Description
Price: $18.00 - $9.69
(as of Mar 19, 2025 11:29:05 UTC – Details)
Soon to be a Major Motion Picture
The first installment in the beloved and New York Times bestselling series from Richard Osman, also author of We Solve Murders
Four septuagenarians with a few tricks up their sleeves
A female cop with her first big case
A brutal murder
Welcome to…
THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB
In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves the Thursday Murder Club.
When a local developer is found dead with a mysterious photograph left next to the body, the Thursday Murder Club suddenly find themselves in the middle of their first live case.
As the bodies begin to pile up, can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer, before it’s too late?
“Witty, endearing and greatly entertaining.” —Wall Street Journal
From the Publisher
Publisher : Penguin Books; Reprint edition (August 3, 2021)
Language : English
Paperback : 384 pages
ISBN-10 : 1984880985
ISBN-13 : 978-1984880987
Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
Dimensions : 5.4 x 0.7 x 8.1 inches
Customers say
Customers find the book amusing and witty. They appreciate the clever plot twists and believable characters. The writing style is described as sharp and easy to read. Customers find the premise interesting and poignant, exploring the issues of aging and coming to terms with it. Overall, the book is described as an intelligent, creative read that is enjoyable for all ages.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Mark –
I loved this book
a great read, I really enjoyed the back and forth chapters between the story and the first-person journal entries. great easy to visualize characters. I stream UK television to the US and I have seen Richard Osman frequently. I think he is just great.
Joseph S. –
Offputting first half, good second half
Richard Osmanâs THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB, the first in The Thursday Murder Club series, centers around four elderly residents of a fashionable retirement center who meet on Thursdays to solve unsolved murders.
A founding member, Penny Gray, who was a retired police inspector, brought files on unsolved murders for the foursome to study. Poor Penny is now in a coma. Her replacement in the group, Joyce (who shares her diary entries with readers) was a nurse. The unofficial leader of the group is Elizabeth, who has a knack of acquiring information by calling in favors people owe her. Ibraham and Ron are the two men in the group.
After an actual murder occurs, the group jumps in to solve it. The police are involved, too, of course (I like Donna De Freitas), and they do an admirable job; but as you probably can guess, they are no match for (drum roll) THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB.
Being an acute observer of human behavior myself, I easily fingered the murderer even before the actual murder. To my chagrin, the obvious murderer instead became the first victim. (In the story we learn of three or four murders and two suicides, some fifty years apart.)
Reviewers call the book âcleverâ and âlaugh out loud funny.â I personally enjoy clever, but donât like silly (Monty Python excepted). I found some parts clever, but too many silly in the first half of the book. The only time I laughed out loud was when I said to myself, âYou paid good money for this?â To be fair, I have long heard the English idea of laughing out loud is to say âJolly good show.â
But wait â That sounds too critical. Hereâs the deal: Early on there are many parallel storylines. The chapters are very short and they hop around the various storylines. I could not latch onto any characters or care about all the plots for the first 200 pages. I definitely didnât laugh out loud (though I did say Good Show a few times).
Many of the side stories came into focus around page 200, and I understood the characters better. About that time, the plot thickened, as mystery writers like to say, and before I knew it, I was enjoying the book. The Oddest thing: As I read the final 150 pages, Iâd recall snippets from the first 200 pages and suddenly they seemed more relevant than when I initially read them. I even thought of reading the first 200 pages again to see if they made more sense now that I knew the whole story (but then the Super Bowl started).
The author, Richard Osman, is better known in England for creating, writing and sometimes appearing in TV shows. In the U.S., you might be familiar with two of his shows – Suvivor and Deal or No Deal. (Neither of which, I regret, Iâve ever seen.)
My rating: 4 stars. It might be 5 stars except for the offputting first 200 pages.
research4u –
I loved this book !
The characters are charming and the setting is delightful. The premise is genius, a bunch of retirees solving cold cases (and warmer, recent cases) whilst sipping wine or sherry, or the occasional whiskey! A fun read and kudos to the author for coming up with such a clever story. You will enjoy itâ¦
Michelle Llewellyn –
Killer Revealed Then Everyone Went Home…The End
I have to agree with other reviewers about this book. The quirky characters are the best part and whole concept to hook a reader in-a group of retirees who like to investigate cold case murders and try to solve them…until an actual murder takes place at their retirement home community. I had high hopes for this book as this is not a genre I read very often, I prefer historical fiction. So, I probably won’t be reading the other books in this series. If not for my bookclub, I would never have picked this up and that’s just what “The Thursday Murder Club” is-a bookclub-type of read.
“Well, let’s start with Elizabeth, shall we?” any good writer worth their salt knows the first line of your novel is critical. This is how you pull in your reader and keep them hooked. This is one of the best opening lines I’ve come across in a long time, unfortunately by the time I got to the end and the murder was solved, I was still confused over who had actually “dunnit” (kinda important if you’re writing a whodunnit novel!) and not really caring what the motive of the killer was. Neither were ever fully explained.
Elizabeth is the unofficial leader of this motley crew of septuagenarians who like to meet every Thursday to discuss cold case murders thanks to one of Elizabeth’s friends who used to work as a police officer here in England, where this story takes place. The opening line is being told from the point of view of Joyce and it might have been nice if our author had picked just one or maybe two or three but no more POVs to use in telling the story because every chapter (some were only a page or two long) jumped from one character’s head to another. Other reviewers have commented on how distracting this was. I agree. Then there were the dead bodies that kept popping up left and right.
We also interrupt this plot many times so one of the characters can tell a story and info dump about one of the dead bodies the Murder Club keeps discovering: the tragic love story of a priest and a nun, a young man murdered just because he knew too much, one of Joyce’s male friends here at the retirement community who just couldn’t go on without his beloved wife who passed away several years ago. All of these stories are supposed to trick the reader into thinking, “NOW the killer can finally be revealed!” Wrong. The story keeps going until the very end, a very anticlimactic reveal of the actual killer.
Then everyone went home.
The End
I don’t think I gave away anything important back there but I do recommend reading this book. It really was an entertaining and enjoyable read. There is very little swearing (gotta love the British and their cuss words vs American!) no graphic descriptions of any of the murders that occur. It is easy to root for Joyce and Elizabeth, their two male friends who make up the club and the two British police officers doing their best to investigate the murders while the Club keeps breathing down their necks but do we have to hear the story from every single one of them, every other chapter? A great pick for your bookclub but that’s about it.
ALBERTO LOPEZ –
Es un tema simpático por el grupo de gente mayor que resuelve los casos. Además puedo practicar el inglés
Mariana Hagemann –
Livro chegou rápido e muito bem embalado. A leitura é super gostosa e flui muito bem. Plot divertido, engraçado. Ãtimo pra treinar o inglês. Já quero o 2!
Martin –
Spannend von der ersten bis zur letzten Seite. Mir gefällt die Schreibweise sehr!
Danica –
I love a novel that is not too winding, but still mysterious enough. I found the storytelling is easy to read, but the twist is amazing that makes me keep guessing who is the killer. Recommend it!
Aybige –
Bought the first three books of the series and canât wait to buy the new one, the fourth book. Great very British crime novel!