I’ve read Horowitz before so when this book appeared on my library app, I decided to pick it up. When I started listening to it, the book sounded familiar and I panicked thinking I’d read it before and was re-reading it. I was wrong. I read The Word is Murder—which, like this book, features the author as the protagonist—but a lot’s happened since I read that book and I completely forgot everything about it. My thoughts on it are here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2261741232

I found this book interesting and arresting. It was well written and pacey, and given the stakes involved quite riveting. What I didn’t like was that this book tried to educate through exposition instead of finding a diegetic way to explain the history of reservations and residential schools and the long term impact of colonialism on the Native American and Indigenous communities in North America. I appreciate a British author taking the time to fill in this gap in knowledge to a British audience, but it almost seemed underhanded to include it as a barrage of text that wasn’t entirely relevant to the storyline.

The biggest issue was how the victim was written. It’s very obvious the theatre critic in question is based on someone real—who knows which critic savagely reviewed one of Horowitz’s plays—and she’s written in the most utterly ham-fisted, cartoony villain way. This woman could do no right. I’d think a writer of this calibre would be above such put downs.

I did enjoy this book, and Rory Kinnear is a good narrator, but this one was trying too hard to go bold with some of its characters and it didn’t work. But, all in all, a fun read.

Love this series!! The writing is brilliant, and the stories are intriguing, with humor as well as suspense. This one doesn't disappoint on any front, and I can't wait to get to the next one. Last but not least, the audiobook's narration is absolutely perfect.

I have really enjoyed the twists and turns of several of Anthony Horowitz's murder mysteries. However, this one fell a little flat for me. Mixing fiction with real life, the protagonist, Anthony Horowitz, has written a play. It gets panned on opening night by critic Harriet Throsby. And wouldn't you know, later that night Harriet is murdered. All clues lead to Anthony. Thankfully, when he is released from prison, on personal recognizance, private detective Daniel Hawthorne agrees to help find the murderer in only a matter of days. The story reminds me of an Agatha Christie novel with all the suspects gathered at the end, on a stage, with Hawthorne delivering the clues which led him to the killer. Perhaps it was the setting of the theatre or the players who weren't very engaging, but I'm hoping the next in the series will have a little more intrigue!

Haven't read the first 3 but didn't impact my understanding or enjoyment.

Thoroughly enjoyed! The H & H relationship is so fun and reminds me of a less manic Sherlock.

Just couldn't get into it, unfortunately.

First off, Rory Kinnear does a fabulous job as the narrator of The Twist of a Knife. The story is told in the first person by the fictionalized Anthony Horowitz, so hopefully, I’ll never hear the real Horowitz speak, since I’ll expect Kinnear’s voice. Beyond that, though, he does all the characters’ voices well, inserting their personality and feelings into their dialogue.

When I first started this series, I wasn’t a fan of Horowitz inserting himself into the story as the detective’s sidekick, but I’ve changed my mind. The bits of his real-life intermingled with the fictional plot are fun. For example, he really did write a play called Mindgame that really was performed at the Vaudeville Theatre.

As the blurb states, Horowitz is the main suspect this time, accused of murdering a theater critic, and the evidence is mounting. Of course, he turns to Hawthorne, who takes the case. (He has his own reasons for doing so; it’s not just out of kindness.)

This is a pretty traditional mystery. We have an unlikable victim and several suspects, each with their own reason for wanting her dead. Hawthorne is our overly observant detective, the only one who is capable of putting all the disparate clues together. Horowitz works well as his sidekick, especially with his personal stake in the case being solved. The cops are pretty useless, having settled on Horowitz as the bad guy and apparently not looking any deeper.

It’s an engaging mystery with several twists and turns. I tend to enjoy the theater as a setting, too, and the Vaudeville and the cast and crew were fun. I also loved how Hawthorne staged the denoument and why.

It was probably a mistake to read the fourth in a series of books without reading the first three. I felt unengaged with Hawthorne because I was not familiar with him, and I found Horowitz' character incredibly boring. The plot line of the actual murder is quite entertaining, but it took far to long listening to the Horowitz character feeling sorry for himself to actually get to the meat of the story.

I may choose to read more of Horowitz work at some time, but I don't feel any great rush to do so.