Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this book to review.

Mr. Campion's Seance
by Mike Ripley

I read the other reviews of this book and because I have not read any other of Mr. Ripley's novels I feel like I missed something along the way. I did not truly enjoy this book BUT, can say it was well written and can see why other readers like it. Not my thing but at least well written.

Mr Campion's Seance is the 7th book in the Mr. Campion series homage to Margery Allingham's Albert Campion. Released 4th Aug 2020 by Severn House, it's 288 pages and available in hardcover and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

Author Mike Ripley has written several books featuring Campion (this is the 7th) as well as other fiction and nonfiction. The point is, he's an experienced and capable author. I've been a fan of golden age mystery (especially British) as long as I've been reading, more or less, and I'm always on the lookout for more golden age fiction since the original authors are sadly long gone. My "acid test" is that there is more than a token effort to channel the original author's voice. Mr. Ripley manages to a preternatural degree. There were a number of places where it really felt like Allingham herself could've written the text: from Campion's affably dotty facade, to his self deprecating humor, to the convoluted plots which resolve in several varying denouements with a twist at the end which leaves the reader really *thinking*; it's all pitch perfect.

This was a very well written and engaging standalone mystery in its own right. The addition of the perennially delightful Campion, Superintendent Oates, Amanda, and the others, made it irresistible. This book really cemented the series in my "must read" pile. I sincerely hope that the author has more in store.

Four stars. Very strong addition.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

This is the first of Mike Ripley's 'Campion'novels I've read although the original Marjorie Allingham books were particular favourites of mine 'So I approached this with some trepidation but I needn't have worried the book is as true in tone and content as it could possibly be,
The characters are unchanged except by age and the relationship between Campion and his wife and the indomitable'Luggs'is just as close and amusing as ever.
The story itself takes place over a long stretch of time starting during WW2 and ending in the 1960's as Campion is called away first on War duties, although we don't follow them, and the scene shifts forward a number of years.
He is first asked to take a look at a robbery and murder carried out during the war by his old police friend Oates,. which closely mirrors one in a detective story written by a woman Campion shares a Godmother with Evadne Childe. Campion doesn't really take it seriously and besides there is a war on and Campion is called away but he later hascause to regret it as do the police.
There is another daring robbery that has appeared in one of Childe's novels although the book has yet to be published.This is followed by a gruesome murder of a woman who worked in the club where the first murder took place and who has information relating to both that and the second robbery but she is killed on her way to meet Campion.Now racked by guilt that he failed to investigate Campion now uses all his resouces to track down the culprit but even so fails to protect another woman who is brutally murdered at Childe's publishers.
Now Campion will risk all to bring the murderer to justice.
This is a super tale beautifully told and worthy of Allinghams originals ,I shall be looking out for more of Mr Ripley's Campion books of which I believe there are a fair number.Having read all the Allingham books ..I can't wait

An excellent addition to this series, it was gripping and entertaining.
The plot is well written and it was interesting to read how it describes and develops the characters over 3 decades.
The mystery is solid, full of twists and turns, and it kept me guessing.
It was an excellent read and i strongly recommend it.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

Murder Most Supernatural.....
In this latest outing for Mr Campion he finds himself embroiled in a complex and disturbing case of murder most supernatural. As usual, a well plotted, often humorous, and complex tale with credible characters and a likeable protagonist in Campion. The author successfully recreates a convincing Golden Age feel to his writing and this makes for a thoroughly engaging and satisfying read.

I’m usually somewhat dubious when one of my favorite detectives is “resurrected” for a new generation of readers by a modern author. Mike Ripley,however, gets Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion as perfectly as if he were taking spirit dictation from beyond the grave. Lugg, Amanda, Officers Yeo, Oates and Luke are all ear-perfect as well. The lively banter among them is straight from the golden age, and Campion’s essential decency and kindness shines through with entire authenticity.

