A Line to Kill (A Hawthorne and Horowitz Mystery)

Product Information

With a Mind to Kill , Horowitz’s new James Bond novel, is expected in May 2022. “I cannot give anything away because they will be unhappy with me ( laughs ). I will say I was thrilled to be asked to return for the third time. This book is part of a trilogy following Trigger Mortis (2015) and Forever and a Day (2018). It is a quieter book compared to the other two.”

Realising all these permutations had been done, Horowitz began to wonder what would make his series different. A Line to Kill is set just before the publication of The Word is Murder (the first in the series) and opens with Hawthorne and Horowitz being invited to speak at a literary festival on the tiny Channel Island of Alderney. Alderney is only three square miles in size, home to about 2,000 people, and has never had a murder… until the detective duo arrives. The novel is very much an homage to Agatha Christie, particularly the later Poirot novels, and she is mentioned both explicitly and implicitly, for example in a chapter title. Following Christie, Horowitz spends nearly a third of the narrative setting the scene for the murder: a small literary festival on a tiny island establishes a limited pool of suspects in a convincing manner; tensions concerning the construction of a Normandy-Alderney-Britain power line disturb the peace of an otherwise idyllic community; and a suitably obnoxious murder victim is presented in the form of Charles le Mesurier.

The book is filled with a dry humor. Horowitz pokes fun at the book industry, the police and human nature in general. The ending was perfect, everyone’s identity was not as it seemed. I would never have guessed the final denouement. When I recognised the Christie-style set-up, I immediately wondered if this was a step too far for Horowitz. The Susan Ryeland series is already an ingenious and compelling homage to the world’s most successful author of fiction and I wondered if A Line to Kill would blur the boundaries between the two series. It does not and each in is, in its own unique way, providing contemporary crime fiction with a much-needed revitalisation.

The story is plotted perfectly with constant reveals about the various characters and twists coming at you left and right to ensure the story is consistently entertaining, and there are lots of little clues and red herrings sprinkled throughout to keep you guessing. It’s a smoothly written and confidently told tale - I breezed through it in a weekend, totally impressed with the assured and seemingly effortless storytelling. Chekhov's Gun: A couple of references are made to Kathryn Harris's over-large glasses. They're part of a disguise to mask her resemblance to Anne Cleary, who is her mother. Another sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan. Lesley is absolutely wonderful and Cattaneo is one of the most brilliant directors I’ve worked with.” A Line to Kill finds us with Hawthorne and Horowitz at a book festival on the island of Alderney southeast of England. Seems like a ho-hum jaunt into literature for Hawthorne who will be on stage with Horowitz to discuss their books. Horowitz doesn't quite know what to make of his fellow authors who represent cook books to poetry to children's books to psychic readings. He's more worried about Hawthorne's ill-prepared manner than anything else.

Neither easy nor difficult

A Line to Kill is a 2021 mystery novel by Anthony Horowitz. It is the third in his series of Daniel Hawthorne Novels.

With every installment in this series, we get to learn more about Daniel Hawthorne’s life from before his collaboration with Horowitz in bits and pieces. He doesn’t reveal much about himself to Horowitz, who is often baffled and annoyed with his tight-lipped partner. In this story, we are finally introduced to certain facets of Hawthorne’s personality we had not seen before and given insight into the details about Hawthorne’s dismissal from his former position as DI. Hawthorne is welcomed by the police from nearby Guernsey to help with the investigation and Horowitz follows in his wake taking notes for what could turn out be a new book. There are almost too many suspects for the unpopular victim who was involved in local politics and promoting the installation of an electric power line connecting France to the UK through Alderney, a venture not popular with all on the island. This begins with Horowitz feeling a little over-confident, as Hawthorne comes to a meeting at his publishers. Hawthorne, he imagines, will be in 'his world.' Of course, this confidence is premature, as Hawthorne manages to be the centre of attention, be utterly confident and embrace the idea of a literary festival on the Island of Alderney. With 'Tony,' as always disgruntled (Horowitz's self-deprecation is done masterfully) and, quite rightly questioning Hawthorne's willingness to attend the festival, the two men and the other 'celebrity' authors head off for the little island.

Tropes:

As the story opens Horowitz and Hawthorne are meeting with Horowitz's publishers to discuss a publicity campaign for their first collaborative book. When a body turns up the next morning, another murder investigation gets underway with Hawthorne helping the local constabulary. Unlike the first two books in the series, this one is confined to a set location with a cast of characters we meet in the opening chapters. In that sense, it’s not unlike a classic Agatha Christie murder mystery. Anyone of 15 people had the motive to do the killing. The question is who. The first in this series ‘The Word is Murder’ was a joy, an inventive and often quite hilarious post-modern subversion of the murder mystery, with the actual author, Horowitz, taking part in the action alongside the brilliant, if socially inept, former detective inspector Hawthorne. Horowitz casts himself as the bumbling Watson to Hawthorne’s almost supernaturally gifted Holmes. The sequence at the end of Live and Let Die (1954) when Bond is dragged over the coral reef is brilliant, says Horowitz. The ending reveals that Kathryn Harris put on a French maid costume for the party and lured Charles away with the promise of sex, only to kill him.

The second in the series, ‘The Sentence is Death’, became a little more plot heavy and less about the tensions between author and his secretive hero. Horowitz is a master of misdirection, and his brilliant self-portrayal, wittily self-deprecating, carries the reader through a jolly satire on the publishing world." --Booklist Arriving on Alderney, Hawthorne and Horowitz soon meet the festival's other guests--an eccentric gathering that includes a bestselling children's author, a French poet, a TV chef turned cookbook author, a blind psychic, and a war historian--along with a group of ornery locals embroiled in an escalating feud over a disruptive power line.Some of the funniest moments occurred when Horowitz deliberately downplayed his success as an author, and the dismissive irrelevant way he was often treated by other characters. Horowitz may be the narrator but Hawthorne remained the definite star of the show. Also true to Horowitz form are the adorable quirky characters, including the ersatz Horowitz. But the most fun is what Horowitz has with his own character and the literary industry. You can always be assured of a very good story, a murder at the beginning of a holiday, event and in this case a festival. Sounding predictable, that’s because it was, and I have to admit to feeling it was all a bit flat and did nothing to move up from third gear. Hence the 3 stars.