A murder takes place in the vestry of a church. Paul Berowne a MP who recently resigns is murdered alongside a tramp. I did like the church scenes. The people in the story were all unlikeable. Lady Ursula, Paul’s vacuous wife Barbara, his insipid daughter Sarah, the brother-in-law Swayne a lazy shifty piece of work.

The rivalry between Kate and Massingham was like watching who was teachers pet. Dalgleish was the usual unemotional on the outside and inside a ball of contradictions. I enjoyed the television adaptation of the book with its minor changes.

The end of the book was good with the kitchen scene with Kate’s grandmother and the madman Swayne.

A conservative politician found in a church with his throat cut along with a tramp, also murdered in the same way. The story then winds through the friends and relatives of the dead man and then a solution is found. The book was fun to read because each character was carefully drawn and had distinct personalities. You could almost meet them in real life. There were no major plot holes that I could discern but I did feel that the drama at the end was a little unrealistic. But overall, a nice cosy mystery and it served me well for a little relaxation when I was piled with work.

Tasty.

Also - feels oddly au courant, considering that it was written in 1986.

p. 286 "Ancroft Comprehensive had certainly had a religion all right, fashionable and, in a school with twenty different nationalities, expedient. It was anti-racism. You soon learned that you could get away with any amount of insubordination, indolence or stupidity if you were sound on this essential doctrine. It struck her that it was like any other religion; it meant what you wanted it to mean: it was easy to learn, a few platitudes, myths and slogans; it was intolerant, it gave you the excuse for occasional selective aggression, and you could make a moral virtue out of despising the people you disliked. Best of all, it cost nothing. She liked to pretend that this early doctrinarian had absolutely nothing to do with the cold fury which seized her when she met its opposite, the obscene graffiti, the shouted insults, the terror of Asian families afraid to leave their barricaded homes. If you had to have a school ethos to give the illusion of togetherness then for her money anti-racism was as good as any."

p. 171 "Old age makes caricatures of us all. No wonder we dread it."

Another wonderful mystery in the Adam Dalgliesh series. I always enjoy the way PD James combines the mystery plot with interesting background stories about the characters.

Another Dalgleish novel by P.D James, which means a clever plot, a couple of murders, and some character development of Dalgleish and his team. This one surprised at the end, with the murderer going on a vengeful spree that threatens one of Dalgleish's team. I like this series, and this is a solid addition.

James is a good mystery writer. She populates the book with plenty of likely suspects, each more selfish and despicable than the next. Her descriptions are skillful and her ability to keep the suspense high in such a long book is noteworthy. Because she has three detectives, all damaged from some past experience(s), she has plenty of fodder to infuse into the murder investigation. She manages to make social commentary on the unwarranted privilege of the upper class, the connivances of the political system, the emptiness of religion, shady obstetricians, and much more. While I can't say that I liked this book, I have to admire her ability to craft such a layered piece of detective fiction.

A Taste for Death features Commander Dalgliesh - PD James's favourite detective - and introduces Detective Inspector Kate Miskin, whose personality now seems, in certain respects, an extension of the private detective Cordelia Gray, who appeared in only two novels and was discreetly abandoned by the author for reasons unknown (to me).

A sordid murder - Are not all murders sordid ? - draws everyone's attention to the sacristy of St Matthew's Church, a fictional basilica in Paddington, where a tramp, Harry Mack, and a former minister and Conservative MP, Sir Paul Berowne, have been found with their throats slit by an old-fashioned, sharp-edged razor.

The police team's meticulous investigation sheds light on a number of suspects in the Baronet's entourage and the motives of those who may have been involved. The Dalgliesh hierarchy, under pressure from public opinion, urges the investigator, one of the very best at Scotland Yard, also a poet with a passion for classical literature and a keen eye for the darkest recesses of the human soul, to produce tangible evidence. But the investigators struggle to do so.

The trained eye of a crime novel reader will detect, early in the plot, the unfinished reflection of a character of apparently little significance, a reflection that proves essential in the last quarter of the novel, crucial for the denouement and resolution of the investigation. Yet the outcome is far from being predictable. Tracks first explored may lead to dead ends.

