Book Review: Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Eight Perfect Murders

by Peter Swanson (Swanson)

 

This is a good book! A little creepy, definitely unexpected, but worth the read if you are a mystery book lover.

 

Another librarian recommended this book to me and I was not disappointed. I do not want to disclose much about the plot, because it may ruin your experience. I will say that the basic premise is that Malcolm Kershaw, owner of the Old Devils Bookstore in Boston, is approached by FBI Special Agent Gwen Mulvey. Mulvey tells him that she is tracking a killer. She believes that a killer is basing his or her murders on a blog post Kershaw made years ago. Kershaw created the “Eight Perfect Murders” post when his book store opened up in 2004, listing what he considered perfect foolproof murders in crime fiction. But now it appears someone is using the premises of those eight books to commit murders that are largely going unsolved; and most likely it is someone he knows.

 

Eight Perfect Murders is a page turner. I read the entire book in one sitting. The farther you get into the book, the more plot twists you encounter. You can guess how it will turn out–you may be right; you may be wrong. I was wrong, sort of.

 

I also greatly enjoyed how Peter Swanson pays homage to some of the classics of the mystery genre: The Red House Mystery by A.A. Milne, Malice Aforethought by Anthony Berkeley Cox, The A.B.C. Murders by Agatha Christie, And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie, The Murder of Robert Ackroyd by Agatha Christie, Double Indemnity by James M. Cain, Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith, The Drowner by John D. MacDonald, Deathtrap by Ira Levin and The Secret History by Donna Tartt. You don’t have to read the featured books first, but your experience would be the richer for it! And if you haven’t read them all yet, chances are good you are going to want to read them afterwards.

[ official Eight Perfect Murders page on the official Peter Swanson web site ]

 

Recommended by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Services

 

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