Rumpole and The Penge Bungalow Murders by John Mortimer, author of Charade http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/12/from-list-of-1000-novels-everyone-must.html and Titmuss Regained http://realini.blogspot.com/2019/03/titmuss-regained-by-john-mortimer-10.html both included on the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List - 9 out of 10

 

Rumpole and The Penge Bungalow Murders by John Mortimer, author of Charade http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/12/from-list-of-1000-novels-everyone-must.html and Titmuss Regained http://realini.blogspot.com/2019/03/titmuss-regained-by-john-mortimer-10.html both included on the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List

9 out of 10

 

 

This reader is not particularly inclined to indulge in detective books, but notwithstanding that, there are some magnum opera that make the expedition worthwhile, given that Umberto Eco has opened our eyes to the potential eternity involved in reading - “The person who doesn't read lives only one life…The reader lives 5,000…Reading is immortality backwards’- why not try to navigate through the lives of criminals (and detectives) to see what it is like to be a thug for a change – assuming readers are just like me, noble, innocent, god fearing humans – besides, you can find some extraordinary facts from such novels, take The Daughter of Time by Josephine Fey http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-daughter-of-time-by-josephine-fey.html for instance and the revelation from it…

 

William Shakespeare has made the world (well, we need to wonder how many know of him today, never mind read his masterpieces) know Richard III http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/richard-iii-by-william-shakespeare.html as the epitome of Evil (with a capital letter, to throw one of the favorite mannerisms, the hyperbole) while the investigation in The Daughter of Time makes plain that this was just…myth, or what might be called ‘fake news’ in the lingo of the present, for Richard III had not killed his nephews and alas, he will be known by most as a monster, when he was if not a good man, then just ordinary…

John Mortimer combines in the Penge Bungalow Murders humor (both Charade and Titmuss Regained belong to the Comedy section on the list of the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List) with drama, for we have two murders in the plot, two bomber pilots that have flown in World War II missions are shot dead and the son of one of them is accused, arrested and put on trial for the killings, while the hero of a series, Horace Rumpole, is assisting in the case to begin with, then becomes the sole defense of Simon Jerold.

 

The two bomber pilots are killed during the night, but in the prior evening they have met for a small celebration, during which Simon’s father has started to promote some martial ideas and attacked his son for his unwillingness to fight, show desire to participate in wars, a more than awkward position given what we will find out (spoiler alerts) and his dejection during the World War II, which at one stage he had become sure that Hitler is going to win, and it is pointless to keep fighting, better see the inevitable

This will be an important part of the defense plan of the young Horace Rumpole, albeit at the start, he has a leader, CH Wystan, he has to work under, only this barrister does not show an interest in the saving of Simon, he is sure the young man will be sentenced, ad executed in those days, and it is therefore in his interest to avoid annoying the court, his strategy is anyway one that keeps decorum at all costs

 

Hilda, or She Who Must Be Obeyed, is the daughter of the leader and will play a crucial role in the narrative, however less she participates in some schemes than she declares, for she does promote Rumpole, then tells him and the readers about her intention to get married, does encourage the aspiring Horace Rumpole, but her support, their dialogues are marred by her imperial perspective, she will force the young man to accept her desire, even if that concerns one of the most important decisions one can take

Seeing that he is not defended by the leader, CH Wystan, Simon Jerold tells him he does not want him for the defense anymore, and he will choose Rumpole instead, because it had been evident that the latter wants to save the client, while the leader is really concerned with other matters, given that this is a lost cause anyway, everybody knowing that it is the young man who did it, so we have a Face Off here.

 

When his father has been determined to push around the too pacifist son, Simon had taken a gun and said something to the effect of ‘if you are so bloody minded to push others to war, see if you can take this, I will shoot anyone of you who approaches me’…the older men had been keen to rough the son around, but this stopped them and later on, it was the clear ‘evidence’ that the young man had wanted to kill the father, then his pal, and other circumstantial proof was summoned to make a shut and closed case…

Nonetheless, Horace Rumpole has seen that the boy is innocent and is going to try to make sure he is acquitted, he finds more about the defeatism of the dead father, then a witness provides key testimony, having heard from the bathroom a dispute – when the two pilots returned from a Nazi prison camp, they claimed that the third man of the team had died in the fire, when the plane was shot down, only there are witnesses that had seen a dead officer, shot next to a laded plain and that sheds a different light.

 

It looks as if the bomber pilots with a wish to abandon the fight (one critic says this is improbable, and we have to agree) could not convince their navigator (was he that, maybe this is a mistake) to join them in their surrender and treason, so they had shot him dead, then pursued their goal of seeing the sitting the rest of the war from the safety of a Nazi prisoners of war camp, however, when they returned, one of their air force mates, present on the evening of the murder at the small party, has had his suspicions.

Those doubts became a conviction that they had killed their navigator, he confronts the killers (it does look as if they had done it) and talks about execution and treason, something heard from the bathroom, this and other facts pieced together by brilliant Horace Rumpole might win the day and save the innocent Simon Jerold, something for which the leader might try to take credit, the way privileged fellows do…

http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world