Death in Holy Orders (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: P. D. James
- First Published: 2001
- Type of Work: Novel
- Time of Work: 2000
- Setting: The coast of East Anglia, England
- Principal Characters: Adam Dalgliesh, Father Sebastian, Father Martin, Archdeacon Crampton, Father Peregrine Glover, Father John Betterton, Margaret Munroe, Emma Lavenham, George Gregory, Roger Yarwood, Clive Stannard, Raphael Arbuthnot
- Genres: Long fiction, Mystery and detective literature, Master sleuth fiction
- Subjects: Murder or homicide, Twenty-first century, England or English people, Detectives, Mysteries, Colleges or universities, Church schools, 2000’s
- Locales: East Anglia, England
Although Death in Holy Orders is in many respects a classical English mystery in the tradition of Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, and other leading practitioners of the craft, this and other P. D. James novels stand apart from and above those of most of her predecessors and contemporaries because she invariably tests the accepted boundaries of the form. Familiar whodunit character types, motives, settings, and narrative devices abound, but she develops her plots and characters with greater complexity than is the norm, and her settings are organic, not mere backgrounds. In sum,...
[The entire page is 1917 words long]
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