Mr Campion’s Seance spans the years immediately following WWII through the early 60’s (and how old is Campion, exactly by then???)

Like Amanda, I was itching to get a two month start on all the other fans of my favorite detective. My sincere thanks to Mike Ripley and Severn House for an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

A storyline may often be seen as ripped from the headlines, but suspicions arise when the book was written prior to an event. When Campion is called in to see Superintendent Oates, he is requested to contact author Evadne Walker Pyne about her latest mystery, The Bottle Party Murders. Released after the Grafton Club Murder, it was written before before the event but was virtually identical to what actually happened. Unfortunately, Evadne had left the country on vacation. Other than visiting the Grafton Club and interviewing the current manager, Rags Donovan, he was unable to make any connections. Six years later another of Evadne’s novels was used as a blueprint for a crime before it was even published. At the time, Rags contacted Campion after recognizing someone who had been at the club with Evadne. Before Campion can meet with her she becomes the next victim.

Mr. Campion’s Seance takes place over three time periods spanning fifteen years. The cases were all still open and Campion has never forgotten them. With the assistance of the three Inspectors involved in the cases, connections are made that finally offer a solution. With the help of his wife Amanda, a scenario is presented to Evadne that she can not pass up as a plot for a new mystery. Evadne is a believer in spiritualists so holding a seance is an important step in their plan to trap a killer. Mike Ripley’s mystery has moments of humor, a touch of the supernatural and a final solution that will not disappoint. I would like to thank NetGalley and Severn House Publishers for providing this book for my review.

Good, solid book. Easy to follow. Would recommend to anyone who likes a thriller or mystery book. Liked the characters and it was difficult to put down!

I do not read mystery books, but after reading this one - I think I might switch from my historical romance and paranormal genre to mystery from time to time. This book was well written. It does not dissapoint!

I discovered the Golden Age of Mystery when I came across runs of Penguin vintage green-spined paperback mysteries at the Powell’s used bookstore in Chicago in the 1970s. Among the many British authors I found on those shelves was Margery Allingham, and her amateur sleuth, Albert Campion.

For the last few years, Mike Ripley has carried on Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion series. This is his seventh Campion novel. This novel plays out over decades, and several Scotland Yard inspectors. The story is set in motion when a murder in the back office of a Soho club follows the plot of a murder mystery by Evadne Childe, with whom Campion shares a connection. A few years later, a woman connected with the club is murdered after asking Campion to meet her.

When Campion is unable to solve these murders, and then another crime mimics the plot of an Evadne Childe manuscript, Campion is determined to flush out the killer, who he believes is the same man in each case. It will take a scheme set up with the help of Campion’s wife, his right-hand man Lugg, and Evadne Childe herself to do the trick.

Mike Ripley does Margery Allingham proud with this entertaining recreation of a Golden Age mystery.

Mr. Campion's Seance is another fantastic entry in the continuing adventures of one Albert Campion, wherein Evadne Childe (with whom he shares a godmother), a successful mystery writer whose novels seemingly foretell several crimes, drawing the attention of three different policemen (Oates, Yeo and Luke) over a fifteen year span.

Once again, Mike Ripley captures Allingham's voice with a well paced narrative that include subtle nods to fellow Golden Age mystery writer Agatha Christie. While the title is somewhat misleading, it does its job to divert the reader's presumption of otherworldly agents having a hand in real world crime.

Mike Ripley confronts Albert Campion with his godsibling bestselling mystery author Evadne Childe whose novels echo real crimes committed over twenty years. Mr. Campion's Seance is Campion at his best The plot is elegant, the red herrings are dropped appropriately, and the action believable. Is the novelist in on the crimes? Surely not. Will the crimes be resolved before too many bodies drop? Read and see.

