A Novel of Suspense (Inspector Ian Rutledge Book 10)

In 1920 five kids arrive at abandoned Yorkshire's Fountains Abbey with an alchemy book they stole from their school. They plan to perform a ritual to raise the devil, but instead flee in fear leaving behind the purloined tome. The next day a corpse wearing a gas mask is found near the book.

Scotland Yard sends troubled Inspector Ian Rutledge to identify the victim as the War Office has an interest in the body too. Although the Great War to end all wars may be over, Ian still suffers from battle fatigue feeling guilty for what he did and saw. His inquiries of the nearby villagers are met with suspicion as each seems to have something to hide. The alchemy book belongs to a conscientious objector schoolmaster, but he also offers little. As deceit seems the norm, Ian struggles to learn the truth while the pale horse of the Apocalypse reminds the shell shocked detective that death is the final frontier.

A PALE HORSE is a fantastic whodunit due to the mentally battered hero whose only respite from the ghost that disturbs him is investigating as this is what he did before he became an unrecognized war "casualty". The story line is fast-paced, but totally owned by Ian even as the audience obtains a deep look at an English village still reeling from the war. This haunting post WWI series remains one of the best historical police procedurals on the market today.

Harriet Klausner

After having read many other books written by the "Charles Todd" team of writers it might be possible for me to become tired of the characters portrayed. Luckily, that has not happened. This particular book in the series does have some small problems, but for the most part I am so interested in the life of the main character, Scotland Yard Inspector Ian Rutledge, that I find I am willing to overlook those problems in favor of the enjoyment I receive from the story as a whole. The novel takes place in 1920, only several years after the fighting stopped in World War I. Rutledge has, as his constant reminder of that war, the voice in his mind of a soldier whom he ordered to be executed for refusing to obey a direct order under combat conditions. It remains a balancing act for Rutledge to function without allowing anyone to realize how much influence the voice of Hamish has over him.

Rutledge is sent on a watching brief for the Army because someone they are keeping an eye on has disappeared. Rutledge has nothing to go on because the Army isn't talking and Chief Superintendent Bowles doesn't want any feathers ruffled. Rutledge drives to the tiny village in Berkshire which sits practically beneath the chalk horse carved into the hillside, not far from Uffington. It is clearly impossible for him to remain unobserved by the other eight residents of the enclave of cottages. All of these people have chosen to isolate themselves, even from the villagers, because of hidden secrets in their lives. After several days Rutledge returns to London, only to be sent immediately to a village in Yorkshire where an unidentified man has been found, presumably the victim of a murder.

Some of the problems I had with this particular book were because all eight of the tenants of the cottages played such a large part in the mystery. That turned out to be quite a few people to keep track of. And the crime in Yorkshire also had many characters attached to it and they also added to some of the confusion. I have to say that I still don't fully understand why the character living in the cottage beneath the pale horse was committing the crimes there. Evidently I haven't fully grasped the explanation and will need to go back and read that part over again. As for the happenings in the Yorkshire area, I enjoyed that much more. That situation involved another member of the police force acting in a self-serving manner and being unwilling to accept the help and advice Rutledge was giving him. These books always surprise me with how often suspects, or even just witnesses to a crime, will simply tell the police they choose not to talk to them and slam the door. Can you really do that?

Once again I enjoyed the atmosphere created for this story. This particular location has probably the most famous of all the chalk horses in England and I liked how it's history was woven into the thinking and actions of the characters. Rutledge and Hamish had a very good "conversation" regarding what had happened in France during the war with Rutledge asking Hamish exactly the same question I have often wanted answered. Always realizing, of course, that Hamish is a ghostly voice in Rutledge's mind, but in these stories he does become a bona fide character. I still have several of the stories to read and this 10th novel in the series is written in such a was as to be a completely stand alone novel. I am mightily enamored of the writing style and characters of these novels. I sincerely hope you will come away feeling the same.

First Sentence: It was nearing the full moon, and the night seemed to shimmer with light.

Inspector Ian Rutledge has been sent to Berkshire, the location of the ancient Celtic chalk horse. The British War Office has lost track of one of their own and want him found.

