The Moon Tunnel

Philip Dryden #3

by Jim Kelly

From beneath a wartime POW camp near Ely, deep in the Cambridgeshire Fens, a man crawls through an escape tunnel. But he won't emerge until fifty years of peace have passed. When he does, unearthed by archaeologists seeking a Saxon burial tomb, local journalist Philip Dryden knows he has a mystery to solve. First the man appears to have been shot in the head - and second, he was breaking into the camp not out. The police treat the body as an historical curiosity, but Dryden digs deeper - and soon unearths a corpse of much more recent origin...

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Ebooks, Suspense, British Literature, Crime, Detective

352 pages, Paperback

First published June 30, 2005

About the author

Jim Kelly is a journalist and education correspondent for the Financial Times. He lives in Ely with the biographer Midge Gilles and their young daughter. The Water Clock, his first novel, was shortlisted for the CWA John Creasey Award for best first crime novel of 2002.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A return to the Cambridgeshire Fens, where reporter Philip Dryden is visiting an archaeological dig as a skeleton is discovered. The site was used as a camp for prisoners of war during World War II, but the placement of the skeleton makes clear the victim was heading into the camp, not escaping from it. That puzzle is further complicated by the fact that the skull has a bullet hole in it. Sensing a great story, Dryden begins to investigate the ancient murder...only to be on hand once again when murder strikes again in present day. It becomes clear that the deaths separated by decades must somehow be connected.

Jim Kelly does a marvelous job, not only in the intricate plot (which kept me guessing) but in the other two legs of the "good book stool": character and atmosphere. Lead character Philip Dryden is a man in limbo because of events that took place in the first book in this series (which is best followed sequentially), and his troubled journey continues in this outing. It is hard not to like Dryden; he's good at heart, makes mistakes (a big one in this book) and has fears and phobias as we all do. The imperfect protagonist is a delight if done right, and Kelly does it right.

The atmosphere in this book is unique and described with lush detail. Kelly has a true skill in painting a scene with words. That applies not only to the setting (the fens, which are in this tale enveloped in fog mixed with the spoutings of a mountain of trash on fire) but to characters and events. The characters, even the supporting cast introduced for this story, are fleshed out into real people. The events - particularly the shocking moments - grip the reader and remain in the memory.

Looking forward to the next books in the series.

[Julian Onions · Rating 3 out of 5]

A reasonable mystery, but not one I really got to grips with. Found it all a bit confusing in parts, so didn't keep me turning the pages as much.

[Carol · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The man in the moon tunnel stops and listens to the night above, shivering despite the sweat which trickles into his ears, making the drums flutter like the beat of pigeons' wings.". This is the opening sentence in the book that serves to beckons the reader to move further into the Moon Tunnel.

Journalist Philip Dryden is doing a story on an archaeological dig at the site of a WWII POW camp. More is found than artifacts when a tunnel is uncovered containing the skeleton of a man who had been shot in the forehead. What makes it more unusual it that he had been traveling toward the camp rather than escaping from it...thus beginning the story of murder...artifacts... and family secrets. Where the plot line was intriguing, the story was difficult to keep up with as there was so much back story written in italics that seemingly went on page after page. If the reader can preserver it does come to a satisfying conclusion.

[Kay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I always enjoy this author, who writes mysteries rather than thrillers. Set in the Fen country, the novel features a detective (Philip Dryden) whose wife is in a partial coma and a sidekick (Humphrey) who lives in his old Chevy Capri, which he uses to chauffeur Philip.
The atmosphere is like peasoup fog because a long-burning fire at the local dump is polluting the area with a thick smog of sulfur fumes. Meanwhile, a team of archeologists unearth the body of a man in a tunnel under the old camp used to house Italian and then German POWs toward the end of WWII. The man in the tunnel appeared to be going into rather than out of the camp, and hereby hangs the tale.
You could read this as a study of how many Italian POWs ended up settling in England while retaining their culture. A second subplot revolves around a reprisal incident in occupied Greece toward the end of the war.
It's a complex tale, not one to speed through, but I enjoyed every minute of it.

