement,” said Pompfret. “It’d be a wonderful sight to see it bounce down the stairs. It must weigh several tons.” (33)

Even the detectives, Detective Inspector Lancing and Chief Detective Inspector Julian Rivers, have a low opinion of the marble bust sculpted by Canova. Although, of course, they are critiquing it as it lays in pieces amongst a crime scene.

Together they lay at the foot of the noblest state staircase in London: both with broken necks. Earl Manderby’s neck had severed below the chin; detached from its monumental shoulders, among chips and blocks of laurel leaves, stylised curls and fragments of outsize features, the marble head lay grotesquely close to Pompfret's, while Pompfret's blood clotted on the black and white blocks of the pavement. (46)

One of the things I would not have expected from a mystery set in a Ministry of Fine Arts is that most of the people who work at the Ministry have a specialised appreciation for art and almost no appreciation for that which falls outside of their specialty. For example, David who is known for being a “passionate addict of the arts”—which is what lead him to being given the job as Minister—has a passion for Holbein drawings and Dürer engravings. Having never studied contemporary art, he admits to feeling a “clinic distaste” for it (18). I got a kick out of all of the jabs at contemporary art and Canova’s sculptures. One gets a sense that Carnac had a great time trashing certain styles of art and artists in the writing of this book.

As I mentioned earlier, David is not the first Minister to be appointed. The two men who held the position before him left their own legacy, shall we say. The first, Joyce-Lawrence, had been given a strict budget in which to stick to, and so he filled the collection with representative pieces of the various schools and periods, and concerned himself less with the actual artists included in the collection. In his office he chose contemporary pieces, referred to by the typists as “the Minister’s “funnies” (18). When Fearon asks about them, David explains,

“You see, Joyce-Lawrence had a sense of humour. These pictures aren’t signed. He didn’t have the name of the painter attached to any of them, and his private list has been lost—if it ever existed. It is my own opinion that they’re all anonymous, for the best of reasons.” (20)

The second Minister was no better. He was not interested in art at all, but he worked wonders in the Ministry’s finances, cutting overspending left over from his predecessor by firing all of the experts. The result is that the Ministry is left with a collection that no one knows much about. The staff who work directly with the art collection might know a painting well enough by sight, but it seems unlikely that most would be able to tell the real thing from a counterfeit. A bit of a problem when pieces in the collection are regularly out on loan to galleries across the country. 

And now, here is the current Minister, David, trying to make sense of the Ministry he has been assigned. He is such a kind and helpful person, that I did not think too much of him—except to suspect him, of course, because he seemed a great deal too good. When I was trying to figure out why the first half of this book dragged a bit, I noticed that just about every scene that David was in my interest started to wane. He is so much of a do-gooder that I found him a bit boring. Although, if he was a person—not just a character in a book—he would be the type to have many friends, and not a bad word could be said about him. 

The second half of this book picks up and feels a lot like a country house mystery to me. The Ministry of Fine Arts may be situated in London, but we don’t see much of the city besides a few scenes near the end where the detectives are rushing around asking questions and chasing leads. Lancing and Rivers spend a lot of time searching Medici House, the building that holds the Ministry, for clues, and ways a person could sneak in or out of the building. And of course, just about everyone who works at the Ministry is a suspect, minus the dear typists, of course.

If you like country house mysteries, I think you would enjoy this one. But don’t expect tea served by a loyal retainer in the drawing room. Refreshment can be found in the canteen with the rest of the house staff, minus the night watchmen, Titmarsh and Smith, who prefer to keep their own company in the bowels of the building.

Overall, I really enjoyed this one. I was impressed with the solution to Pompfret’s death, and while I did not come close to figuring it out, the clues were there in the text, so that one could solve the crime themselves, in theory. Carnac’s skill with description gave me a clear picture of Medici House, but also the crime scene, which I sometimes find writers either gloss over, so as not to make things too gruesome, or go too far with it. Carnac provides a good balance, I think. 

I won't say the tense conclusion made up for the slow beginning, but it did make me want to return to this one again sometime. I would like to see if it was just the mood I was in while reading, or if the first half really did drag. Next time, perhaps, I will have more patience with the ever kind and helpful David. If you have read this one, I would love to hear your thoughts on the pacing and anything else you care to discuss about it!

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of Murder as a Fine Art for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

This blog post contains affiliate links for Blackwell’s. As a Blackwell’s Affiliate, I may receive a small commission, at no additional cost to you, if you decide to make a purchase through one of the links on my website. I recommend Blackwell’s because I use them myself. This helps support me in sharing—what I hope is—valuable content. Thank you for your support!

The Ten Teacups by Carter Dickson

THERE WILL BE TEN TEACUPS AT NUMBER 4, BERWICK TERRACE, W. 8, ON WEDNESDAY, JULY 31ST, AT 5 P.M. PRECISELY. THE PRESENCE OF THE METROPOLITAN POLICE IS RESPECTFULLY REQUESTED.

