The Word is Murder

A Novel

By: Anthony Horowitz

Narrated by: Rory Kinnear

SHE PLANNED HER OWN FUNERAL. BUT DID SHE ARRANGE HER OWN MURDER?

New York Times bestselling author of Magpie Murders and Moriarty, Anthony Horowitz has yet again brilliantly reinvented the classic crime novel, this time writing a fictional version of himself as the Watson to a modern-day Holmes.

One bright spring morning in London, Diana Cowper – the wealthy mother of a famous actor - enters a funeral parlor. She is there to plan her own service.

Six hours later she is found dead, strangled with a curtain cord in her own home.

Enter disgraced police detective Daniel Hawthorne, a brilliant, eccentric investigator who’s as quick with an insult as he is to crack a case. Hawthorne needs a ghost writer to document his life; a Watson to his Holmes. He chooses Anthony Horowitz.

Drawn in against his will, Horowitz soon finds himself a the center of a story he cannot control. Hawthorne is brusque, temperamental and annoying but even so his latest case with its many twists and turns proves irresistible. The writer and the detective form an unusual partnership. At the same time, it soon becomes clear that Hawthorne is hiding some dark secrets of his own.

A masterful and tricky mystery that springs many surprises, The Word is Murder is Anthony Horowitz at his very best.

Suspense is the modus operende

That this novel is extraordinarily well written is an understatement. Horowitz creates suspense at each turn. And it is not until the very end that one appreciates this. I could suggest that you pay attention to all of the characters but that would not help you figure out “ Who did it “. But read on as the process is highly enjoyable.

Anthony Horowitz doesn’t disappoint!

I loved Magpie Murders and didn’t think Anthony Horowitz could reel me in again to this next book, but he certainly did!
The Word is Murder grabs you from the first sentence. The relationship he builds between Horowitz and Hawthorne had me laughing, smirking and totally engaged with the back and forth banter of these two unlikely comrades.
The icing on the cake ? the great readers of this murder mystery. I’m hooked! On to The Sentence is Death !