Here's a sample of how Kelly describes a drive through a small town that used to be a railroad junction:

"Humph, ignoring the dismal visibility, took the first two crossings at the Capri's top speed of 53 mph, achieving a satisfying degree of lift-off and percussion on re-entry. This was one of the joys of his life and he was deeply satisfied to hear the exhaust hit the ground on the second attempt--a hollow clang like a Chinese dinner gong--followed by the faint but exotic scrape of the rear bumper touching the tarmac. But the third barrier was flashing red before he got within distance so he was forced to pull up in the mist and wait. A train clattered past devoid of passengers, rocking the cab slightly as it rolled over uneven sleepers.

" 'That was very childish,' said Dryden, looking pointedly out of the side window at the tethered goat, its eyes a pool of satanic yellow and black. 'Well done.' "

[Reggie Billingsworth · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kelly remains an outstandingly compelling writer with a deft slyness that I always look forward to. And this mystery with its little acknowledged historical background promised to be entertaining and intriguing.

Sadly I had to start skipping about half way through Moon Tunnel. Much as I appreciate Kelly's style and impressive research, I just found the time shifts, the rather gory descriptions and the overall depressive mood that permeates the one-note life of Dryden and his sad-sack side kick cab driver too much to take or even want to keep up with.

Dryden himself seems to become almost a two-dimensional character in this title despite Kelly's obvious appeal to the readers' sympathies for the protagonist's tragic domestic status. There's just something hard to truly believe about a guy who magically produces snacks out of his capacious coat pockets on such a random but regular basis. Whether or not this trait is intended as a mood lightener by the author, the weird comical effect seems totally misguided and as a reader I don't really know what to do with that. Other reviews have noted the overall theme of claustrophobia. If this is your nightmare...walk away from this book.

So I skipped to the end and was most satisfied with the good fortune of a final epilogue that conveniently answered all my questions without all the stress of slogging through the last half of the book. Thank you Mr Kelly.

But I still think I prefer his Shaw/Valentine series.

[Alistair · Rating 3 out of 5]

Once again I found a book by Jim Kelly hard going.
However I must say "The Moon Tunnel" is a vast improvement on the previous two Dryden books.
This time it was not *all* doom and gore, The story was well pieced together and held my interest.

I will attempt the next in the Dryden books, but need to read something else first.

PS/ If you suffer from claustrophobia, this is not the book for you!

[Sarahandus · Rating 1 out of 5]

It just isn't my cup of tea.

[Michael Cordery · Rating 5 out of 5]

I decided to read the Cambridgeshire Fens books as I was born and raised in the Fens, albeit on the Norfolk side of the border. That was over 80 years ago and I left when i was 16 but I remember every bit of those 16 years and the Fens. It was tough then and winters were very cold without the mod cons we have today. When you are looking at the totally flat peat land scape it seems colder but then we knew no different. Jim Kelly makes the point that the places, people etc are fictitious but I can tell you the places are not. A lot of the villages are the real villages e.g. Southery, Hilgay, Ten Mile Bank and others just have a simple name change, particularly the creeks. I almost know where Philip Dryden is every day. I was born during WW2 and there were POWs around my way and many decided not to return to the homelands after the war. When I was around 12 an ex German POW who lived close by helped me with my algebra. He with his wife settled very well and were seen as a part of our village.

I believe to date this is the author's best book. Cleverly conceived. An excellent plot with the usual twists, intrigues, characters, conflicts and eventually resolution. It can be a tougher than usual read. The books are a little longer than most and there is something happening most chapters. As always the end to this book was had the usual unexpected resolution.

I look forward to a change of pace after the next book. Reading this in OZ on a warm day my ancestral home seemed very bleak. I guess it is so much different today.

[GBL · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the third novel in the series by Jim Kelly, set in Ely, featuring the journalist Phil Dryden. The discovery of a body buried in a long forgotten tunnel attached to a POW camp sets off a series of events revealing a historical mystery.

The body in the tunnel, at first, appears to be that of a missing Italian POW from the Second World War but it soon becomes clear that there is more to the story, with the puzzle of why the man would be heading into the camp rather than trying to escape. Phil Dryden has been reporting on an archeological dig where the body is found and is drawn into the mystery. The discovery of the murdered chief archaeologist shows that there is a modern aspect to the mystery.

