What a wonderful, truly delightful read! Fifth in this highly entertaining series featuring a cast of geriatric detectives with unusual and sometimes imperceptible skills, Osman has produced a mystery novel guaranteed to please fans and newcomers to his work. These clever and quirky residents of a senior living facility who call themselves The Thursday Murder Club have untangled a number of cases of murder with an aplomb sufficient to warrant a precarious relationship with two regular police detectives upon whom they call periodically for the kind of muscle they themselves cannot muster. It works for everyone, even if it frustrates the constabulary.

Elizabeth is former MI5 spy with mad skills and a permanently suspicious nature who has suffered the loss of her beloved husband and is still in grief. Ron is a former labor agitator whose rough and tumble life has included plenty of literal knocks from police but who is a steadfast and courageous fighter. Ibraham is a gay psychologist whose clients include some very dodgy criminals whom he mentors into better mental health. Joyce is the ringer here: she seems a quite nice if dithery old lady whose perceptions often exceed those of her more educated and experienced colleagues. A motely crew if there ever was one.

The plot centers around a cache of bitcoin estimated to be worth three-hundred-fifty-million pounds, as it has been languishing in a secret storage facility at the bottom of an abandoned coal mine for decades. There’s your MacGuffin. Murder and potential kidnapping accompany the attempt to reclaim the mythic code that unlocks the fortune. The Thursday Murder Club becomes involved via a marriage of one of the principals to Joyce’s hedge fund operator daughter. In their own classic style the oldsters go about solving a murderous bombing and a mysterious disappearance finding themselves along the way dealing with several criminal types from an amateur to seasoned professionals whom they confront with remarkable sangfroid.

Sure to entertain mystery lovers and those who just love a good story, amusingly told, this book is a surefire hit.