Nuts & Bolts: Richard Osman
A structural analysis of Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club Books
Osman has so far produced four books in this series, of which I’ve read the first three. All the books in the series (at least the three I’ve read) share common protagonists, style, and narrative structure. The four books (with estimated word counts) are:
The Thursday Murder Club | Sept 2020 | 111,926 words
The Man Who Died Twice | Sept 2021 | 123,646 words
The Bullet That Missed | Sept 2022 | 121,009 words
The Last Devil to Die | Sept 2023 | 123,646 words
All the books feature the Thursday Murder Club, a group of four senior citizens living in an upmarket retirement village who meet each Thursday to study cold-case murders, but frequently find themselves involved in actual cases. I think it’s fair to say that the books are in the Cosy Mystery sub-genre of the Crime genre.
The bulk of the narrative is written in third-person present-tense from multiple viewpoints, with POV characters including all four protagonists, antagonists, and other minor / ally characters. I’d actually suggest that it’s more third-person omniscient, because there are so many viewpoint characters and because the narrative can hop between multiple viewpoints in a single scene. However, interspersed with these sections are diary entries written by one of the protagonists, Joyce. These are first-person past-tense, and often serve as flash-backs to events that occurred “off-camera”.
Chapters are short; in the majority of cases each scene / section gets its own chapter.
The setting is our present-day world (specifically Kent, England), but with fictional geographical elements, chief of these being the retirement village, Coopers Chase, and the nearby city / town of Fairhaven.
The stories contain humour, but are not of themselves humorous. The mysteries are intricate, but not head-scratchingly so. In general the stories are light-hearted and apolitical, with characters who are warm and engaging but in some cases perhaps just a tad too perfect. (I’m a big fan of Polish builders, but Bogdan being tough, brave, handsome, a good lover, clever, thoughtful, incredibly kind, and willing to do pretty much anything the Thursday Murder Club ask him to do, up to and including acts of quite serious criminality, does seem rather over-cozy — but maybe I’m just jealous.)
But having said all of that, the books do get into some thoughtful philosophy on ageing, living in old age, and in particular, the challenge and horror of dementia.
As of book 3, no dogs have been harmed.
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