Sky High

by Michael Gilbert

Genres: Crime, Mystery
Pages: 254
Series: British Library Crime Classics
Rating:

Synopsis:

In the village of Brimberley, the worst thing on the horizon seems to be the chance of being outshone by the rival village choir of Bramshott. But that is until Brimberley’s lead tenor is blown up in his home by an explosion that rocks the whole community. As an amateur coalition of the motorcycling choir leader Liz, her ex-commando son and a retired general begins to piece together this strange crime, mystery upon mystery compounds in a case involving dark secrets buried in the turmoil of the Second World War, parochial grudges, a burglar whose reputation borders on the mythical, and a volatile killer poised to strike again.

First published in 1955, this classic village mystery with elements of WW2 spy fiction showcases Gilbert’s ingenious plotting and ability to blow the reader’s assumptions sky high.

I was a little worried that Michael Gilbert’s Sky High would be kind of grim, since the last book of his I read was really grim in a weird way (it was so matter-of-fact about prisoner of war camps). This one is also rather haunted by war, admittedly, and there is a certain melancholy matter-of-factness about matters of war, since many of the characters were soldiers or related to soldiers, and one of the main characters was in Palestine, etc.

That said, it doesn’t have quite that same dark feel, in part because one of the other main characters (his mother, actually) is a comfortably middle-aged woman who manages the choir, rides a motorbike, and has a gift for amateur detection. It practically takes a village to untangle exactly what’s happened, though, with each character contributing their own skills.

In the end, I was surprisingly sad about who the culprit turned out to be, and surprisingly invested in it not being any of the characters I liked — I hadn’t realised I was getting attached. There are some tense moments, too, which feel really well done. I couldn’t help wincing to myself as Tim worked out what was bothering him in the final scenes, bracing myself for the possibility the author wasn’t going to let him figure it out in time.

Overall, I liked this a lot more than I’d expected; the mystery was solid, we had most of the pieces to work it out, and I cared more than I realised.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)