Status Updates From The Dead Shall be Raised & ...

He fought like a madman, flailing the air with his manacled hands and giving with his feet, the best exhibition of la savatte that Littlejohn had ever come across.

He resembled certain oddities who, a number of years ago, could be found in Bloomsbury writing formless poetry and biographies and essays for eccentric and short-lived periodicals which sprang-up like exotic plants and as quickly perished.

1. The Dead Shall be Raised *** 1st novel in this 2-book collection featuring Scotland Yard's DCI Littlejohn. A body comes to light 20+ years after the disappearance of a suspected murderer. A vacationing Littlejohn is called in to assist the local police. This was a fairly conventional police procedural with nothing shocking in the way of twists or reveals. A nice period atmosphere though of Christmas 1940.

[Not a Christmas book at first glance, but the 1st novella is set at Christmas time in 1940 and a policeman baritone sings one of the solo parts of Handel's Messiah at a performance on Christmas Eve. The title is a quote from Messiah: "The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." from Corinthians 15:52-53.]