TL;DR: Well, for a murder mystery, this was delightfully charming and cosy! I didn’t think it’d be so much fun following around four septuagenarians in a classy retirement village who are more than a little obsessed with murders but here we are. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron were wonderful characters and I loved learning more about each of them as the story progressed. There’s a host of side characters who were just as realistic and relatable, especially Chris and Donna, and colour me surprised by the reveals at the end cos I didn’t guess any of it right! 😂 Osman wove the many mysteries and storylines together so well and I can’t wait to continue with this series in the future.

This series has received a lot of love ever since I first heard about it and I understand why. This is humorous, charming and cosy—all things that you might not necessarily expect from a murder mystery but it works so well with the characters and setting. Elizabeth was quite a force to be reckoned with and I loved her mysterious (but not so mysterious) background, her shrewdness, and her endless connections that helped these elderly folk solve the murder mystery better than the coppers can. I mean, obviously, right? 😉 Although Joyce seemed like the “meek” one who mostly goes unobserved and is certainly underestimated by many, I have to admit that she’s a little bloody thirsty and I adored her! I feel like Ibrahim and Ron had less prominent roles in comparison to these two but the book would’ve been incomplete without Ibrahim’s pointed opinions about good health and exercise and without Ron’s bullish attention-seeking behaviour. They were both curmudgeonly in their ways and I adored them. They were an unlikely but well-suited quartet who had a thing for going over cold cases and I could read so many more books with them in it!

Two other central characters were Donna and Chris, the coppers who basically got whipped around by the quartet and brought in to be part of their Thursday Murder Club/found family. These two were flawed and relatable characters who I hope will continue to play big roles throughout the series. There were moments in Chris’ chapters that I didn’t expect to hit as hard as they did but holy relatableness! It was a bit of a rude slap to the face but made me feel way more connected to him than I ever expected to feel. And this is really all the more reason why I loved this book!

Although at times this felt a little dense with all the details and the number of side characters (most of whom I found intriguing), I still found it charming and I never skimmed sections or felt bored. I loved the quartet’s delight in talking about discovered pop culture things and the brilliance of technology. Their perspectives were amusing and ironically spot on! Honestly, all of it made me a bit nostalgic for the UK, especially with all the day-drinking, tea-drinking, daytime TV, soaps and dry humour (and I obviously mean that in the best of ways).

I would say that if you find the beginning a bit slow, it does pick up, though I can’t say that it ever really becomes a “fast-paced” mystery. However, the combination of quirky charming characters and their life stories, the various mystery threads that had to be weaved together and of course, solving the murder were a great mix that kept the ball rolling. Not to mention that the very conversational and matter-of-fact tone of the writing made it feel like you’re also a character in the book, solving the mystery and murder right alongside the characters. At least, that’s what it felt like to me! It’s been a while since I’ve found a book that I couldn’t wait to come back to and this was one of them. I would recommend this if you’re looking for a cosy-ish murder mystery with great characters, humour, and wit.

Have you read The Thursday Murder Club or is it on your TBR or does it sound like something you’d enjoy reading?

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