A review by innerweststreetlibrarian
Death at the Opera: (Death in the Wet) by Gladys Mitchell

1.0

Oh dear. This is a bit of a mess. I really couldn't guess who was the culprit (which is usually a good thing with a mystery!), and kind of had the feeling the author just picked one at random so she could just stop writing (and therefore blamed it on someone with a totally ludicrous, unbelievable motive). Most of these vintage murder mysteries are a bit preposterous, and they all have a brilliant eccentric detective, but at least they mostly have something going for them so you can suspend disbelief for a while. I don't think this one really does. There's something morally wrong with the idea that you bring someone in to investigate a murder "just to see" if someone "bad" did it and should be punished, but if someone "not bad" did it, then sweep it under the carpet and pretend everything is ok. The stereotypes are laid on far too thick.