The Case of the Gilded Fly (1944) by Edmund Crispin

This is the first book of my re-read project and it was also Crispin’s first mystery novel. Six years has enabled me to forget pretty much everything about this plot, so I was by and large coming to this book with a clean slate. Though having said that I think there were a number of things that I noticed with this book that I didn’t really pick up on with my first reading. One of these things is how Crispin’s novels do not necessarily have the same light hearted breeziness of earlier 1930s comic crime novels. Written in 1944, with the plot set in 1940, there is a decidedly darker hue to this book, which I hadn’t fully appreciated on my first read. However I am getting ahead of myself…

Over the course of a trying railway trip we are introduced to 11 passengers heading into Oxford. One of course…