The Thursday Murder Club Literary Elements

Murder Mystery

Kent, Cooper's Chase village, approximately present time

The narration flips between third person omniscient and the voice of the character Joyce.

Mysterious, thrilling

Protagonist: a group of retired individuals who created The Thursday Murder Club; Antagonist: the mystery killer

Tony Curran, a local ruffian and businessman, gets suddenly murdered. This opens up a case for the police and The Thursday Murder Club, led by a retired secret agent, Elizabeth.

As the mystery unravels, many plot twists suddenly appear. Elizabeth's best friend Penny and her husband are connected to Ventham's murder, while the murderer of Tony Curran is the unassuming Polish worker Bogdan.

"Who loses what, Penny? That's the question, isn't it?"
-foreshadowing of Penny's involvement with the murders.

"The journey passes very pleasantly. The sun is up, the skies are blue and murder is in the air."

"Like whoever wrote that diary about Holmes and Watson?"

"Matthew Mackie turns and looks back across the Garden, squinting into the sun. Either side of the path are the gravestones, neat, ordered, symmetrical, stretching forward in time towards the iron gates. The oldest graves are nearest to Christ, with the newest joining the line when their time had come. There are around 200 bodies high on the hill, a spot so beautiful, so peaceful, so perfect, Mackie thinks it could almost make him believe in God."

"I wouldn't want you to feel like we were interfering, Donna, but at the same time I do want to interfere."

"I think I would have helped if I saw a fit youngster take the tumble I did. I think you would too. I think I would have sat with him, I think the traffic warden would have picked up his laptop and I think the woman in the café would still have offered to drive him to her GP."

n/a

"The leaves clinging gamely on, the last hurrah of the heat, the odd trick still up its sleeve."