Product Description

On sick leave from Scotland Yard, Inspector Alan Grant finds a dead man aboard the night train to Scotland and is drawn into the mystery of the man's death by the lines--""the singing sands, that guard the way to paradise""--that are written on the dead man's newspaper. Reprint. 15,000 first printing. NYT.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #72488 in Books
• Published on: 1996-12-16
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780684818924
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Customer Reviews

Oh What a Wonderful Tey!
This book is definitely my favourite of the Ins. Grant series. It is truly unfortunate that Ms. Tey was taken from us so young. Just think what she would have written! This book was published posthumously after her untimely death. It is as perfect a mystery as you will ever come across. In the book Grant is going on a holiday. On the train that he has taken to go to Scotland to visit friends, a young man is found dead in his room. It truly looked like misadventure, but something about it disturbed Grant and got him searching a trail that took him to the Hebrides, back to London, and to Marseilles. And what actually got him going on this impossible search were a few lines of poetry scrawled on a newspaper that the young victim had had with him before he died. Wonderful story!

Tey's Best
"The Singing Sands" is Tey's most riveting and well-crafted novel. It has more wonderful characters, more variety and beauty in the scenery/locations, and a less intense pace than her other books. It also takes the reader deeper into Grant's psyche than any of the others.

Grant is a complex and interesting man, and his Scottish voyage is more than just chasing down a confounding mystery: it is a lonely and revealing internal journey for him, at the end of which he finds resolution and new depths in himself, comfort and at-homeness within.

Tey was fascinated with Grant and in "Sands" she explored new aspects of her delicious character, perhaps falling in little in love with him in the process. I know I did.

Terrific atmosphere
I think it was Robert Barnard that pointed out Tey's avoidance of the "play fair" whodunnit--the type where a reader could deduce the solution from clues given a la Agatha Christie. That is certainly true here. Information is given to Inspector Grant by characters who are introduced quite late in the book. While these nuggets propel the narrative and lead to a satisfying conclusion, this is not the sort of mystery one could solve with the clues given.One reservation I have about her writing is her use of extended interior dialogues for Grant. They feel contrived and stilted. Otherwise I found the book compelling, especially due to the vivid atmosphere created. After reading it I have become quite interested in the Hebrides !