[.ca] Dissolution (ISBN 0330450794)

very good debut book:
this is the debut book by c.j. sansom, which already places him in the elite level of contemporary authors (perez-reverte, eco, et al). his writing style is exquisite. just as good as, but totally different from, another monastery/abbey murder mystery: the name of the rose by eco. 5 stars *****

Dissolution and Diversity:
I picked this book up and couldn't put it down. Not only was I captured by the mystery, the writing and the characters - I was amazed at how Sansom could weave such a diversity of people into a historical novel. As a writer in the area of disability myself, I seldom find books that have accurate and compassionate characters with disabilities - Sanson manages this with ease. There are sections of this book that would work well in a disability studies class but even so there is never the sense of being preached at or being lectured - disability is just another aspect of the book which is there because disability has always and will always exist.

A fascinating historical mystery debut:
In the winter of 1537, lawyer Matthew Shardlake is asked to look into the brutal murder of a commissioner of Thomas Cromwell, the vicar general of King Henry VIII at a monastery on the south coast of Britain. The much feared Cromwell demands that Shardlake get results immediately so Cromwell will have everything wrapped up when he tells the king about the incident. He sends Shardlake as his representative to solve the crime. This is in the midst of the dissolutions of the Catholic monasteries throughout the realm as presided over by Cromwell. Shardlake, a hunchback travels the treacherous roads with his aide, Mark Poer, from London to the remote monastery. The suspects include many of the monks residing there. Things get especially tense as the deaths continue even after Shardlake arrives. There is a wealth of detail in this well written debut which, alone, makes this work noteworthy. Sansom succeeds in bringing this time and place of almost five hundred years ago to the reader with a rare sense of immediacy. In fact, it is the fascinating detail that keeps the pages turning. The mystery itself is cleverly presented and the solution quite adequate. Pacing is the casualty of the meticulous attention to detail. Characters appear realistic, yet, it is difficult to distinguish one monk from another. A glossary in the front helps. Historical mysteries can be extremely difficult to write especially by a first time novelist who handles the task adeptly. A worthy nominee in two Crime Writers Association categories.

Murder in the monastery:
Since Ellis Peters' passing, I didn't expect to read any new good murder mysteries set in English monasteries. Thankfully, I was wrong, as I thoroughly enjoyed this work by a new author. This book takes place centuries after Brother Cadfael's time, when the British monasteries were falling into the corrupt lifestyle of the pre-Reformation Catholic Church. Of course, Henry VIII's dispute over his wished for divorce sped things along, and the new officials who arose in their master's wake were for Reform, and wished to close the monasteries, as symbols of the "papist" devils. Our intrepid hero goes to a large monastery on the coast to strong arm the abbott into surrendering his monastery to the crown, after his predecessor was murdered there. The plot deepens when two other murders occur, and our hero and his assistant must work diligently to discover "whodunnit", from a list of several likely suspects. There are religious discussions, traces of disillusionment in some of the characters, and all in all quite an exciting tale from beginning to end. I look forward quite eagerly to further books from this author.

A wonderful first novel...:
If you want to see just how good this novel of Henry Tudor's time is, also read "Day of Wrath" by Iris Collier. Dissolution is extremely well written, with a believable plot and characters....this becomes very apparent when you read Collier's mystery of the "dissolution" in Tudor times...it's a horribly written, amateurish first attempt.