So begins the captivating 1937 locked-room mystery, The Ten Teacups by Carter Dickson, a pen name of John Dickson Carr, and the latest book in the British Library Crime Classics collection.

It would appear to be a fairly innocuous note that arrives on Chief Inspector Humphrey Masters’ desk with the first post on the stifling Wednesday in question. That is, if it was not for the fact that after receiving an almost identical note in April two years ago, a body with two bullet holes was discovered at the address provided. A murder that has yet to be solved. Cue Sir Henry Merrivale, or H.M., as he is almost exclusively referred. 

The police surround 4, Berwick Terrace. Detective Sergeant Pollard, is situated across the hall from a newly furnished room in an otherwise empty and uninhabited house. At the centre of the room is a table and resting on a rare antique peacock patterned shawl lay ten teacups evenly spaced like the face of a clock. Not a soul could get in or out without being seen. So when Vance Keating enters the house he is most certainly alone in the room when the clock strikes 5 p.m.

Four-fifteen. Four-thirty. Pollard felt his scalp crawl and his wits thicken under the pressure of heat. Still no sound issued from the room, nor was there a sign of any other visitor, while the watcher stood neck-cramped with his eyes on the door. The hand of his wrist-watch crept upwards: a quarter to five. And now good theories began to dissolve when he remembered Masters’s words: “I don’t know whether you can run a secret society without any fuss, but I’m smacking well certain you can’t run one without any members.” He was right. Vance Keating sat alone in the shrine, guarded if ever a man was guarded with police at both the back and the front. Five minutes to five. (43-44)

Like the incident two years before, there is a certain inevitability to what occurs. A man is dead and now the police, with the help of H.M.—who appears to doze off at the most unfortunate times—need to figure out how. None of the clues seem to bring them any closer to a conclusion and none appear to be linked with each other. The similarities are the ten teacups on a table, an antique with a peacock print, a newly furnished room in an otherwise empty and uninhabited house, and a person who has been killed in a way that could not possibly be self-inflicted. Oh, and that both houses were previously owned by Mr. and Mrs. Derwent. There is a sense of ceremony to both scenes, which helps spark the idea a secret society is involved in the murders.

I loved the premise of this book. The beginning had me hooked and did not want to put it down. When I was called away, I kept thinking about it, spinning scenarios in my head of where the plot might go. I fear my dog and husband did not get my full attention for a couple of days!

I never felt like I learned anything about H.M. Perhaps, the reader is not meant to. He is certainly not the focus of this book in the way that some detectives are the central character and the murder is just a way of showing off the detective’s intelligence and little quirks. But there is an absence in the place of H.M. I almost forgot he was in some scenes. It is as though he sits back and takes things in, following the trail to the truth, while not sharing any of his process with us. He often scolds Masters for blundering ahead and showing all of his cards to the suspects. Again, perhaps this absence of a figure is purposeful. After all, he is referred to as H.M. almost exclusively, not a name, just a stand-in for one. Somewhere in the first chapter or two, I had to check the back to make sure I was not getting confused between Humphrey Masters and Sir Henry Merrivale as the two share the same initials. Are they meant to be the ying and yang of each other, together creating law and order? I will be interested to read some of Carter Dickson’s other books featuring H.M. to see if I can glean anything more about him in those.

My only real quibble with this one was the ending. It felt like it dragged on for much too long. The conclusion was complicated, required a lot of explaining, and some aspects crossed over into the unbelievable. And when I say complicated I mean bordering on convoluted—there are footnotes, for goodness sake! Although, I would be lying if I didn’t admit I did sort of love the novelty of the footnotes. I do see why the author chose to spin out the ending, as many mysteries of this sort tend to, but it is not a format that I like. To me this one felt a bit too much like Poirot gathering everyone together in the library to show off how cleaver he is. The only difference is that H.M. managed to do this without a gigantic monologue. For which, I am truly grateful. 

I lied. I actually have another grievance to air. The representation of women in this novel is narrow at best, and sexist at worst. The two woman in this book, whether portrayed as either the whore or the virgin, both have a performativity to them. This is an idea I formed as I was reading the last quarter. But I would like to reread this one and take note of whether there is strong evidence of this in the text, or if it is just an impression I was left with. Off hand, I can think of two such occurrences. One is when Mrs. Derwent, feigns she has been assaulted by Masters, creating a public disturbance.

“The point is,” growled Masters, “that all the time the commotion was going on, either out of devilment or to give her time to think what she was going to say, that woman was lying back pretending to cry, and laughing at me through her fingers.” (117)

One of the problems here is that we never do get Mrs. Derwent’s side of the story. We are expected to take Masters’ version of events as truth without question because he is a police officer.

