Review: The Twist in the Tale

em.thompson, The Twist in the Tale (Kindle 2024)

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/217108899-the-twist-in-the-tale

George Aarbuthnot parks his Bentley next to the moat; he is early for luncheon chez his client, author WC Lumin, at Stoat Hall. Chef/wife Edith Lumin is cooking a wild boar they’d caught rampaging on the estate, with bilberry syllabub for pudding.
The luncheon guests, all with hilarious Dickensian names, have been instructed to write a short story, they are told at first, for their host to rip off. The true purpose of the exercise is more sinister.
Around the table are: Hermione Lumin—’scrumptious eye candy’, Reverend DeMoncey—who organised the Mission for Fallen Gentleladies minibus, Edith Lumin—in a bloodstained butcher’s apron, Sherriden Slipshod—bohemian publisher, Spencer Lumin—pinstripe suited barrister with sunken cheeks, and Felicity Lumin DeMoncey—’knee-tremblingly beguiling’.
Thompson’s distinctive style and clever wordplay is in evidence. With invented words: (minibusphobia, echoic expanse) and alliterations: (mishmash of misconceived mythology, gut-gurgling gulp). A character is ‘like the lovechild of a hobbit and a bull mastiff grim’; a setting is ‘a blot on the landscape in the remotest wilds of deepest nowhere’.
Despite all the punning and joking around, the plot is substantial, with an unexpected twist at the end.
This novella is an absolute joy.