The Case of the Christmas Card (Book Review)

 

The Case of the Christmas Card
(Ali Dawson 2.5)
by Elly Griffiths
Audio book narrated by Julie Maisey
(4 hrs and 42 mins)

A "Christmas special" in Elly Griffiths' series about time-travelling detective Ali Dawson. 

You can read my reviews of the two previous books in the series here: 
The Frozen People and The Killing Time. 

In the first book we got to know Ali Dawson, a woman in her 50s, working with a "cold case team"  reputed to investigate "crimes so old, they're frozen". What most people outside the team don't know, is that they have even found a way to travel back in time to do research. In both books we get to follow Ali back to London in the 1850s - but even the time travellers themselves are still having difficulties when it comes to  understanding the details of how it all works - and especially, how to get back to their own time again...

In this "Christmas special", it's not Ali who goes travelling in time, though - but a famous person from the past who unexpectedly turns up on her doorstep, in our own time: The famous author Charles Dickens (whom Ali met before, back in his time.) And he doesn't know more than Ali, neither about how he ended up there - or how to get back.

Quoting Audible's teaser for the book:

"As the whole of London is in full festive swing and preparing for the most special day of the year, Ali and Dickens are exploring the town, desperate to solve not just one but two crime cases. Will they succeed before Christmas Day arrives - and more importantly, will Charles find a way back home?"

While I'm still having "difficulties" myself with the time travelling concept in these books, at the same time I did find it entertaining. 

 

The problem with listening to audio books is that it's hard to go back and look up specific things afterwards, but I think it was hinted at somewhere in this story that the real Dickens did actually at some point "disappear". So asked the all-knowing Google AI about that, and this (below) is what it came up with:

 

Charles Dickens did not permanently disappear, though he did go missing from his family for a short period as a young child, and he maintained a secret, hidden double life as an adult.

• Childhood (1824): At age 12, when his father was sent to Marshalsea debtor's prison, Charles was sent to work in a blacking (shoe polish) factory. He lived on his own in a lodging house and was essentially cut off from normal family life, an experience that left a deep emotional scar.

• The Staplehurst Train Crash (1865): Dickens was briefly unaccounted for or lost from public view during the June 9, 1865, train accident in Staplehurst, Kent. He survived the crash and famously crawled back into a suspended first-class carriage to rescue the manuscript of Our Mutual Friend before helping other wounded passengers.

• Secret Affair (1857–1870): As an adult, Dickens lived a double life. He separated from his wife, Catherine, in 1857 and maintained a clandestine, long-term relationship with the young actress Nelly Ternan, keeping her hidden from public society.