There also seems to be something performative about the victim’s fiancée, Frances Gale, stamping her foot like a child when she doesn’t get her way with the police. But I cannot for the life of me find the place in the text where this occurs, so I may be forcing an interpretation without textual evidence. Something to look out for on a reread, for sure.

Of course, the books republished in this collection are bound to be a product of their time. There is a disclaimer at the beginning of each of them, making it clear that the British Library are in no way endorsing any of the problematic views portrayed in these books by republishing them. 

With this series British Library Publishing aims to offer a new readership a chance to read some of the rare books of the British Library's collections in an affordable paperback format, to enjoy their merits and to look back into the world of the twentieth century as portrayed by its writers.

These books are a snapshot of a time when the publishing industry was not questioning how underrepresented groups were being stereotyped and generally cast in a negative light. One cannot be sure that the author was knowingly portraying women in this light. It seems likely that the author too would be a product of his time, as are we all, for that matter.

There are other aspects of this book, specifically the conclusion, that I would love to go into, but the majority read mysteries for the plot and I would hate to spoil the experience for anyone, and as this is a book review, not an academic essay, I will refrain. However, I might have to do a full on spoiler-y discussion of this at some future date. If you have read this one, please get in touch. I would love to chat about it, but let’s keep the comments below spoiler free. Reach out via the contact form on this site, (which you can find at the top right of this page), or email me at carosbookcase@gmail.com.

The final verdict? Despite its convoluted ending, I would reread this one, not just to analyse the text, but because I enjoyed the first three quarters of this book so much. The premise ignited my imagination in a way that I have not experienced from a book in a long time. I recommend giving this locked-room mystery a try. Enjoy figuring out how, why, and whodunnit, and revel in the novelty (or do I mean oddity?) of those footnotes.

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of The Ten Teacups for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

Coming up next will be a review of Murder as a Fine Art by Carol Carnac a.k.a. E.C.R. Lorac, pictured below, along with a couple more titles in this collection that I was lucky enough to receive from the publisher. After enjoying her book Murder in Vienna, I am especially excited to read more of her work. If you are interested, you can find my review of that one here.

This blog post contains affiliate links for Blackwell’s. As a Blackwell’s Affiliate, I may receive a small commission, at no additional cost to you, if you decide to make a purchase through one of the links on my website. I recommend Blackwell’s because I use them myself. This helps support me in sharing—what I hope is—valuable content. Thank you for your support!

Luckier Than Most: An Autobiography by David Tomlinson

I have to admit that when I saw Dean Street Press were republishing David Tomlinson’s autobiography, Luckier Than Most, I didn’t immediately place the actor. Once I learned David Tomlinson played the father, Mr. Banks, in the 1964 film of Mary Poppins, my interest was peaked. But when I realised he was also in The Love Bug (1969) and Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971), two of my other favourite films from when I was a little girl, I knew had to pick this one up. Am I ever happy I did! 

While I don’t think I’ve ever written a review for an autobiography, I do love them. I especially enjoy reading about the lives of my favourite writers. I’ve read more than my fair share of biographies about Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf, but I will always want to read another one. Next in line for favourite lives to read about has to be dancers and actors. As someone who has spent more than half their life in and around the theatre, I find a certain comfort in reading about theatre people. It’s a little like meeting up with old friends. There is going to be drama—because of course there is—but there is also going to be friendships formed as everyone works towards a common goal, putting on the best show possible or getting that movie made. The thing that I find really fascinating is not all of the shop talk, but the intimate details of a person’s life. How do people who are successful in their careers balance it with their personal life, or do they?

I feel like I should explain one thing before we go on. I went back and forth on whether to refer to David Tomlinson by his first or last name in this review. Typically, I refer to writers by their last name, but because I mention other members of the Tomlinson family in this review, I thought it might be simpler to just use the writer’s first name in this case. I hope this liberty of familiarity does not offend anyone.

While David does not present himself as a person who brings the drama—off stage, that is—he did have a complex family life, especially in his formative years. The preface, written by David’s son, James Tomlinson, made me tear up. Craig Brown’s introduction made me gasp audibly, twice. The first chapter opens with the teaser, “In which I am born into a family steeped in mystery . . . “. Then it continues: 

Some years ago my brother Peter was on his way to Heathrow on an airport bus. It was, I supposed, pure chance that the traffic stopped at Chiswick. Glancing sideways Peter was astonished to see our father sitting up in a strange bed, in a strange house, drinking a cup of tea. 

David’s father lived Friday night to Monday morning in Folkestone with his family and spent the week in London where he worked as a solicitor and lived at his club, or so he said. They were not often able to contact him there, so they had their doubts, but Peter’s discovery sets David on “the trail of the truth”, as he puts it. I’m tempted to explain more, but I’d rather you read it for yourself. We quickly realise David Tomlinson lived a fascinating life, and it wasn’t always fascinating in a good way. If this was fiction, one would say it was too unbelievable. 

