The Sentence is Death is the second in the Hawthorne and Horowitz series of murder mysteries.
As with The Word Is Murder throughout the book there are snippets about the crime writing process and the working (and family) life of the real Anthony Horowitz. The difference being, this time I was prepared for that.
This story opens with Hawthorne crashing onto the set of Foyle’s War and demanding Anthony follow him to the scene of another murder.
Divorce lawyer Richard Pryce has been found clubbed to death and slashed with a bottle of wine. Why have an expensive bottle of wine in the house when Richard Pryce did not drink? Why were there numbers painted on the wall near the body. Who was he calling as he opened the door to his attacker? And, above all, why has he been killed?
As a divorce lawyer you would think there must be plenty of suspects. Or could it be someone in his private life, rather than professional life, that killed him? The book narrows down the suspects, who seem to link together and overlap rather well. When Horowitz manages to solve things with 50 pages to go, you just know there is something wrong. Luckily Hawthorne is on the right trail and the ending ties up all the loose ends nicely.
Also, we learn during the book, that Horowitz has agreed to write three books about PI Daniel Hawthorne. So I’m eager to get the next book in the series.
Highly recommended.
The Word Is Murder is available from City Adventurers Solve The Murder
The Sentence is Death is available from City Adventurers Solve The Murder
A Line to Kill is available from City Adventurers Solve The Murder
Plot
‘You shouldn’t be here. It’s too late…’ These were Richard Pryce’s last words, overheard moments before the celeb divorce lawyer was bludgeoned to death with a £3,000 bottle of wine.
Strange circumstances pile up. Pryce was teetotal, so why this bottle? Why those words? Why did the killer paint a number on his wall? And, most importantly, which of the man’s many, many enemies did the deed?
Baffled, the police are forced to bring in Private Investigator Daniel Hawthorne and his sidekick, the author Anthony Horowitz, who’s really getting rather good at this murder investigation business. But as Hawthorne takes on the case with characteristic relish, it becomes clear that he, too, has secrets to hide. Anthony knows they must be exposed – even at the risk of death…
