Upon a Dark Night

by Peter Lovesey

Book Overview

The ever-popular Peter Lovesey spins another fabulous mystery for his favorite subtle sleuth. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0892966696
• ISBN13: 9780892966691
• Release Date: January 1998
• Publisher: Mysterious Press
• Length: 374 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 9.3" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

Cleanly written police procedural.

This was my first Peter Diamond novel, and I immediately liked the character. Despite a surfeit of gruff and unlikeable middle aged English detectives, Diamond still stands out as well-drawn and interesting. At the beginning of the book, the only threat facing Diamond is that he might die of boredom. He starts investigating apparent suicides in Bath out of a lack of more obvious murders to pursue. When his investigation ties in with the mysterious case of the amnesiac found wandering the roads of Bath, his life gets rather more exciting than he might have wanted. I had some issues with the way that the two major threads of the story were knitted together. I felt as though this affected the pacing-- particularly in the second half of the novel. Still, I liked both threads and the book kept me reading. Recommended for fans of British police procedurals. I will be picking up another in the series when I get the chance.

One of my favorites

UPON A DARK NIGHT is one of my favorites in the Peter Diamond series. In spite of his gruff, rather unloveable personality, Peter Diamond has an amazing ability to tease out the link between two apparently unrelated deaths, a farmer, who apparently killed himself with a shotgun and a woman, who jumped/fell off of the roof of a building. While everyone else in the department figures, including his rival, John Wigfall, concludes each died by suicide, Diamond comes to believe that the cause of death is not so obvious. Complicating the cases is a missing person named Rose, reported by a notorious shoplifter named Ada, who has not exactly endeared herself to the Old Bill. Soon, Peter connects all three cases with an unlikely suspect and he races against time to prevent another murder disguised as suicide. Peter Lovesey is one of the best crime fiction writers today. This is not an English cozy, but an extremely well-written police procedural mystery, well-paced with an intricately woven plot. I would highly recommend both the series and this book.

fantastic Diamond police procedural

Things have been so quiet lately; Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond suffers from hypertension caused by ennui as he has not had a homicide to keep his blood pressure level. Normally Diamond would ignore an apparent suicide by a farmer, but with nothing else to occupy his time, he decides to take a quick look. First thing he realizes that the farmer's arms were too small to pull the trigger of a shotgun placed under his chin Peter simultaneously investigates what he believes is a homicide while trying to persuade his superior that someone killed the farmer. At about the same time, a girl falls off a rooftop during a party. Initial reaction was it was a tragic accident, but Diamond sees incongruities with that explanation. He investigates both deaths while an amnesiac is found in a hospital parking lot by a shoplifter Ada who reluctantly releases the woman to someone claiming to be a sister. Ada talks with Diamond, who reluctantly follows up her comments and links the two deaths and the abduction with a fourth party as he begins to find the buried connection. UPON A DARK NIGHT is a fantastic Diamond police procedural as the cop is at his curmudgeon worst due to absolute boredom from no cases; only someone like Diamond could bemoan a major drop in the murder rate. Thus two homicides would have probably remained under the radar screen with the killer free except that Diamond basically had nothing interesting to do. The mystery is brilliantly established so the audience like Diamond's boss sees no foul play until Diamond's inquiries begin to cleverly prove otherwise. Peter Lovesey is at his best with this awesome who-done-it. Harriet Klausner

Classic Detection a la Peter Diamond.

The Peter Diamond series is a great series, and this book is a good one. Peter is suffering from the stress of lack of work in Bath. Then there seems to be a lot of unexplained suicides on his patch. He begins by investigating one of them, and it turns out to have a lot of unexplained puzzles. Could it be murder? And what about the other suicide? Introduce a young girl with unexplained amnesia and Peter's got more puzzles than he knows what to do with. Lovesey characterizations are wonderful and this book is no different. It's complicated, neat and has a great plot.

GREAT BOOK in a great series

Bath's head of the murder squad, Peter Diamond, is investigating two recent deaths. The first is that of a farmer, who apparently killed himself with a shotgun. The second case involves a suicide also. A woman took a nose dive off of the roof of a building. Everyone else in the department figures these are two obvious suicides, but Peter thinks otherwise. He feels someone has cleverly killed two people and set the deaths up to look like the victims had taken their own lives. A third case surfaces when an amnesiac, dubbed Rose, is taken from the local homeless shelter by her sister. Ada Shaftsbury, a renowned thief, tells Peter that Rose was kidnapped. She nags him until he agrees to look into what appears to be a simple family matter. Soon, all three cases merge as Peter continues to investigate what may or may not be a crime wave in Bath. Peter Lovesey is already acknowledged as one of the masters of the English police procedural. His latest novel, UPON A DARK NIGHT, will enhance that deserved reputation as it might be his best book to date. The story line is extremely complex, but in the hands of a master like Peter comes together in a brilliant tying of sub-plots. Peter is great because of all his flaws. Who else roots for homicides because he is bloody bored? This reviewer strongly recommends the entire Diamond series because they are all quite good, but this novel is simply incredible. Harriet Klausner