I’d not read anything by Alexandra Benedict before but this book ticked a lot of boxes for me – a sleeper train, a whole load of shady characters thrown together and murder! Add in Christmas and I hoped for a lovely festive crime novel with shades of Agatha Christie.
The story opens with a death, before flashing back to the whole cast of characters boarding the train as they head north for Christmas – in this case not the Orient Express but a sleeper train to the Scottish Highlands that sets out despite weather warnings. Because of the reduced number of stops, the sleeper train has less passengers than usual – perfect for a murder mystery with a limited cast of characters!
And what a cast they are! Our main character is former Met detective Roz Parker, but she is joined by a ‘University Challenge’-style quiz team, a celebrity social media influencer, a reality TV star, a stowaway, a not-so-happy family and others. Aside from Roz, there aren’t many on the train that you’d want to while away a long train journey with – so it’s a bit of a relief when the serial killer starts picking off passengers as the train gets stuck in snow!
The mystery is well-plotted and kept me reading. I enjoyed that there were plenty of twists along the way – especially as links between characters became evident. I did come to this book expecting a cosy-ish crime novel in the vein of Agatha Christie – I know that Christie did touch on some horrific things, but always with a reasonably light touch. I found that ‘Murder on the Christmas Express’ didn’t quite fit the model in that some of the themes were very dark, especially the plotlines featuring rape and domestic violence. This made the book feel a little uneven in places – not a problem for me, but perhaps not a comfortable read for those appreciating trigger warnings. There were also a couple of points where I found the revelations a little unbelievable.
Despite this, I’d recommend this to anyone looking for a festive murder mystery this Christmas – there’s plenty to keep you guessing and a cast of (horrible) people to point the finger at! Armchair detectives will have a lot of fun and thank their lucky stars they aren’t on a sleeper train hurtling into the snowy wilderness on Christmas Eve!
Thanks to NetGalley for my copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
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Header photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
