Dead Heading

Inspector Sloan #24

by Catherine Aird

When Jack Haines reports a break-in at his greenhouse, the motive of the intruder is unclear. Other than the destruction of some expensive orchids, no damage has been done and nothing seems to be missing. But Detectives Sloan and Crosby sense something sinister, and soon their suspicions are confirmed. Similar reports are multiplying and sabotage is the word on everyone's lips. The pair are drawn into an equally perplexing case when the mysterious Miss Enid Maude Osgathorp goes missing. Investigations begin at her deserted abode, Canonry Cottage, where the detectives soon discover that the house has been raided. Shattered glass is found in the larder and traces of blood bespatter the floor - a disturbing event has taken place, but the identity of the perpetrator is unknown. It soon becomes clear that the cases are linked, but will this provide the clues necessary to solve the mystery? Detectives Sloan and Crosby aim to find out ...

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Audiobook, Cozy Mystery, Contemporary, Procedural, British Literature

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Kinn Hamilton McIntosh, known professionally as Catherine Aird, was an English novelist. She was the author of more than twenty crime fiction novels and several collections of short stories. Her witty, literate, and deftly plotted novels straddle the "cozy" and "police procedural" genres and are somewhat similar in flavour to those of Martha Grimes, Caroline Graham, M.C. Beaton, Margaret Yorke, and Pauline Bell. Aird was inducted into the prestigious Detection Club in 1981, and is a recipient of the 2015 Cartier Diamond Dagger award.

Reviews

[Julie · Rating 3 out of 5]

An intriguing mystery involving plants.

I learned a new word: twocking, which is British slang for the act of breaking into a motor vehicle and driving it away.

One victim dies of an overdose of paracetamol, which is the British name for acetaminophen. The following joke is included in the text and goes, "Why are there no aspirins in the jungle? Because the "parrots eat 'em all."" Very droll.

One of the things I like most about this detective series is the wry humor and another is the relationship between Detective Sloan and Constable Crosby. Here's an example of their dialogue:

Crosby: ""I don't know that I can remember the way backwards," said the constable moodily. He had been hoping to drive back to the police station and its canteen."

Sloan: "If, Crosby, baby elvers can find their way four thousand miles back to the Sargasso Sea without a route map, I think you should be able to manage it."

[Ivonne Rovira · Rating 5 out of 5]

Detective Chief Inspector C.D. Sloan return with the incorrigible Detective Constable William Crosby in tow in Dead Heading, the 25th in the series. Sloan, an inveterate gardener, brings his knowledge to bear in what at first appear to be two unrelated cases: two acts of sabotage involving delicate orchids at two plant nurseries and a prickly spinster named Enid Maude Osgathorp who appears to have gone missing.

Dead Heading boasts clever plotting, memorable characters, and infusions of subtle humor — just what longtime fans of author Catherine Aird have come to expect. The demanding Superintendent Leeyes and the blundering Crosby certainly will make the reader — although not the long-suffering Sloan — smile. And I really enjoyed that it was Sloan’s legendary skill at gardening that finally cracked this case.

Highly recommended for anyone seeking an enjoyable cozy.

[Cyn McDonald · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have never understood why everyone seems to think that Constable Crosby is a nitwit. He's actually fairly smart and observant. I guess it's the odd comments and muttering to himself that puts them off.

I haven't read these in any sort of order, due to availability at the library. I have enjoyed the ones I have read.

[Roshni · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really dig the number of gardening puns in this. This is a great quick read where Inspector Sloan tries to puzzle out the connection between a missing person and some destroyed orchids. He is deep in the weeds in this one, trying to hack his way out with lots of investigation ground work and helped by the trusty Constable Crosby.

[Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Centers around the local nurseries, and begins with the destruction of three whole greenhouses full of plants. If the culprit hadn’t chosen to bury the body where he did, most of the mayhem wouldn’t have been necessary.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really, 4 1/2 stars.

[Kerrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I decided to borrow this from my local library after seeing a tribute to Catherine Aird on Martin Edwards' blog after the CWA announced she had been awarded the Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence in her work.
Edwards says

Her plots are clever, her characters and situations are entertaining,and her humour a real bonus..