Jim Kelly uses a past event as the starting point for a modern mystery, showing how events from the past can cast a long shadow over people and places. He has created interesting characters in Philip Dryden, his wife and his sidekick Humph. He succeeds in conveying the demands on a journalist to find a story and report on time, while always being alert for the next storyline for the next front page.

[PS The current publisher of the novels Allison & Busby, only have the rights to the first three Philip Dryden novels, originally published by Penguin. Hopefully, the success of these novels will lead to the republication of more of these interesting crime novels.]

[Kathleen Robson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed this novel and found it got better as I kept reading. It's about the discovery of a body in a tunnel from an WW2 internment camp near Ely. It begins as a ww2 mystery but the plot has many twists and turns before it reveals the identity of the body, the killer and the motive. I quite liked the character of the local reporter and sleuth, Philip Dryden, a world weary and embattled cynic with a soft centre. I enjoyed his almost symbiotic relationship with taxi driver, Humph, but I didn't really think that the backstory about his wife in hospital and her relationship with her father added anything to the story. But overall it had enough strands and plot to keep me interested and I enjoyed it.

[Laine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could have been interesting plot wise but drowned in thick detail, pages and pages of what appears to be constant gloomy foggy weather in the Fens of Britain. How are people driving when they can't see their hand in front of their face for the thick mist? The protagonist small town journalist is a sad sack, his domestic situation tragic, his friend-chauffeur even more depressed and depressive, the other characters all unappealing. A slog that I skimmed for the plot that was somewhat confusing and not because I had to dredge it out of pages of padding description. Others who seem to have done their duty and read the book word for word have also commented on some confusion with the many red herrings, name changes and time shifting.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

A skeleton is found buried in a tunnel with articles that had been stolen from a local mansion back in the 1940’s, and curiously, the tunnel was adjacent to a former POW camp for Italians and Germans. The skeleton also has a bullet wound in the skull. Dryden starts investigating which prisoner it could be and why was the skeleton crawling towards the camp versus away from it. This investigation leads to an Italian family that owns a local restaurant, to a group of people stealing from archeological sites, a man from the local museum, and an owner of the local dump. Great writing and weaving of a complex story with an ending that wraps up everything.

[Tony Lawrence]

I read the 1st 2 from this series, the Ely reporter/sleuth Philip Dryden, but Kelly then seemed to drop off my radar. Now, after hearing him speak at the Felixstowe book festival I am inspired to start again, and seek out other 'East Anglia noir'

A very interesting, if not astounding, weaving of a complicated family history, love and revenge, against a misty Fenland backdrop. However, it looks like something is beginning to shift in Dryden's private life, a health scare for Humph, a move (temporary?) to Lucca with his Locked-in wife ... not sure how much more Kelly can squeeze out of this series and Ely?

[David McGill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why was the escaping World War Two prisoner of war crawling back through the tunnel towards captivity when he was shot? That is what interests journalist Philip Dryden when archaeologists uncover remains. This is the third mystery set in the Black Fens of Cambridgeshire. Like Jim Kelly's novels set here or in nearby Norfolk it is rich in the character of the bleak landscape as much as the players who strut and fret upon it. Not the least bit bleak, it is beautifully written and a darned good mystery.

[Maddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this hard to follow from beginning to about 3/4th way through. Once things began to speed up, it became more bearable. This could possibly come from my American understanding of English, not British which took some getting used to? Either way the ending was absolutely dreadful. That last bit told me too much and bored the entire book.

[Sharlene Almond · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good murder mystery interweaving history with present day events. It was a little slow going for me (I do tend to like the fast pace of thrillers) However, I enjoyed the historical and cultural aspect to it. Definitely would enjoy reading Jim Kelly's other novels.

[Paschalis]

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[laura harvey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really good book. Intriguing! I didn't want to out it down

[Abigail]

I just couldn’t do it. I’ve been struggling to get through it for over three months. It’s time to throw in the towel.

[David Highton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow moving in the first half, this story about a journalist following the story of a body in a tunnel below a wartime POW camp develops well in the second half. Just about 4 stars.

[Eirlys · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shades of war

Another thrilling and suspense filled book. I liked how the characters have developed throughout the novels. Dryden is a complex man and always keeps me guessing.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ely is a small town, deep in the Cambridgeshire Fens. It's situated near low lying marshes and the canals that formed the trading routes of old. Current day Ely is slow and quiet. It's also deeply shrouded in heavy smog – part mist / part smoke from the local dump. The dump is a huge pile that's been building up for decades, and it's burning, deep in its centre, pumping pollution out to mingle with the mist.