In nearby Yorkshire Fountains Abbey, the body of a man, wrapped in a cloak and wearing a WWI gas mask is found. Near him is a book on Alchemy. Is this the same man?

With the voice of Hamish in his head, a soldier whom Rutledge ordered to die by firing squad while fighting in France, it is up to Rutledge to solve the mystery and save an innocent man from being accused of murder.

I am such a fan of this series. There are multiple plots, many layers to the story and always the subtext of the effect of war on men. Todd weaves them together beautifully.

The descriptions are so well done; you get to know each of the characters, you see what Rutledge sees, and you feel his frustration, exhaustion and sorrow. The twists in the plot kept me thoroughly intrigued to very end.

As a standalone book, I'd have rated it "excellent." However, as part of the series, I rate it "Very Good Plus" only because I'd like to see a little more change or growth in the character of Rutledge. Either way, this is a wonderful book, and series, that I highly recommend.

Charles Todd, for those who aren't familiar, is a mother and son team of writers who live in the Eastern U.S., and are both of them apparently fervent Anglophiles. They have, for the last decade or so, been collaborating on a series of mysteries chronicling the adventures of Inspector Ian Rutledge of Scotland Yard. As far as a British mystery series is concerned, these books are very conventional in their structure and setting. Rutledge is almost always somewhere out in the rural British countryside, attempting to discover who killed someone in rather murky surroundings. The similarities to Richard Jury or Adam Dalgliesh are very obvious. There is one significant difference, though, and it's what makes the series stand out: the books are set in the period just after the First World War, and Inspector Rutledge is a veteran of said conflict. Even more unique, he's haunted by the ghost of one of his subordinates, a corporal whom Rutledge had to shoot and kill after the man panicked and tried to run away during a battle. The dead man doesn't blame Rutledge for the incident, not exactly anyway, and serves as a sort of alter ego for Rutledge. You're never entirely certain whether Hamish MacLeod's ghost is really there, or merely a figment of Rutledge's imagination, given that he was horribly scarred psychologically by the war.

In the current episode, Rutledge is first sent to a hamlet of cottages in rural England to find a single man who lives in one of them. The War Office wants the man found for some reason, though they won't tell Scotland Yard why. Rutledge has no luck, really, and is then recalled and sent in a different direction to look into a killing in another rural setting. The two incidents are of course connected, and Rutledge must settle things as further killings occur, and the plot becomes more tangled.

Todd is best with the rural atmosphere of England 80 years ago, and this is one of the better entries in the series. The evocation of the drawing of a horse on a hillside near the cottages is especially spooky. Altogether a good book.

The Inspector Rutledge series from Charles Todd are 3-star and 4-star works: none rises to the level of greatness, none descend to 2-star level. They are decent reads. Pale Horse rates 3 stars: decent, but not memorable, worth keeping rather than donating to your local library. There's no groundbreaking here, nothing we haven't seen in the other Rutledge mysteries. There's an unidentified corpse, some less than professional police work (not by Rutledge), time spent in village pubs by Rutledge speaking to local residents.

There are some things which don't feel quite right. Rutledge spends a great deal of time driving back and forth between London, Yorkshire, Berkshire, and Wales, often late at night. Most other series involving Yard inspectors seem to emphasize travel by train. Yorkshire is 200-plus miles from London, and in 1920 there were no motorways. I would think that few petrol stations would be open late at night. Finding your way around at night would not be that easy, and 6-volt headlights (unlike the current 12-volt systems) did not allow a good rate of speed. Motorcar breakdowns were much more common: cars were not designed for sustained long-distance travel. I often found myself thinking about all this driving rather than the mystery at hand.

The story itself seems rather slow at times, and the denouement seems somewhat anticlimactical as well as centering on some improbable coincidences, and there were some large potholes in the story road, so to speak, that were left unfilled-in. If you haven't read Todd's stories, try some of the other works first. For alternative period pieces--mysteries set just after WW I, try also Winspear's books, and in particular, Airth's fine River of Darkness.