Despite the number of books Aird has written (see Fantastic Fiction for the list), I have never reviewed one in the history of this blog.

DEAD HEADING was true to Edwards' summary: a clever two-pronged plot where the strands finally merge, but it is hard to see for most of the book how they will. A cozy in the British tradition and a fine mystery. I also enjoyed the characters of the two main detectives and their boss. It didn't seem to matter that I had come in at the end, rather than the beginning, of the series.

[Jo-Ann Jones]

Catherine Aird is apparently revered in England -- they've given her an O.B.E. While it's clear she can rub two words together, she might consider giving up murder mysteries altogether, in favour of parlour conversations between a lot of very proper English people. In this book, the murder ultimately seems secondary to the purpose of this story, as if it were an aside in a stage play. None of the characters have 3 dimensions, especially and including Detective Chief Inspector Sloan and his bumbling sidekick Constable Crosby. Crosby is an aside as well, never offering anything useful or relevant. Aird has so many characters in this book all vying for the role of "bad guy" that Inspector Sloan is more of a juggler than a sleuth. I hope her earlier works deserve a better gander than this unfortunate tale of disappearing flowerpots.

[Lisa Kucharski · Rating 4 out of 5]

As with many of Aird’s books the title generally refers to some aspect of the crime generally the location- and Dead Heading (the plucking of dead flower heads from a plant) indicates that the location for much of these crimes center around gardening...though it appears Sloan’s love of roses won’t get used it does help to know other aspects of gardens.

An interesting plot here, and I was able to figure out aspects of it by playing the “detective” and while that helps, it doesn’t solve who did it right away.

Nice mystery that begins with so many “seemingly” unrelated threads that all sew together in the in end.

[Antoinette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dead Heading is a Sloan and Crosby Mystery by Catherine Aird. It is a British police procedural that I never would have picked up except it came highly recommended. It is as dry as dirt ( a pun related to the topic of gardening, the subject of the novel), neither Sloan nor Crosby is the least bit interesting, but Aird can write. Her use of adverbs is amazing. If you think adverbs have no place in a police procedural, you must read this book. I probably will never read another police procedural in my life, but I enjoyed this one and she kept me guessing to the very end.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cozy mystery genre. This is #24 in a series featuring Detective Inspector C.D. Sloan. I have never read any of the others, but it is a stand alone novel. Someone deliberately opens the greenhouse gates at two nurseries, killing all the plants inside, which are mostly orchids. At the same time, a local woman disappears. The two cases are related, and it us up to Inspector Sloan to discover how. I did find his sidekick, Constable Crosby, annoying rather than amusing.

[Jane Irish Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cross between police procedural and cozy mystery. Written with a great deal of wry humor, the story draws the reader in from the beginning, when Sloan is handed two cases. First what appears to be malicious damage at two local garden supply greenhouses, where open greenhouse doors lead to the destruction of valuable orchids; and second, the disappearance of an older woman, who once worked for a local (now deceased) doctor, and is now an avid gardener. Are the cases connected, and if so, how?

[Cherie Waggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've read a number of the Inspector Sloan books now and my only observations are that Sloan needs to pick up the pace; Crosby needs to shut up; and the Chief needs a little humility. He doesn't do anything but yell and when Sloan closes the case, takes all the credit. Not a criticism, just an observation.

[Missyd · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came across an article about Catherine Aird recent death at age 94. I had never heard of her before. In the article she said started writing as the police in the murder mysteries all were depressed alcoholics and she’d like to read one about an everyday ordinary policeman. And I thought I’d like that too!

I enjoyed it and did not pick the murderer.

[Suzanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Catherine Aird's Inspector Sloan's series is one of my favorite British village mysteries. "Dead Heading" did not disappoint. I only gave three stars because there was a lull in the middle where it seemed Sloan struggled to make progress. Generally he is always moving the case forward.

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

one of my favorite series.

I enjoy thé repartee. i like them as people, there is no. Unnecessary Violence. No suspense. I enjoy Crosby’s asides. And the quotations which keep cropping up. Figured it out but I may have read it before.

