Ashbys have lived there for generations: the estate — established but unpretentious, like its family (who will never change their traditional inn rooms for better ones when they attend the local agricultural fair) — represents the continuities and privileges of English country life. Josephine Tey wrote a number of detective stories but her best work hardly comes under the heading of a whodunit. Imagine sliding the book out of its strong protective case, casting an eye at the beautiful colour illustrations and then whetting ones appetite with the concise and lucid intro from Ruth Rendell. Further, he insisted: we only have differing perceptions of things when we see them from different perspectives.

Brat, who has a striking resemblance to men of the Ashby family, has a chance meeting with a connection to the family. I’ve been rereading The Daughter of Time for decades, so it’s odd that until now I had never read another novel by Josephine Tey. it is why i always took really extensive notes in lecture classes, and why i forget things people tell me allll the time. He knows things about Patrick's life and the Ashbys that only Patrick could have known, and he is the exact image of Patrick.

Brat is a nice man, and isn’t particularly swayed by the idea of an inheritance – what really gets him is the idea that he’ll get to work with a whole stableful of premium horses. It is about a young man, the Brat Farrar of the title, who is claiming to be the heir to a large estate. Edmund Husserl, creator of Phenomenology, believed that to understand existence, we must stand back from it, we must pause and detach and reflect. Aunt Bee is typical of a generation of war-time women who had to be strong and unselfish for the sake of others.

He is persuaded to impersonate Patrick Ashby, the elder twin of Simon Ashby, who was thought to have committed suicide eight years previously, and whose body was never found.

It’s an intriguing set up, if one is willing to suspend disbelief, and I always am for some sort of coincidental premise. I believe that Tey’s plays were far more successful during her life-time than her novels although they did well enough.

It turned out to be a real page turner, so well written that I was wishing for it to go for at least another 300 pages. My old housemate, and dear friend, Kirsty has three abiding passions: dogs, lexicography, and talking about how great Josephine Tey is. A stranger enters the inner sanctum of the Ashby family posing as Patrick Ashby, the heir to the family's sizeable fortune. This book is unusual in that it draws the reader inside the story and invites you to unlock the mystery. The Ashby family consists of Beatrice Ashby ("Aunt Bee"), a spinster of about 50, and the four children of her late brother Bill: Simon, 20; Eleanor, 18–19 and the twins Jane and Ruth, 9.Bee supervises and runs the horse estate with the help of her niece Elenor and nephew Simon who are young adults. As a young teenager, I’d longed to be part of that horsey set, and listening to this gave me that odd nostalgia for something I’d never had (I bet there’s a German expression for that). This book is perfectly suited for all ages, there is no gore, bad language, gratuitous sex or unsettling content and the adult subjects are masterfully handled. very good - fine with two small, faint dings on front cover and tiny faint crease at upper right corner front cover. Horses and horsemanship were the Ashby family trade and helped him to be accepted, and Brat finds himself liking Bee, his 'aunt' and Eleanor, his 'sister'.