Except the Dying Book

Join Murdoch as he begins a case, attempting to find the cold blooded murderer of an innocent teenage girl... Twist in and out through the turns and flips as the story unfolds and mirror Murdoch as he figures out just who had done the heinous crime.

This is of course, the predecessor to the television series (which I happen to be a massive fan of!), but if you are a fan of the TV series I can safely say that you will most likely enjoy this too - but you must be aware that book Murdoch is slightly less gentlemanly and more callous, less courteous and less bashful - which are some charms that I was looking forward to reading in book form but are sadly missing. That being said, I truly do love the book version of Murdoch, too, and I enjoy them both very much the same! They have formed as two separate characters to me, but I love them both dearly (and I cannot help but see book Murdoch as Yannick, too, even though he's described as having a moustache!) and have formed quite a liking towards the book version.

The appearance of Crabtree was brilliant; though I hope to see more of him in later novels so to get a feel for this version of his wonderful character! The very same goes for Brackenreid; I can't wait to see his and Murdoch's day to day conflicts! The characters are all well rounded and they leave you yearning to see more of them; they don't seem square and boring and each character has a distinguishing feature about them so you don't feel that it's the same sort of character duplicated; even the generic constables at the station house have quite telling differences about them to help you differentiate between them. It's utterly charming how each character also possesses different views and varying dialogues; which adds diversity and further depth to the story.
The back stories are also really good for the characters too and it's so nice to learn about them as we go along!

The mystery in this is strong, it keeps you guessing and completely pulls you in from the first page right until the very end - which, by the end, my heart was hammering and my eyes were wide; which is a sign of a brilliantly formed mystery novel. Jennings writes in such a way that you simply can't guess from the off "who dunnit", but begins to pepper clues here and there so that you can piece them together as Murdoch does - which helps the reader feel truly connected with the story and as if they are working alongside the detective. I felt like another Constable opposed to someone reading some documents about a case; it was written so well that I felt part of it rather than like an onlooker. The whole story was really tense and interesting all the way throughout and there definitely weren't any dull moments throughout - it kept me on my toes and well and truly kept me thinking; there was never a turn of the page whereby a thought hadn't crossed my mind. It was extremely well thought out and there was no plot holes - everything had been covered and sealed with an extremely brilliant turn of events.

I can safely say that the "climax" of the story was incredibly intense and I felt goosebumps, my heart was hammering and I was feeling so pulled into the story that I forgot there was a world surrounding me outside of the book. It was absolutely phenomenal how Jennings made the climax so easy to read, so thrilling without any slight dose of monotony or predictability. Ahhh, it was wonderful!

For me, the mystery was tense, the story was well written, the plot was well thought out and interesting and the writing was superb and kept up with the time era that it was written in; I loved how it was obvious that research had taken place in order to make even minor details like how a gas lamp was lit back then had been looked into in order to get it right! Everything was accurate to the time it was based within - even down to the entirety of the vocabulary - and it was thoroughly exciting to read.

I was honestly stricken by how brilliant this book is and how wonderfully intense the storyline was; I'm definitely excited to continue with the series and would 100% recommend you check this series out for yourself!
This is honestly an all round, great mystery novel - and I would whole heartedly recommend this to anyone (Murdoch fan or not), who is just starting out with the mystery genre or someone who has read plenty!