The Moving Toyshop (Gervase Fen, #3) in Reading the Detectives

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The Moving Toyshop (Gervase Fen, #3)

Edmund Crispin

Start date: May 14, 2022

Finish date: June 6, 2022

Discussion: Buddy reads

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What Members Thought

Mar 01, 2021 Rosario added it

Shelves: dnf

I bought this because I read somewhere that Agatha Christie was a friend of Crispin's and really liked his books. I'm always on the lookout for more Golden Age-type mysteries!

It started well. I was intrigued by the idea of this moving toyshop, and what the hell might have happened there. But it all went downhill from there. Crispin is nowhere near as funny as he thinks he is, his female characters are crap, and his male characters are obnoxious. They're very callous and go around sowing chaos a ...more

8 likes · Like · see review

Jun 07, 2015 Damaskcat rated it it was amazing

I believe this is generally accounted one of the best of Edmund Crispin's Gervase Fen stories and it is certainly very clever. Richard Cadogan goes to Oxford for a short holiday. He is a well known poet and the reader gets an idea of his character from the opening scene in which he has an acrimonious discussion with his publisher about the size of the advance on his next book.

Cadogan goes to Oxford by train and for various reasons finds himself in a toyshop in the middle of the night and in comp ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Jun 14, 2022 Frances rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery-series

This is a rather crazy and unbelievable mystery set in Oxford in the 1930's involving a mysterious will, a Toyshop which disappears, and various Professors/proctors/undergraduates/visitors who move in and out of the narrative, which I believe takes place over a single 24-hour period. I give it 4 stars because it is fun and light and has some very clever dialogue and some truly ridiculous plot turns and chase scenes. The movement through Oxford in and out of colleges and pubs and punts and other ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Oct 21, 2016 Ellen rated it liked it

The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin.

This book may have been popular during the 1940's-50's when slapstick was the rage. It did not suit my taste in mysteries. It started off with a man on a mission who meanders into a toy store and although no one is there continues all the way upstairs and stumbles over a murdered woman.

The race is on as the police, then notified, cannot only find the body of this murdered woman...they cannot find any toy store. In its place is a grocery store. It boggles the ...more

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Apr 12, 2022 Jill rated it it was ok

Shelves: edmund-crispin

One of the reviews said this was like a Benny Hill sketch, and I couldn't agree more. It is a complete farce. Fen was not so ill-mannered in this book, which was a great improvement. I don't think P G Wodehouse would have any competition with author, this is not a patch on him. I did think the overall plot of this was well thought out, but the racing about in 8 wheeled trucks was pathetic, along with the hoards of students.
If this was supposed to be Crispin's best, it doesn't bode well for the r ...more

1 like · Like · see review