Everyone On This Train Is A Suspect

I absolutely gobbled up Benjamin Stevenson's previous murder mystery novel, Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone, and its sequel, Everyone On This Train Is a Suspect, did not disappoint. Stevenson has immense fun playing with the conventions of rules of the mystery genre, pointing out when the rules are broken, and when he's adhering to them (hm, we're at the 60,000 word mark now, we're due for another murder). In fact the key word for Stevenson's books is playful, despite their sometimes gory and dark subject matter. 

There was an extra element of fun in this book for me, because it features a collection of murder writers, who each specialise in a different kind of mystery and thus contribute a special expertise to the deduction. Thus we have forensics, legal, psychological etc. Ernest himself is suffering from the insecurity of the debut novelist, and there are plenty of enjoyable digs at the publishing industry, literary festivals, writing snobbery and rivalries (of course this wouldn't be possible with a collection of kidlit and YA writers, because everyone in that community is so supportive and simply lovely -- I'm not even joking).

The idea of a crime writing festival held on the Ghan is simply gorgeous -- what a dream! I hope Stevenson got a grant for research. Trains, writers, murder and self-aware playfulness, as well as a genuinely clever and twisty plot: what more could you ask for? Oh, and it's Australian, too.