[Adele · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a different and interesting plant themed plot. It was a good story, but did seem a bit slow and repetitive in the middle. This has been a very good series that I have enjoyed. I really liked Detective Sloan and Constable Crosby.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

A greenhouse door is left open during a frost which kills all the new orchids and other plants ordered for spring. Then it happens to another greenhouse. Several suspects are investigated but soon cleared. At the same time, a retired nurse has been missing for 3 weeks and her house burgled.

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Comfortable characters, surprising ending. Would like to read more in the series.

[Sara Aye Moung · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am very much enjoying this series. This one is particularly intriguing with a floral theme and an unexpected denouement.

[Susan Eubank · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good with the plant theme. Just a little too plot driven for my taste.

[JB · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't know why but I kept thinking this book was set in the forties or fifties until I got a mention of a mobile phone. It was okay, not horrible, not great. Probably won't bother with another.

[Janelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

[Kara Rowley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool and scary

[Deb Mervold · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this Crosby and Sloan novel. Characters were likeable. Plot was interesting.

[Dr. Fitz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Surprisingly entertaining, a new crime for me.

[Jill Stirling · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent

[Melissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another tricky mystery from Catherine Aird involving a missing person who isn't much missed, and two greenhouses full of orchids with the doors left open to a killing frost ... accident or sabotage? The clues are there, but the resolution comes suddenly, with many clues pointing to other suspects - all wrapped up tidy for the end.

[Gloria Feit · Rating 4 out of 5]

I must admit that this was my introduction to the Sloan and Crosby Mysteries, of which there have been more than twenty. But it won’t be the last I read, as it is completely charming.

DI Christopher Dennis (“Seedy”) Sloan is head of the small Criminal Investigation Department of “F” Division of the County of Calleshire Police Force at Berebury. Practically on the eve of his appraisal by his boss, known as a “Personal Development Discussion,” he is on “good behavior” when that superior officer, Superintendent Leeyes, assigns him to investigate what may be only a malicious breakin at a local plant nursery where, on a cold night, the doors to two greenhouses were left wide open on a night when an early frost has set in, virtually killing its contents, in one of which were the remains of young and very special [read “expensive”] orchids, threatening the livelihood, or worse, of the nursery’s owner. From this seemingly innocuous beginning, the ensuing plot ultimately involves a break-in at an area cottage by two different persons; “an unloved missing person; the blackmailing of more than one poor soul; the probable suicide of one of them; the odd, naïve behaviour of a maker of bonfires; inexplicable goings-on in the horticultural trade and, cast into the mixture for good measure, the destruction of hundreds of infant orchids.”

When a second nursery is broken into, Sloane and his underling, D.C. Crosby, investigate, and discover that yet another large number of valuable orchids has been destroyed; it becomes clear that this is something more than a coincidence. As things escalate and the number of suspects rises, the pressure on Sloane mounts as well. Leeyes is a difficult man to please: “on a bad day the superintendent was quite capable of blaming him for not catching Jack the Ripper.”

With references to Shakespeare, Erasmus and Shaw, and filled with horticultural metaphors, the writing is delightful. The attorneys for one of the suspects are Puckle, Puckle and Nunnery. (I do have to admit that I never knew that the word “turf,” in the plural, could be “turves.”) By the end, all the loose ends are tied up and the mystery is solved to the reader’s complete satisfaction. The novel is recommended.

[Damaskcat · Rating 5 out of 5]

DI C D Sloan decides crime is declining in his area of Calleshire when he is asked to investigate the loss of some valuable orchids at a nursery where it appears the greenhouse doors have been deliberately opened on a frosty night.

A missing person – a former doctor’s receptionist – from the same village seems a bit more like his usual work but there do not seem to be any leads to either crime. When another nursery also loses some valuable orchids in a similar manner it looks as though someone just doesn’t like orchids.

But naturally things are much more complicated than they seem and Sloan is once again landed with DC Crosby who, it appears, will never grow into a half way decent detective. Yet just occasionally he makes an apposite remark which starts his superior thinking.

Sloan and Crosby make an entertaining duo who somehow manage to investigate – and solve – crimes in spite of unwarranted interference from the irascible Superintendent Leeyes. This is not great literature but it is great entertainment if you like your crime stories with a touch of humour and not too much violence. The series can be read in any order.