It is true that a writer evolves with every book. But the saying has never been true as it has been for P D James. Slightly better than her first Cover Her Face, but boring nonetheless. Don’t get swayed by the Book Blurb.

Dalgleish and Martin investigate the murder at a psychiatric clinic.
I preferred this second novel over the first one in the series, it seemed to feature more of Dalgleish and his investigating this time around. I particularly liked how the pace in increases towards the end of the book as the killer is eventually unmasked.

Ha! Like Dalgleish, I was looking too hard for a complicated killer. Consequently I blew past every suspect but the one I was SURE had done the deed. Boy was I wrong! Don’t bring your murders to me! I will never catch the villain.

This was the second of this author's books involving Adam dagleish as the detective in charge of a murder investigation at a psychiatric clinic. It is interesting but I did not find myself getting very involved with any of the plethora of characters thrown in. Her later mysteries showed her development of her protagonist to a better degree

I was so wanting to love this :( But it was so and boring and the twist unexciting (to me and also, it seemed to the author)

Слаба втора книга от поредицата!

Като почитател на сериите винаги се стремя да ги чета в реда, определен от автора. И рядко пропускам томче. След Убийството на прислужницата, която доста ми допадна, "Загадката на клиника Стийн" се оказа огромно разочарование. Протяжни обяснения, които сякаш не водят на никъде, недоизградени образи, някак плоско и наръфано действие. Накратко - поизмъчих се.

Нашият детектив Адам Данглиш изобщо не прояви каквито и да било дедуктивни способности. Случаят с убийството на административния секретар на психиатричната клиника сякаш се реши от само себе си, а заподозреният бе поднесен на разследващите изневиделица. Сякаш Джеймс се бе отплеснал, докато не се е усетил, че е време да я приключва тази книга.

Накрая, но не на последно място съм длъжна да споделя, че българското издание се оказа доста претупано и пренебрегнато. Текстът не бе коригиран добре, имаше доста грешки и пропуски, голяма част от които вероятно технически. Накрая се оказа, че изданието го няма в Goodreads и се наложи да го добавя.

Aihe toki mielenkiintoinen true-crimestä kiinnostuneelle mutta ei tämä silti suuria ahaa elämyksiä tuonut jos ei sortunut tirksitelyynkään. Käännös luultavasti noudatteli tunnollisesti alkuperäistä siksi ahkeraan lauseet päättyivät "minä sanoin" mikä kävi kirjan edetessä ärsyttäväksi.

I love the character Fredrica Saxon.

This book was pretty okay. It's kind of like a Midsomer Murder in that most of the suspects were awful and I hoped they would all be the one to go to jail. I guess Midsomer Murders are like this book in that way, really, since this book is older. Also it's wild the way the psychology profession has evolved since the '60s, when this book was written.

Read this as part of the M.E. Mystery Challenge 2022.

Adam Dalgliesh #2 (one of my favorite detectives and a personal goal of mine is to read the entire series), and while this was a decent book you can tell the writing style of P.D. was evolving as compared to her later books, such as Death in Holy Orders. The writing isn't as tight and the characters not as sketched out. I did guess the perpetrator rather quickly but it was interesting to see the timeline needed for the murder to take place.

The book was originally published in 1963 and so there's mention of LSD being used to treat psychiatric patients. I am a nurse and I had to look up the difference between a Sister and a Nurse (the term Sister for a nurse stems from the time nuns were nurses). From the research I could find (and if anyone in the UK reads this, please correct me if I'm wrong), a Nurse in the UK would be similar to a Staff Nurse in the US; a Sister or Ward Sister in the UK is similar to a Charge Nurse in the US; a Nurse Matron in the UK is similar to a Nursing Director in the US. The one thing I really enjoyed about this book was learning about all this (the LSD therapy in psychiatry and UK nursing terms).

One murder: stabbing.

Много английски маниер на оисане - твърде много герои, объркващи подробности - някои, от които нямащи нищо общо с разказа. Като цяло не беше история, която да ме погълне изцяло.

Dull. Murder wasn't very challenging or particularly original. Characters weren't interesting.