Once you get beyond the first chapter, the rest of Luckier Than Most is less of a rollercoaster, and I have to say that I’m glad of that. I didn’t want to read about a bunch of unpleasant things happening to someone. That isn’t to say that this book is boring or that David does not suffer hardships throughout his life, but the ups and downs are distributed throughout the narrative. There are good things happening alongside the bad.

David served in World War II, while in Canada he had leave to visit New York. While there he fell in love with Mary Lindsay Hiddingh, and after a whirlwind romance, the couple got married. He was soon shipped back to the UK, and while he was struggling to get permission from the government for Mary to join him, she died in tragic circumstances. The couple were together mere months. I will leave it to David to tell you the details. Although, I will mention that if you read the preface and introduction first, like I did, you will find out some of this information before hand.

One of the things that really stood out to me is how much and how hard David Tomlinson worked. At times he was on a movie set at Pinewood Studios during the day and then in the evening he would be onstage in a play. After doing a double shift he would then commute to his cottage in the little village of Mursley in Buckinghamshire.

About this time I decided that what I really wanted was a country retreat . . . a little cottage away from the hurly-burly of London. I was playing every night and sometimes filming in the day but still there were Sundays when a bit of a garden and greenery would be welcome as well as a bit more space form my growing collection of period furniture and paintings. 

David stared in eight films that released in 1948! The thing that gets me is that he doesn’t tell the reader in a boastful way, like, “look at how in demand I was” or “look at how hard I worked”. He just informs us because he is imparting information about his life. Perhaps a more suitable title for this book would have been Humbler Than Most. Of course, the catch is if he had called his autobiography that, he wouldn’t have been. 

My nest-building instincts were now channelled into the cottage at Mursley. There was plenty of scope for improvement. In fact, even now, some thirty-five years later, I’m still working on it.

I was filming at Pinewood on Made in Heaven when I saw the most fetching young redhead. (Later I was to learn it wasn’t red, it was titian.) She had come down to see the director of the film on which I was working. Her name, I quickly discovered, was Audrey Freeman, and I thought she was dazzlingly pretty. 

She was at the time a principal dancer in Zip Goes a Million with four cameo roles and several dance numbers opening the first and second half of the show with spectacular effect. She had been trained as a dancer since her childhood.

 

He describes their life of him cooking for her in his one room pied-a-terre in Chelsea, while they both were busy with their respective careers.

I was lucky enough to marry Audrey on May 17th, 1953 at Ealing Register Office. It was ten days after my thirty-sixth birthday. Audrey was just twenty-one.

“I shan’t give up my career,” she told me.

“Quite right,” I agreed. “I need the money.”

As you can see, David’s wit comes through in his writing. The couple went on to have four sons. Their third son, William, or Willie as David refers to him, was diagnosed as autistic when medical professionals knew little about the neurological and developmental disorder. This passage broke my heart and I have to say made me feel angry for William and his family.

One consultant, after examining Willie, said the best thing we could do was put him away in a home and forget about him.

“He’s a write-off,” we were told perfunctorily. It is difficult to believe it now but that is what he said. We couldn’t accept that diagnosis.

Thankfully, they found Sybil Elgar, who had started a small school in her home for children with autism. Under her care, William blossomed to his potential. The information about autism in this book is predictably dated—this book was originally published in 1990, and a lot of new findings have come to light since then and research continues to be done. But, of course, this does not in any way diminish the Tomlinson family’s personal experiences. 

I’ve mainly talked about David’s private life in this review, but he shares plenty of anecdotes from his career, including working with many famous names. My personal favourite was his first impression of Laurence Olivier, and how something Oliver said to David years later when they were working together provided some context to explain what looked like very odd behaviour on the part of Olivier.

It feels a callous to critique how someone chooses to record their life, but I think it would be remise of me not to say that I found the ending of this book to be a bit abrupt. Perhaps that is why it came across as a bit trite. David basically wraps up his autobiography in a page with the reflection that despite all of the complications in his life, he has been “luckier than most”. I’m not sure if this brief summing up reflects his humility. He has given us the facts after all, and reflecting on a life that is still being lived is difficult. I expect that is especially true if the life you are attempting to turn into a narrative arc is your own. I don’t know that I could do it. Thank heavens no one is likely to ask it of me!

I would have liked this book to be longer. This edition is only 190 pages and I think another 100 pages would have allowed for more details, descriptions, scene setting, and perhaps a little more introspection. But overall, I found this to be a moving and entertaining book, much like David Tomlinson’s performances. 

This book comes out tomorrow, Monday 3 March 2025. Thank you to Dean Street Press Ltd. for kindly sending me a copy of Luckier Than Most for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

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