1940 Evadne Walker-Pyne nee Childe, war widow, has just delivered her latest murder mystery book to her publishers before she travels to Essex to stay with her elderly mother.
Campion and Evadne, share a god-mother, which she discovers when he delivers two Belgian army men to stay at her home, the Mill House.
1946 Superintendent Oates informs Campion that the latest Childe novel - The Bottle Party Murder - depicts the Grafton Club murders of December 1945, which occurred after the book was written. But this is only the first time. When the plots are kept secret how is it possible.
A well-written and interesting crime mystery which spans the years from 1940 to 1962

Albert is related to an author by virtue of both being godchildren to the same lady. He doesn't know a lot about her but the Superintendent wants him to talk to her and find out why the latest book she wrote is the sane as a crime committed. He doesn't think it was an accident...

Severn House and Net Galley let me read this book for review (thank you). It will be published August 4th.

Campion is concerned. If she didn't mastermind the murder and robbery, how could her book repeat the actions of the thief so accurately? Then her next book has the same thing happen.

As he questions people, pestering the publishing house and the author, he still doesn't see how it happened. Then a woman he met at the first murder and robbery set up a meeting with him but didn't show. Come to find out, she's dead outside...

Then the publisher gets killed in her office. Suddenly he has a clue. His godsibling is letting her stories out of the bag with a woman she trusts. She shouldn't. And he tells her why..

Mr. Campion stories don't move very fast but he gets his man. In this book he's married and they are very much in love. She even helps him with his investigation.

I have read all six of the previous mystery novels written by Mike Ripley where he continues the crime stories featuring Albert Campion, the main character in the Margery Allingham novels. I've found the resulting books to be a little uneven at times but this one is a total winner for me. It feels like an Allingham novel and I can't say better than that. The plot is wonderfully complicated - a la Allingham. The dimensions of characterization are wonderful - a la Allingham. The story moves along at a wonderful pace - a la Allingham. Wonderful is the word and that's exactly how it felt to me when I was reading it. No stress because something just wasn't feeling right; no impatience because things were moving too slowly; no lack of interest because I had figured it all out pretty early on. No, this one was a success for me from the beginning and I had not figured it out.

Ripley sort of wrote himself into a corner by taking up the adventures of Albert Campion right where Allingham left off. This made Albert a pretty much certified elder statesman and that soon became a problem for me. Albert's age didn't coincide with the trials and tribulations he was being asked to participate in with the new stories. In Mr. Campion's Séance all those problems are circumvented because this story starts and stops in natural ways over a twenty-five year timespan. The mystery stays there, for all intents and purposes an unsolvable crime, while time passes. And yet Ripley is able to keep it all fresh and relevant when Albert comes up against the case again and again. The story revolves around a mystery author who uses a crime in her story and has that crime play out in real life, not once, but twice. How can that happen when the timing for the publication of the book should make it impossible? A twist within a twist in search of an ultimate twist. Good stuff!

Thank you to NetGalley and Severn House Publishers for an e-galley of this novel.

‘You’ve finished it? The new book?’

Told over five parts, the novel starts in 1940 with Albert Campion meeting the famous author Evadne Childe at a police shooting range. Miss Childe is seeking advice on firearms: not research for the detective novels she writes, but as preparation for self-defence when she moves to East Anglia to look after her ageing mother.

She and Albert Campion meet again when he delivers two temporary house guests (two Belgian soldier refugees) to her in East Anglia. She advises him that she is using her married name these days: Mrs Walker-Pyne. Her husband, Edmund was killed in 1939 during a U-Boat raid, and while she hasn’t abandoned writing fiction, she’s set it to one side for the moment. Albert Campion tells her that as they share a godmother, they are godsiblings.

In 1946, with the war over, Evadne Childe’s new detective novel ‘The Bottle Party Murders’ is successful. It catches the attention of Superintendent Stanislaus Oates because it bears similarities to a recent unsolved murder at the Grafton Club in Soho. The book was written before the murder: how can Evadne Childe have described the events before they occurred?

It will take fifteen years to answer this question and will involve several different people and some quite intriguing situations. This is a clever murder mystery, with some unexpected elements and the suspense builds towards the end.