Philip Dryden is a reporter with the local small newspaper. Philip was a bigger fish in a bigger newspaper / reporting pond until a car accident that nearly killed his wife Laura and changed both their lives forever. Laura was trapped in the car that Dryden was driving as it went into one of the canals. Comatose she has lain in a hospital bed for many years since then. A victim of “locked-in” syndrome, she has recently been able to communicate sporadically with the outside world via a computer driven by mouth suction. Since the accident Philip has refused to return to driving, and he is now ferried around by Humph, owner driver of a beaten up Capri taxi and devotee of language lesson tapes. Humph is happy to drive Philip and then sit and wait, in fact there is very little of Humph's life that's conducted outside of the Capri.

In THE MOON TUNNEL Philip is pursuing a number of stories. Firstly the future of the town dump is causing ructions, and as the smog lingers, the local council and the dump owners escalate the arguments. Not too far away, an archaeological dig is working on a series of Anglo-Saxon burial tombs. The tombs are situated below a WWII prisoner of war camp which held Italian, then German, servicemen up until the end of the war. Many of the Italian prisoners worked on farms in the area and a lot of them stayed in England after the war. They, and their families, are a prominent group in Ely still. When a skeleton is found in a wood lined tunnel, it makes sense that this is an escape tunnel from the POW camp, and the body must be that of an Italian serviceman. Only there doesn't seem to have ever been an escape from the camp. Combine that mystery with the theft of an extremely valuable painting from one of the local “Country Houses” in the dying days of the war, and Dryden thinks the body in the tunnel is not really who they re-buried him as.

THE MOON TUNNEL is one of those engaging, stately character driven English mysteries. Stately isn't meant to imply a slowness of plot that's annoying, rather that the story progresses elegantly and smoothly. Philip is a perfectly feasible amateur sleuth as he digs away at stories that interest him, perhaps that could be saleable to bigger papers than just his local rag. His ongoing devotion to his wife is touching, but not cloying or overplayed. The nightly visits to Laura, particularly now that she can communicate, albeit stiltedly, convey an intellectual as well as loving connection between them. His ongoing reliance on her ability to perform some research tasks for him is natural as is his acceptance that she may forget. Philip's ongoing friendship with Humph is also beautifully drawn out. Humph's a character and really Philip is equally as eccentric and these two men have created a friendship out of mutual reliance which is comforting and charming. Many of the cast of supporting characters also fall into that eccentric category. Ma, the dump owner, is a women to remember, as is Vee, the elderly sole remaining member of one of the great families of the great Country Houses.

Despite the amount of back story between Philip, Laura and Humph, THE MOON TUNNEL still stands up well on it's own. There is just enough information about their past to make the reader catch on to what is happening, without rewriting earlier books. The mystery of the body in the tunnel interweaves the archaeological team, local Druids and protesters, the ex-pat Italian community and Dryden's own family. There are components of this story that come from the Second World War, there are aspects that are very much current day. THE MOON TUNNEL is a very entertaining book, the mystery is interesting, the pace of the overall book is really good and Dryden and Humph are a great combination.

[LJ · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE MOON TUNNEL (Unl. Inv-Philip Dryden-England-Cont) – VG
Kelly, Jim – 3rd in series
St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2005, US Hardcover – ISBN: 031234922X

First Sentence: The man in the moon tunnel stops and listens to the night above, shivering despite the sweat which trickles into his ears, making the drums flutter like the beat of pigeons’ wings.

Journalist Philip Dryden is doing a story on an archeological dig at the site of a WWII PoW camp. More is found than artifacts when a tunnel is uncovered containing the skeleton of a man who had been shot in the forehead. What makes it more unusual it that he had been traveling toward the camp rather than escaping from it. This embarks Dryden on a story of murder, artifacts and family secrets, including this own and his wife’s, a woman in a Locked-In Syndrome for the past five years.

