Cover Her Face by P. D. James

I was sort of disappointed in this book, it's a very run-of-the-mill detective novel, and written in a 1920s/30s style (I actually kept forgetting it was supposed to be taking place in the 60s and thinking that when they were talking about the war they meant the first, not the second world war). The story wasn't very good (it was pretty obvious who the murderer was, and there was nothing particularly creative about the solution), and I didn't particularly like any of the characters, I actually hated the detective, Dalgliesh, who I thought was really annoying and rude. The only character I did like was Felix Hearne, a traumatised ex-member of the French resistance, who was cynical and witty. The novel was sort of bitterly funny at times, but not anything like as hilarious as Dorothy Sayers' stuff. I guess an odd feature of the book is that the solution to the crime can only be found by understanding the unusual personality of the murdered character, but it wasn't really particularly remarkable in any way, and not very entertaining.