The Division Bell Mystery - Ellen Wilkinson

The Division Bell Mystery by Ellen Wilkinson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I do enjoy a good murder mystery and when I came across the opportunity to read and review a novel from the golden age of murder mysteries. My knowledge of authors from this period is fairly limited to the well known and still popular (Christie, Marsh and Sayers mostly) and I had not heard of Ellen Wilkinson. This is possibly because, unlike the others mentioned, she only wrote the one detective novel. She was, in fact, the first female, Labour MP in Britain and a bit of a character by all accounts. I do feel that I've been a bit remiss in not knowing more about her before now, seeing as she was a trailblazer for women, a writer, a left-wing politician and just so happens to share my birthday. Still, by the happy accident of coming across this book, I do now know a little more about her.
On to the mystery itself. It focuses on the government and parliament. The division bell of the title being the bell that is rung to signal the vote in the houses of parliament and also in this book, the murder of Georges Oissel, who had been negotiating a loan to the government. Young tory MP Robert West, who is parliamentary private secretary to the Home Secretary tries to solve the murder. Particularly as the Home Secretary is implicated by way of his being the last person to see Oissel alive. As the story progresses he finds himself drawn to the attractive granddaughter of Oissel. Although it appears that she herself might be caught up in the murder somehow.
In many ways, this book is as much a book about the way parliament works, as it is a murder mystery. There was much the reminded me of the wonderful yes minister and it's clear that it's a world that Wilkinson knows well. In many ways, it's surprising how little has changed since it was written.
I enjoyed the whole book, both the parliamentary aspect and the mystery. I have to admit that I didn't solve it, but that didn't detract from my enjoyment. I particularly liked the character of Grace Richards, who I believe was based on Wilkinson herself. I would have been interested to see how the relationship between the MP's on opposite sides of the house might have developed had there been future books.
This isn't a perfect book, there are a number of things that don't really work so well. Characters that play a large role and then vanish suddenly, others who pop up unexpectedly as though they had been there from the start. I'm not entirely convinced by the method of murder either, but perhaps this is simply because I can't really picture it from the description. Still, overall this is very enjoyable and if it is taken as a 'first' book in a series, even if there aren't any further books, then it stands up quite well. I really enjoyed it and can't help but be sad that it's an only one.
I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.


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