Charles Todd is actually two people - a mother/son writing team who live in Delaware and North Carolina. Like other duos before them, most notably Ellery Queen, they create complex, satisfying mystery novels that seem to have been carefully crafted by a single author.<
Their detective is Inspector Ian Rutledge, introduced in "A False Mirror" and since appearing in eight other stories, including the current book. Here Rutledge, himself somewhat damaged during World War I, is sent to investigate the murder of a man found wearing a gas mask. The story begins in Yorkshire in an ancient abbey and takes Rutledge to Berkshire, where isolated homes built for lepers in the distant past serve as a metaphor for the outcasts who still live in the area. And looking down from its hillside above it all is the chalk-cut figure of a horse. The horse perhaps predates Christianity, but one cannot help but think of the Pale Horse and its Pale Rider.<
The authors encourage the reader to think so, in fact. They describe the German assault with poison gas during the war as the approach of silent, pale horses. And that is just in the brief first chapter.<
Full of rich characters and built around a solid idea, "A Pale Horse" is one of the best in the series. Rutledge is operating at the peak of his powers here, and "Todd's" prose is as smooth and graceful as it can be.

Another good suspense novel , with familiar characters, by Charles Todd. Numerous victims and more suspects. A very involved plot but with a satisfactory conclusion. As usual, Inspector Rutledge has to cope with the reluctance of local police who resent his involvement and the politics of his superiors at Scotland Yard.

I love the Todd mysteries, especially trying to figure out what in the Inspector's mind Hamish is responding to. The icon in this book is the chalk horse on the hillside, and he really is a character in the book. The plots in all these books are not simple, and the reader really has to follow the characters' emotions as well as their actions.

A Pale Horse is another offering in the excellent mystery series featuring Inspector Ian Rutledge of Scotland Yard. Like its predecessors, it conjures up the post World War I society of Britain and the scars left on the survivors of The Great War. The tormented Rutledge is never far removed from the accusing inner voice of Hamish MacLeod. Corporal MacLeod served under Rutledge's command during the Battle the Somme, but when he refused to lead any more men "over the top," Rutledge was forced to execute him. The guilt of that action almost destroyed Rutledge and implanted the ghostly MacLeod firmly in his psyche. MacLeod is one of the most inventive and intriguing characters in all of the mystery genre. In this novel, Rutledge again find a solace of sorts in his work. He doggedly refuses to give up on the mystery of the man found dead at Fountains Abbey -- despite (or perhaps because of) the political repercussions of the case. Also like the other novels in this series, the characters are well-drawn, the plot is compelling, and the setting is wonderfully atmospheric. If you've read any of the other novels by this mother and son writing team, I'm sure you'll enjoy this one, as well. My only complaint is that the tempo tended to bog down a bit in the middle --I have not had that sense in the other Charles Todd books. Still, a very good read.

The weakest of all the books. Does the author not know the law? Rutledge knows the identity of the murder victim (and has proof from independent identification of the sketch) and yet allows another policeman (Madsen) to hold an innocent man who could not have killed him (a phone call would have fixed this problem)? By sleight of hand, the innocent guy is then charged with a murder of a missing man(Shoreham)when no body has been found or whether he is really missing? What a major flaw! The book gives great evidence of being hurriedly written. What a big disappointment--this flaw is so major that I stopped reading at the halfway point.

I am entranced with the stories of Inspector Ian Rutledge. I intend to read them all. I love being inside his head as he figures out the mystery. It is interesting that it is set in the early 1900's after World War I. It is a time that I know little about. Really good plots with surprising twists.

VERY WELL WRITTEN, INTERESTING CHARATERS, I'M A HUGE CHARLES TODD FAN, HAVING READ ALL THE BOOKS IN THE IAN RUTLEDGE SERIES, I CAN HONESTLY SAY EACH ONE IS BETTER THAN THE PREVIOUS ONE. I OFTEN READ THEM IN ONE SITTING, JUST CAN'T PUT IT DOWN. SUSPENSEFUL TO THE VERY END. AND I LOVE THE WIT AND REASONING OF HAMISH.

Charles Todd has maintained the high quality of interest and intensity shown in his earlier Rutledge novels. The book has fulfilled every hope I had for it, and I look forward to the next in the sequence.