Traditional crime writing at its best; the kind of book without which no armchair is complete
The Sunday Times
No one constructs a whodunit with more fiendish skill than Colin Dexter
The Guardian
Dexter has created a giant among fictional detectives
The Times
A character who will undoubtedly retain his place as one of the most popular and enduring of fictional detectives
- P. D. James, <i>The Sunday Telegraph</i>,
The writing is highly intelligent, the atmosphere melancholy, the effect haunting
The Daily Telegraph
The triumph is the character of Morse
Times Literary Supplement
Colin Dexter’s superior crime-craft is enough to make lesser practitioners sick with envy
The Oxford Times
[Morse is] the most prickly, conceited and genuinely brilliant detective since Hercule Poirot
The New York Times Book Review
‘A giant among fictional detectives’ – The Times
Death is Now My Neighbour is the twelfth novel in Colin Dexter’s Oxford-set detective series.
As he drove his chief down to Kidlington, Lewis returned the conversation to where it had begun.
‘You haven't told me what you think about this fellow Owens – the dead woman’s next-door neighbour.'
‘Death is always the next-door neighbour,’ said Morse sombrely.
The murder of a young woman, a cryptic ‘seventeenth-century’ love poem, and a photograph of a mystery grey-haired man is more than enough to set Chief Inspector Morse on the trail of a killer.
It’s a trail that leads him to Lonsdale College, where the contest between Julian Storrs and Dr Denis Cornford for the coveted position of Master is hotting up.
But then Morse faces a greater, far more personal crisis . . .
Death is Now My Neighbour is followed by the thirteenth and final Inspector Morse book, The Remorseful Day.
Colin Dexter’s bestselling and award-winning Inspector Morse novels are loved across the world. Beginning with Last Bus to Woodstock, the series follows the nation’s most beloved fictional detective in his work as a senior Criminal Investigation Department officer within the Thames Valley Police in Oxford. Morse is known for his penchant for cryptic crosswords, English literature and cask ale, as well as his world-class deductive reasoning.
Written between 1975 and 1999, the thirteen novels proved ideal for television, being adapted by ITV with John Thaw playing Morse from 1987 to 2000. Spin-off shows have also been abundant, with Shaun Evans portraying the inspector in the prequel, Endeavour; as well as Lewis, a series based on Morse’s former Detective Sergeant.