Nurse Pearce is acting the part of our patient this morning. We have just been going through her history. She is Mrs. Stokes, the fifty-year-old mother of four children, wife of a council refuse collector. She has had a laryngectomy for the treatment of cancer." She turned to a student sitting on her right. An almost-graduated nursing student is killed while playing the patient in a demonstration/instruction lecture before a visiting VIP. It might have been suicide - the girl was extremely religious, temperamental, moody, and prone to extremes of behavior - much of it rather unforgiving, and some of it perhaps illegal. As the local police work their way through the suspect list and information they've gathered, no real conclusion is reached and the case goes cold. But before too long another student is dead under suspicious circumstances, and the "coincidence" is too much for one high-powered doctor connected with the training facility to endure. He calls Scotland Yard himself, and Adam Dalgleish is assigned to the case, along with Sargent Masterson, a young, not exactly raw (but not far removed from it either) policeman with a slight tendency for bullying witnesses. He's got a lot to learn. It’s a typical Dalgliesh move, understated and subtle, but he remains aloof. Maybe nobody knows him. He’s recently widowed. He’s a published poet but doesn’t talk about it much (Masterson is incredulous, most of the women are intrigued), and he is a man of few words. Policing and poetry work together for him. He observes and reflects, and he’s challenging to read, although one character thinks she has him figured out. Except Dalgliesh has a core of kindness and the brutality of police work. The all-female community from the top down flutters around him, except grumpy Sister Brumfett, who tells him he is bullying everyone and disturbing the routine. Written in a completely classic style this may seem a bit slow-moving for modern tastes, but is downright explosive when compared with earlier, similar, stories. I've recently been reading Mignon Eberhart's nursing mysteries from the 1930s, and if you want "slow-moving thriller" (not *exactly* an oxymoron...), then her earliest work is for you! But while Eberhart was entertaining, James is an overall much better writer, and it is fascinating to see here how little of the attitudes towards nurses and their craft had changed in the intervening forty years. And while outside of the small-hospital environment (the nurses live-in, and don't spend much time in The Real World) things are changing rapidly in the social sense, here the ethos is of an older Britain even in 1970 - the values are traditional, the plotting traditional, the writing style traditional. But not stuffy, not at all boring.

As Dalgliesh narrows down who might want to do away with Pearce, she finds out more about Fallon and why she was admitted to the school’s hospital wing, and just as he realizes that she may be connected in some fashion, tragedy strikes again. Photo: Christopher Barr/Acorn TVDavid Bamber (Flesh and Blood) as Edgar Froggart - a teacher who knew Venetia's father and has followed her career The action is det in 1975. A Mrs Thatcher is vying for the leadership of The Conservative Party. Nightingale House Hospital, trains young nurses and one nurse dies during a demonstration when a tube is pushed through her stomach. Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Leo’ on Netflix, in Which Adam Sandler Voices a Lizard Who's Also a Child Psychologist CAST = 1 stars: Absolutely massive, first of all, and one of the novels 2 major downfalls. We're introduced to Miss Muriel Beale, and Inspector Nurse on her way to an inspection, and her roommate Miss Angela Burrows, a Principal Tutor in a London teaching hospital. They disappear until the final chapter. It's sorta cheap that this appearance of 2 ladies living together is really a preview of, well, a number of nurse-nurse relationships. Supposedly, they all have 'boyfriends', so we learn that's what they called them at one time. There is Mary Taylor, Matron at John Gardener's Hospital (SHE has a BIG SECRET and you know what it is). Hilda Rolfe (BIG SECRET!) is the Principal Tutor, Mr. Stephen Courtney-Briggs (well, one character as straight as they come, and sadly to Briggs he is surrounded by pretty young gals with BIG SECRETS) the Senior Surgeon, Sister Mavis Gearing a teacher at said hospital. There are 7 students in an opening training class, plus more in bed with the 'flu'. There is Miss Collins, the housekeeper. Chairman Sir Marcus Cohen is in Isreal and why he is even mentioned is beyond me. Same for Alderman Kealy. And that's not even half the cast. Few authors outside of historical non-fiction need this many people to tell a story. (unless you are James Michenor, natch.) And things like "...that high-handed bitch of a Matron" are the kind of lines encountered often. Did I mention Sister Bum? She has MORE THAN ONE SECRET! (People with this name usually do.)

It’s not the first time that James’ protagonist, who was featured in 14 books from 1962-2008, has been brought to the small screen (Roy Marsden and Martin Shaw played in him the ITV and BBC adaptations and there were several British radio iterations), but it’s the first time that Carvel, an Olivier Award-winning actor, has taken the role. He proves to be a fine, workmanlike addition to the oeuvre — nothing fancy or too clever, but he gets the job done. Sometimes less is more, without distracting character tics early on. You'll be the General Nursing Council, Miss," he stated grandiloquently. "What a pity you decided to come in this gate. The Nurse Training School is in Nightingale House, only 100 yards or so from the Winchester Road entrance.Nicholas Banks (Why Didn't They Ask Evans?) as Marcus Dupayne - the third Dupayne sibling. He runs a museum

Courtney-Briggs remains reticent and actually misleads the police, claiming he had left the building immediately after surgery and had put a white scarf on a fallen tree to warn other pedestrians. Police also find out that Sister Mavis Gearing had invited Leonard Morris, the chief pharmacist of the hospital, to dinner; they had parted ways several minutes after midnight. Morris had seen Sister Brumfett leave the building, too, but testifies that at 12:17 a.m., he injured himself after stumbling over a fallen tree in the dark. Contrary to Courtney-Briggs’s earlier claim, Morris had injured himself because the tree did not have a warning marker. A weakened pane of glass that had been blown out in the evening storm suggests an outside intruder, but the absence of other indicators turns the investigation on those who had been inside the building. Carvel’s performance is so compelling that it smooths over some of the narrative problems of the first mystery, but it doesn’t smooth things over so completely that you’re not left with questions after everything is resolved. Julia Pardoe's composed, rather childish voice went on: "So if the victim was really meant to be Fallon, it couldn't have been one of us, could it? We all knew that Fallon wouldn't be acting the patient this morning."

No one replied. The logic was apparently unassailable. It was impossible to imagine anyone wanting to murder Pearce. Pearce, Miss Beale realized, was either of the company of the naturally inoffensive or was too negative a personality to inspire the tormenting hatred which can lead to murder. Then Nurse Goodale said drily: "Pearce wasn't everyone's cup of tea." Yπάρχουν κάποια λάθη (ευτυχώς, όχι πολλά για να κάνουν περίεργη εντύπωση) στην μετάφραση και την εκτύπωση του βιβλίου...