The Word Is Murder

This is another cracker from Anthony Horowitz, hot on the heels of The Magpie Murders. If that book had begun deconstructing, playing around and having a lot of fun with the form of the whodunnit, this brand new adventure carries on that theme: this time Horowitz puts himself into the story - and in the reluctant role of the Watson/Hastings sidekick to boot. His detective this time is a million miles from a Poirot, a Holmes or a Father Brown. Hawthorne swears like a squaddie, chain smokes his way through the case, is as politically correct as Bernard Manning and is not at all easy to get to know. It's clear that he's somewhere on the autistic spectrum, but is far from being endearing in the way that, say, Christopher was in The Curious Incident of The Dog in the Night Time.Horowitz seemlessly mixes reality with fantasy (of course it's fiction and none of it happened, but your disbelief is very readily suspended) until you don't know where one ends and the other begins. Is he using the real name of his agent? Did that building really exist? Has he ever met someone like Hawthorne in real life? There is a wonderful scene where the gruff detective bursts into a meeting about a Tintin film script Horowitz is having with Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson. How much of this happened? You don't know and, naturally, you don't care but it creates a deliciously ambiguous halfway house between the world we know and the parallel universe of detective fiction. In fact, Hawthorne is perhaps the most realistic new detective to appear for a very long time.I thought I'd worked it out quite early on and was delighted when the fictional version of Anthony Horowitz (or 'Tony' as Hawthorne calls him) began thinking along the same lines. We were, of course, both completely wrong. The real Horowitz had flummoxed us as usual.

I was intrigued by the concept of this tale (elderly woman goes into an undertaker's, arranges her own funeral and is murdered 6 hours later) but a few chapters in, I realised that Anthony Horowitz features in the novel as himself and alarm bells started ringing ........Having been pressurised into writing about the case by ex-detective Daniel Hawthorne - an oddball character a bit like Adrian Monk from the US TV series 'Monk' (ie darting off all over the place and never explaining himself) - who has you reaching for the headache pills by Chapter 3: why employ a writer to document a murder you are investigating but keep them in the dark about what's going on? The line between fact (Horowitz writing for Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson) and fiction (the murder) becomes really blurred and I found myself having to go back and re-read many pages in order to keep up with what was the 'unravelling of the murder' story and the Anthony Horowitz 'real-life' narrative (very weird) but even so, it's not hard to work out 'whodunit'.As another reviewer says, some readers are not going to like this book AT ALL. That would be me. Yes, it's well plotted and brilliantly written as is most everything produced by Mr Horowitz but it would have been much, much better if he had taken himself out of the equation and written a first-class 'whodunit' of which he's more than capable having done an utterly brilliant Sherlock Holmes re-boot with the sensational 'House of Silk', but this book will leave some readers disappointed, some puzzled, some closing the book in wonderment and some wishing they hadn't bought it. It appears that there are more of this genre to come, but I won't be back for No. 2, sorry.

I think of Anthony Horowitz as a writer for young adults although I know he has written books for the estates of Arthur Conan Doyle and Ian Fleming.I love a murder mystery and was curious when I came across this book describing itself as unlike any crime book you will ever have read. It is the first in a series and the author has put himself in as the narrator. I was hoping I'd love it and then there would be more to read.The book is 387 pages split into 24 chapters.AH builds into the plot a lot of elements which are true, particularly about his life and career progression which is really interesting to read. The main plot story is fiction but the lines between fact and fiction are very blurred which is very intriguing - keeping the reader guessing all the way through.There is no other reaction than to be blown away by the complexity of this novel from the overall concept to the intricate detail - the planning that must have been involved with this book is vast.It is basically a book about an author writing a book which seems very difficult to pull off successfully but is addressed so clearly that the overall effect is effortless.AH makes it clear from the start that the reader is being given clues about the murderer so I read this book with an investigative eye but still had very little idea about the outcome. There is no other option than to put yourself into the care of the author, relax and enjoy the ride!I felt that I was being manipulated all the way through this book and the experience has never been more enjoyable.Of course, there has to be an ending and I worried that it might be disappointing but I was wrong. It couldn't have been better with many answers and a few questions left hanging to be carried forward to the next book.

The elderly Diana Cowper entered a funeral parlour to arrange her own burial. Everything was planned down to the last detail. A wise decision at her age, one can argue, but the story takes a more sinister turn when she's brutally murdered. Just six hours later.Hawthorne, a disgraced and disgruntled ex-police detective and now an investigating consultant, is tasked to look into the case, but he sees an additional opportunity. Why not have the investigation chronicled by a famous author and earn some money? An author who Hawthorne has been advising on procedure for one the author’s TV shows. His name was Anthony Horowitz.Anthony Horowitz is known for writing the scripts for (some episodes of) Poirot and (all episodes of) Foyle's War. Younger readers might recognize the name because he also writes the immensely popular Alex Rider series.So, Anthony Horowitz, writes a thriller with himself in the role of Watson to Sherlock Holmes (or – more fittingly - Sam Stewart to Christopher Foyle). The story is set after the supposed end of Foyle’s War, thus before the Cold War episodes. Throughout the story Horowitz gives us an insight in his busy writing schedule, juggling time and means to write all the books his readers are expecting from him.The mystery of 'The Word is Murder' is fairly well constructed. Still, a part where Horowitz writes about meeting producer Steven Spielberg and director Peter Jackson does feel like padding and gives the entire book an unnecessary show of being somewhat like a vanity project. Besides, in some parts the writing seems to lack a bit of natural flow, possibly the result of too many rewrites or - equally possible – because Horowitz was still in the process of transitioning from a young adult writer to a writer for the adult market.Still, the overall conclusion was that 'The Word is Murder' is a solid first try and I will certainly want to read the second installment, 'The Sentence is Death'.

I enjoyed reading this book, Anthony Horowitz has written himself as a character into the book. He is a writer and approached by dectective Hawthorne to write a book abou him. Anthony then shadows him on a murder case.There is one chapter where Anthony attends a script conference with Steven Spielberg and this chapter I could have easily done with out, as felt it added little to the storyI did not work out who the killer was, I enjoyed reading the methods of Hawthorne and his observation skillsI bought this book as I had read Magpie Murders - which was another interesting book. Following reading the review on amazon it was suggested reading The Word is Murder before reading the Sentence is Death, which i am about to start.