There was a harder edge to this book than the previous in the series. Kelly does a wonderful job of conveying the emotion of his characters which gives this book great impact. For Dryden, it is the frustration and fatigue of caring for this wife, along with the guilt and love that still exists. There is also his antagonistic friendship with Humph, his driver and all the fears and nightmares with which Dryden lives.

I love learning from books. It was interesting to be at Dryden’s shoulder as he wrote and filed his news stories. Not only did I learn about the PoW camps in England but about Seahenge, the artist Richard Dadd and chariot burials. All fascinating stuff and I am so grateful for the existence of the internet. More importantly, these things added strength and veracity to the story.

It’s not the easiest book in the series to read The story is a complicated one, aided by narrative from the past (unfortunately written in long passages of italics). Where it begins down one path it ultimately turns and goes down another path entirely. I was never able to anticipate when the story was going but allowed it to take me with it to a very satisfying end.

[Damaskcat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Journalist Philip Dryden is interested by the discovery of a skeleton in a tunnel which led from a former prisoner of war camp . The body seems to have been using the tunnel to get into the camp rather than escape from it and it seems to have met its death by shooting.

The archaeologists excavating the area seem uninterested in the body and the police are even less interested. But Philip believes there is more to it than appears and his hunch is proved right when a much more modern body is discovered in the same trench.

I found this a totally absorbing story and I was interested in all the background information about prisoners of war in England. I love the setting of this novel, and the series - in and around Ely - and the author writes evocatively about it. I like the characters - the enigmatic Dryden himself with his tragic private life; Humph - the taxi driver who loves junk food and language tapes and Dryden's fellow staff members at The Crow - the local newspaper for which he writes.

If you like crime stories with interesting backgrounds and believable characters then try the Philp Dryden series.

[Monica · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another good book in the Philip Dryden series. Once again Philip puts together the pieces of a puzzle that starts in the past only to unravel in the present. When a body is uncovered in a tunnel underneath an old POW camp in the fens, Philip has a good story on his hands. What he doesn’t foresee is that this body is the start of a much larger mystery. Add a second body to the story and things are no longer as simple as they seem. As I’ve said in my previous Philip Dryden reviews, I like reading a mystery from the point of view of a reporter rather than always from a police angle. It makes for a nice change as Philip approaches the solving of the mystery in an entirely different way. Add some returning characters, such as Humph, and this was a novel that kept the pages turning very quickly.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not quite sure this lived up to its initial promise and at several points it felt as though sections had been written separately and then put together and no editor had looked carefully enough to smooth over bumpy joins. Plus one major issue which permeates the book is 'tidied up' far too quickly at the end, and there were some implausible elements (the career path of the detective) which smacked of lazy 'made for TV' lack of research (almost as if the author were not UK based which was weird) Within the story itself, it was great that Laura got to do some of the research for her husband and some interesting topics come up. It didn't feel too lightweight.

[Genevieve Paquette · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got this one used, and it wasn't bad. I haven't read anything else by the author, and despite it being third in a series, it didn't make much difference. The story was self-contained. Not a lot of emphasis on the characters, which was ok by me (they weren't particularly interesting, tbh, and I wasn't a big fan of the main character). I wasn't sold on the wife-with-locked-in-syndrome subplot, but the main mystery was pretty good, and I enjoyed the way the painting situation was resolved.
I wouldn't actively seek out more by the author, but if someone passed me on a copy of something, I'd probably read it.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very enjoyable book - as are the others by this author that I have read over the winter. Well written, plausible plot and set in an area that in know very well.

BUT ... for this series books 1, 2, 3 plus 6 and 7 are available (I read them in Kindle format) but 4 and 5 are unaccountably out of print and not on any ebook format. Madness - here the author has a fan wanting to give him money and the books are not available. Why do publishers do this - going out of print I understand but a cost-free ebook version should be available for ever.

[Sandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Despite some mind-blowingly luscious descriptions this, for me, fell short of other of Jim Kelly's novels. In part I suspect because I've now discovered his more compelling other series, but there did seem to be an over-abundance of repetition of quirky habits and I got very mired in the multiple strands of plot.

[Tara Plumley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoy Jim Kelly's writing the fact that it is set in an area of the UK that I know really well is a huge bonus. This is gripping writing , real can't put it down have to do it in one sitting stuff. More people should read him ; up their with the likes of Rankin and Stuart Macbride