Summary:
At Scotland Yard, Inspector Grant has a reputation for being able to pick them at sight. Now he is in hospital, knowing that no amount of good behaviour is going to make this anything less than an extended stay. Yet his professional curiosity is soon aroused. In a portrait of Richard III, the hunchbacked monster of nursery stories and history books, he finds a face that refuses to fit its reputation. But how, after four hundred years, can a bedridden policeman uncover the truth about the murder of the Princes in the Tower? (summary from https://www.fantasticfiction.com/t/josephine-tey/daughter-of-time.htm)
Group Reviews:
9 thumbs up
4 thumbs down
Those readers who love history, Shakespeare or genealogy seemed to be the ones who enjoyed this story the most. Others found it difficult to get into or impossibly to finish.
Criticism ranged from the writing being “too dry” to the plot being confusing and meandering. All those English names—all those same English names used over and over again! One reader said the language was “strange,” another bemoaned the lack of character development and action, and pacing of the story. The writing was “too abstract.”
Kudos were given for a real “armchair detective” story. Many found it fascinating how a mystery was “solved” from the bedside. There was a reader who felt that the true character development of the story was in our understanding of Richard III.
Definitely a story for history buffs!
