The Eighth Detective by Alex Pavesi

THE EIGHTH DETECTIVE by Alex Pavesi is often and aptly described as inventive. It is a terrific set of murder mysteries within a mystery and will appeal especially to fans of Anthony Horowitz (The Word is Murder and The Sentence is Death) or of the debut novel, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, by Stuart Turton. In Pavesi’s work, readers meet the main characters, Julia Hart (an editor) and Grant McAllister (a writer) after having already been entertained and surprised by a short story involving murder at a villa in Spain. McAllister is a mathematician who many years ago had self-published a collection of short story murder mysteries, each intended to illustrate his theories about the permutations of detective fiction. Julia is an editor working to get some background prior to a forthcoming wider publication of the stories. After each story is read, she asks several probing questions and Grant attempts to explain his thinking.  The stories themselves are suspenseful and intriguing, often paralleling the features (locked room, detective as killer, etc.) used by famous mystery writers such as Christie or Conan Doyle.  However, there are some inconsistencies in the stories and a sense of menace increases as they become darker (a woman falls to her death, another is drowned in the bath, a grandmother is smothered). I definitely enjoyed the mystery aspect, but also found much to appreciate in Pavesi’s descriptive writing style and his use of frequent similes. I am highly recommending THE EIGHTH DETECTIVE which received a starred review from Booklist.