This is the seventh novel in Mike Ripley’s continuation of Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion novels. It isn’t necessary to have read other books in the series to enjoy this instalment, but Albert Campion is such an interesting character that I want to read them all. While I’ve only read two so far, the others are on my reading list.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Severn House for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

I am so glad that this character and series lives on.
A golden era series that feels fresh.
As always, great characters and a well written whodunit.

This book starts in 1940 and ends in 1962. That is a long time for a murder mystery. The story follows Evadne Walker-Pyne who is a mystery author with an archaeologist detective in her books. She has been writing his stories for over 30 years. Evadne Walker-Pyne is a woman who married a much younger man than her and he was an archaeologist. Shades of Agatha Christie! Unfortunately, her husband died early in their marriage.

When her books become the blue prints for actual crimes, the police and Albert Campion are interested. Although they are interested, they can’t get a handle on who has been able to know the plots of her books (which is a closely held secret until publication).

This book was a delight to read and felt that the author followed Margery Allingham’s style very well. I think this is a perfect book to curl up with on a rainy afternoon. My thanks to NetGalley for providing me an advance reading copy of this book.

Mr Campion’s Séance is the seventh book in Mike Ripley's marvellous continuance of the Albert Campion novels by Margery Allingham and, in some ways, it is the most ambitious of the series to date.

The book opens in 1940 with Campion meeting the famed Evadne Childe at a police shooting range. Evadne is the author of a highly popular series of mysteries featuring archaeologist, and amateur detective, Rex Troughton and is also one of the War’s first war widows, with her archaeologist husband Edmund being killed at sea in 1939 during a U-boat attack. Campion and her also share the same godmother and they again meet briefly when Campion deposits two wartime lodgers, Belgian soldier refugees, at her country estate near Colchester. The story then moves forward to 1946 when Evadne’s latest bestseller catches the attention of Superintendent Stanislaus Oates. The crime at the heart of the book bears a striking similarity to a recent, real life, unsolved murder at a club in Soho. Although Evadne wrote the book before the murder occurred, she predicts it remarkably accurately and it sets Oates wondering. He asks Campion to investigate the matter, but his efforts are cut short when he is sent on a mission overseas. The effects of the murder linger across the 1950s before finally reaching their violent conclusion in 1962.

Mr Campion’s Séance is a carefully plotted and quite enjoyable murder mystery that proceeds down some unexpected paths. The spreading of the plot over three tumultuous decades gives the story some depth and the mystery writer Evadne Childe is a marvellous creation. It takes a little while for the crux of the story to emerge, but Ripley keeps the reader well entertained during the early parts of the book with amusing comments and interesting reflections on crime writing. While the latter stages deliver good surprises, unexpected deaths and a suspenseful conclusion.
See my full review at: https://murdermayhemandlongdogs.com/mr-campions-seance-by-mike-ripley-severn-house/

288 pages

4 stars

Author Mike Ripley write a la Allingham so very well. I could imagine myself reading one of her books, it was so very real.

This is a great little story about a famous mystery writer Evadne Childe whose latest book is eerily like a real murder that occurred. Similar club, similar setting, same gun left at the scene... Inspector Albert Campion and his bosses want to know just how she managed to pull this off. Was she involved? An accomplice perhaps?

Campion sets about to discover just how she did know. When it happens again, confusion reigns. Campion and his lovely wife Amanda set up an experiment to test a theory. The first attempt ends up confusing them even more. But the second test has Campion thinking.

Very well written and plotted, these books are a delight to read. I truly enjoyed it. The book is full of little asides that take the reader on alternate journeys. And Lugg, Campion's aide-de-camp, is a true delight. (I don't care about his part and apparently, neither do the Campion's.)

I want to thank NetGalley and Severn House for forwarding to me a copy of this absolutely wonderful book for me to read, enjoy and review.