The crime at Black Dudley

Overall, I actually enjoyed this one quite a bit more than the latest instalments I've been reading from Dorothy Sayers and Ngaio Marsh. It's got the action and adventure and dark mysteries reminiscent of some early Christies. The writing style is generally easy to follow, to the point where I'm really wondering why I took this long to start on Allingham.

What probably dragged the rating down a bit for me was the mystery being just a tad bit too convoluted and the solution of the mystery packing a little less oomph than I would've wished. I was frankly pretty lost during many parts of the story especially when there's a lot of action going on (I generally can't visualize action very well so fight scenes or car chase scenes really go over my head).

The series is named after Albert Campion but tbh he's not exactly the main sleuth in this one. He does make major contributions to the mystery solving but George Abbershaw was undoubtedly the main protagonist in this one. Campion is interesting but I don't think we really saw him with enough depth for me to feel particularly invested in him as a character.

About the ending: I really really spent half the book convinced that Meggie had been the murderer. She was behaving a little suspiciously cool when George and her were speaking with Mrs Meade and I always thought her little expressions here and there or just how quiet she's being at certain moments, all seemed so well placed for her to be hiding something. Honestly, Wyatt was a pretty disappointing solution, and the motivation was a bit unrealistic, with a random love affair and a really exaggerated sense of self-righteous vigilantism trying to right a wrong that he perceives to have been done to a woman he fell in love with, just cos he thinks this criminal society is responsible for miseducating her and making her dumb? Just what??

I'd definitely still continue on to more Albert Campion mysteries and would recommend this one to anyone interested in golden era cozy mysteries, especially those with more action.