Product Description

A rising young stage comedian, who is about to receive his profession’s award as Most Promising Newcomer, dies sensationally on stage at the start of his act; as he picks up the mike, he is electrocuted. Faulty wiring seems to be the cause; no one person’s to blame; a verdict of death by misadventure is returned at the inquest. But Simon Brett’s actor/detective, Charles Paris, who has already solved some highly complex murders in Cast in Order of Disappearance, So Much Blood and An Amateur Corpse, happens to have been in the audience. And when another member of the cast reveals the comedian checked his equipment before the performance, Charles is launched on a further fascinating puzzle.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1449727 in Books
• Published on: 2000-05-19
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 164 pages

Review
Perhaps that title is an omen, because Charles Paris, English actor-sleuth, is a good deal less witty here than in his previous four cases - but this is nonetheless a likable case, nicely colored with a music-hall/TV background. The victim is up-and-coming comic/musician Bill Peaky, electrocuted by his guitar at the Winter Gardens music-hall in seaside Hunstanton. Charles is in the audience and determines to sleuth the "accident," even if it takes time away from his new, well-paying (!) job: playing straight man to a legendary old comedian who's attempting a TV comeback. With the action split between convincingly depressing TV-special rehearsals (the old comedian's traumas in the inhuman medium are neatly rendered) and Charles' haphazard investigation (he accuses Peaky's wife, then his agent, then a drug-addict "roadie"), Brett is far from dull; but his satirical gift seems muted here. And the solution, when it comes, is a mild eyebrow-raiser. Lesser Brett, then, but a neat, swift read by anybody's standards. (Kirkus Reviews)

About the Author
Simon Brett is a former radio and television comedy producer, who has been writing full-time for more than twenty years. Creator of the Charles Paris, Mrs. Pargeter and Fethering series of mysteries, his psychological thriller, "A Shock to the System" was filmed, starring Michael Caine. Married, with three children, he lives in an Agatha Christie-style village in West Sussex, England.

From AudioFile
Actor Charles Paris witnesses the murder of an up-and-coming, but not nice, comedian. Confronting almost every character with an accusation of murder, Paris has the curiosity and perseverance just right for an amateur detective. Frederick Davidson catches the perfect ironic and self-deprecating tone for Paris. Davidson's excellent portrayal of the classes of people found in the British television studio and vaudeville hall greatly contributes to the enjoyment of this mystery. A great choice for Brett fans or anyone who enjoys audio mysteries. T.R. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Customer Reviews

An inside look at stage life
Charles Paris, amateur detective, sets out to try to unmask a killer. A comedian is electrocuted by an improperly wired microphone. No one else thinks its murder, but Charles Paris knows it. The best thing about this book is the inside look at television and stage acting. It's like being in on the inside ot this fascinating world. The book is actually quite funny as well. I enjoyed it. It is definitely in the cosy genre.

I guessed the killer right off, but that doesn't matter
While on holiday, second-rate actor Charles Paris witnesses the apparently accidental death of up and coming comedian Bill Peaky. However, after speaking with some of Peaky's "friends", Paris comes to suspect that Peaky's death was not an accident, but murder.

If you have read any of the other books in Simon Brett's Charles Paris series of mysteries, you will already know just how easy these mysteries are to solve. It is very unusual for me not to guess the killer in one of these books within the first 50 pages, and this book was no exception (as an aside, this is not the case for all of Brett's novels, and in fact, one of Brett's non-series books, "Dead Romantic", is an excellent example of a mystery, and it kept me guessing right to the end). However, you don't read Charles Paris novels for the mystery elements. The mystery is just there to provide a structure to another story of life in the entertainment industry, and that is where Brett's strength lies. Prior to becoming a novelist, Brett worked in the entertainment industry and his stories of what it is really like are both fascinating and hilarious. In this instalment, Brett writes about stand-up comedy and comedy variety shows. The book was written in 1979, so some of the references are a bit dated, but not so much that it matters. This is one of the better Charles Paris novels.

Doesn't measure up to the greats
After a steady diet of Dick Francis, one cannot help but be dissapointed in "A Comediane Dies." Unfair, I know, to always judge one author by another, but Brett's characters are simpler, less sympathetic, and generally less intriguing. Moreover, the plot was more predictable than the best of the mystery genre. Certainly it would be boring to read a mystery in which the detective homed directly in on the guilty party, never wavering in his certainty or following false paths. But at the same time, every mystery author knows this, and therefore their readers intuitively know that neither the first, nor the second or usually even the third will turn out to be whodunnit. Read 5 or 7 of the genre and you start to suspect only the least suspectible. The excellent writer, however, will pepper his plot with enough entirely unsuspectible characters to keep the reader both distracted and guessing. Unfortunately, Brett does not, and neither his characters nor his settings are interesting enough to make up for it. The saving grace of the book, if there is one, is the rather adroit and amusingly barbed commentary on the English theatrical and television scene. The pure British wit displayed in these discourses is almost enough to keep the book going - although not, I'm afraid, enough to tempt me to others in his series.