This well-written crime novel is a quality page-turner. PD James knows how to narrate, describe and report with precision the work and days of ordinary and extraordinary protagonists, exploring the twists and turns of everyday life and the frustrations that lead to the fatal act. The author skilfully balances procedures and interrogations, the personal reflections of the protagonists, and concrete situations from everyday life. Even places - whether fictional, like the church or the Berowne family's Sir John Sloane mansion in Camden Hill, or real, like Holland Park or the banks of the Thames - are beautifully, albeit unostentatiously, described.

The recurring characters in Baroness James's detective stories - Adam Dalgliesh above all, but eventually Kate and John Massingham - are endearing, with their qualities and insights, but also their flaws and their own private ghosts. Here, the prolific author offers a fine, realistic reading of the world around us, with a hint of subtle humour and a touch of poetry.

"London, laid out beneath him under a low ceiling of silver-grey cloud, looked eternal, rooted, domestic. He  saw the panorama, of which he never tired, in terms of painting. Sometimes it had the softness and immediacy of watercolour; sometimes, in high summer, when the park burgeoned with greenness, it had the rich texture of oil. This morning it was a steel engraving, hard- edged, grey, one-dimensional."
(Book Five, chapter 6)

Another slow paced book in the typical P D James style
It all starts when a Ministwr ( immediately after his resignation) is found dead Ina church, along with a vagabond, both with their throats cut . Whrhrt it's homicide or suicide is difficult to tell at first glance, and the mystery deepens as Adam Dalgleish and his team sigs deeper into murky secrets

Favorite of the series so far. Solid as a mystery, but so much more as a character study and some odd touches.

I didn't enjoy this.

It's well enough written. PD James can write, though I do agree with some other reviewers who mentioned that this book was a bit long, and could have used some editing. I'm giving it three stars, because I think it is a well-written mystery.

But I found it unpleasant to read. I hadn't realized there was 10 years between this and the last Dalgliesh novel. It shows, and not in a good way. Apparently some major events have happened in the protagonists life, that are sort of obliquely alluded to, but not really described. Also, I found the mystery itself, and everyone involved, unpleasant. Very much so. Not that I expect a murder mystery to be a barrel of laughs, but this felt darker than the previous PD James novels I've read. It probably didn't help that my interest wasn't really grabbed until 100 or so pages in.

I thought there were too many characters, and it seemed to meander around.

Oh, and I seriously hated the ending. Not who the killer was revealed to be, but pretty much everything associated with the action of wrapping the case up. It felt both far too unpleasant, and far too... convenient. Ending the review now before I talk myself down to two stars.

We know within half-a-dozen words that persons have been done to death. In a style worlds away from the twitterverse, P.D. James continues for eight pages before dishing up satisfaction for any who live by plot alone. In the meantime she takes whatever time she needs to set the scene of the crime (a sortof worse-for-wear All Saints Margaret Street, translated to a seedy neighborhood around Paddington Basin, near Paddington Station) and to introduce an incongruous pair: a spinster church lady, whose preoccupation with church vestries and high church ritual have not diverted her from Matthew 19:14, and her forsaken, independent eight-year-old protector. Only after we’ve come to care a bit about this odd couple and been kept in suspense, through a dark tunnel and past weedy thickets, does James open a door to reveal the bloody scene. It’s classic P.D. James. Some people have time for it; others don’t.

After that, the spinster and the eight-year-old will largely vanish until the denouement, after which (to her credit) James sorts them out in a way more realistic than heart warmingly satisfying. In the intervening several hundred pages Adam Dalgliesh must confront both a mounting pile of corpses and the largely (if not wholly) unlikable members of a titled British family variously to blame. A female Inspector Miskin assists the Superintendant and occasionally eclipses him, which happily enriches the interaction of personalities and points-of-view. I’m guessing/hoping the author continued to play them off against one another as Dalgliesh continued his unending fight against crime in later books. Restive readers longing for a little less talk and a lot more action should welcome the plot’s later twisty turns and gunfire, though they should be forewarned that James will also take the time to pick up some of the pieces afterward.

I wasn't gripped from the beginning of P.D. James' Taste for Death, but I'm happy I continued reading. I felt more and more engaged as the story unfolded. To me, that more than made up for the slow beginning. This was an enjoyable and intelligent mystery. This was my first time reading P.D. James, but I'll look for more of her work. 3.75 stars.