Commander Adam Dagliesh is given a sensitive case that has occurred on Combe Island, a private island off the coast of Cornwall. It is an elite getaway for distinguished people of the higher echelon. The island has high security and limited access by either helicopter or the island’s boat, which prevents casual visitors’ access.

There are few who live on the island: Rupert Maycroft – secretary/manager, Dr. Guy Staveley – resident physician and wife, Tamlyn – boatman, Emily Holcombe –last surviving Holcombe, and the usual support staff of housekeeper, cook and such.

A current visitor has been found hanging from the tower of the island’s famous lighthouse. Nathan Oliver is a well-known and popular author. A mean, opinionated, selfish, demanding man; he is accompanied by his 32 year old daughter, Miranda, who has devoted her life to serving him, and his assistant/copy-editor, Dennis, who seems to worship the man.

Other visitors to the island are a retired German diplomat and the director of a controversial research lab.

Complications arise when the diplomat contracts SAR and is air-lifted off the island to a hospital. Dagliesh also comes down with it and is quarantined to a private room. This leaves Miskin and Benton-Smith, two of Dagliesh’s team, to work their way through secrets past and present, connections, relationships, twists and turns in the moody atmosphere of the island. A second murder doesn’t make it any easier.

A tight plot, it isn’t easy to figure the connections between the characters, but you know there are some. The atmosphere of the island and the secrecy of the characters make for a solid read. ( )

(2005) (audio)Very good Adam Dalgleiesh mystery. AD tries to solve a hanging murder on an island resort that is the proverbial locked room. Noone could have gotten in or out so the suspects are limited to the dozen or so residents and staff on Combe Island. Assisted by DI Kate Misking and Sgt Francis Benton-Smith. This is first James novel I have been able to get thru as she writes in excruciating detail but listening to the book seemed to be a better way.

I don’t want to give anything away, but there’s a special surprise that makes it a perfect read in the time of COVID-19! ( )

I picked this up because I can't take any more crime books that are full of brutal murders and torture. And I guess this did fit the bill - very old style Agatha Christie with all the characters stuck on an island with a mix of rich people, servants and a priest. And it had a lighthouse for my lighthouse theme. Did have some brutal murders and a lot of torture of characters by their parents (mostly historical) but as the characters were all pretty wooden (and a lot of them rich) it didn't get under the skin.
I passed it on to John who is grateful for something really unchallenging. Sends him to sleep within minutes! ( )

I registered this book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/14429511

Adam Dalgliesh is on the case.

Dalgliesh is sent off to investigate a possible suicide on a remote island right when he was about to embark on a weekend with his love, Emma. He knows she understands and will not complain, and perhaps this bothers him a little. But he needs to be the one on this case, as it is a sensitive situation.

Combe Island was owned by the Combe family, which eventually turned it into a haven for overworked high officials and others. It is not advertised and its temporary residents are protected from invasion of their privacy, even by workers on the island. So when one of those well-known visitors is found hanging from the lighthouse it is sensitive indeed, and rather than the local police, the island's managers call in a favor from Scotland Yard.

Dalgliesh arrives by helicopter with his team: DI Kate Miskin and Sergeant Francis Benton-Smith. Benton-Smith is new to the team and Miskin is wary, does not favor him with her confidences or, on her own, discuss the case with him.

The investigators interview everyone on the island, as they all had access to the victim. More than one had reason to take him out. The possibility that someone from off the island caused this apparent murder, though, is remote.

The pressure is on, and it gets worse when an incident causes further difficulty and Miskin and Benton-Smith are forced to work more closely together.

Will Dalgliesh's affair with Emma survive these interruptions? Will the killer or killers be found? ?

A good solid tale of detection. ( )

Perhaps it is even 3½ stars.

While I did enjoy this mystery, I felt that there was something about the structure of the novel that bothered me -- it was mostly a police procedural, albeit in an unusual set of circumstances, with the exception of the fairly long second section. Not only did this section differ in style, but for some reason, it also went back in time to before the first section. Why?? Couldn't this information have been conveyed to the reader while maintaining the style of the rest of the book? It seemed to me to be an uneasy mixture of modern novel & traditional police procedural which was unnecessary. ( )

I liked the story but P. D. James style of writing seems snobbish. He seems to go out of his way to use too many obscure words and phrases. I doubt I'll read another by him. ( )

-- THE LIGHTHOUSE is a satisfying read. When a guest at an exclusive island compound is found dead three London police officers find out "who done it." A few guests have motives, & a few alibis are weak. After learning back stories, whereabouts, & capabilities murderer is revealed. Police officers are as interesting as the island's guests & staff members. Novel by P.D. James is sophisticated. It contains interesting details. -- ( )

This is one of the later entries in the Dalgliesh series. It starts out a little slowly but picked up steam after the first part is gotten through. This finds AD and his team sent to an island to solve a murder and in the course of things there is another murder. Plus one of the lesser suspects gets SARS and conveniently gives it to our man Dalgleish. His subordinates have to take over and they get things squared away. Well done. ( )

Not my favorite PD James ( )

3.5 I'd forgotten about this author and I'm looking forward to having a fairly new-to-me character to follow in a series. I have seen a couple of PBS/BBC mysteries based on her books, and those were good, too. ( )

A great read from the doyen of crime writers.

This is one of the later ones and an absolute delight. For a complete review please click on the link below or paste it onto your browser.

http://onerightword.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/the-lighthouse-p-d-james.html

( )

This is only my second P.D. James books so I can't compare this book to a "typical" P.D. James book. I enjoyed it very much, James can certainly write an intelligent mystery with fully developed characters. My only warning is to keep a dictionary nearby; she does like to use an expanded vocabulary! ( )

Over the years, the character of Commander Adam Dalgliesh has become a real person. Helped by the TV series of PD James detective novels, whenever I read a Dalgliesh book I see the face of actor Roy Marsden. ‘The Lighthouse’, the 13th in the series of 14, is perhaps her best. There is no doubt that as the series progressed, the writing acquired depths earning it the label ‘literary fiction’. A lot of the action is in the mind, intellectual detection. The Lighthouse is a long way from ‘Cover Her Face’.
This is another closed room mystery. The room is an island off the North Cornish coast, a secure, secluded get-away-from-it-all holiday destination for politicians, celebrities and entrepreneurs. Dalgliesh, with his team Kate Miskin and Francis Benton-Smith, become residents on the island with its small number of suspects. Dead, is a famous writer, Nathan Oliver, found hanging by a rope from the railings of the lighthouse. Nothing, from this point, is as it seems. All the island’s guests, residents and staff could have a motive. Oliver was not generally liked. But you can rely on James to unwind a story which brings unexpected depths, difficulties and an unpredictable motive for murder. Many of the suspects are unlikeable, but unpleasant people are not necessarily capable of killing someone. Set against the island location, its isolation, mists, tides and birds, are the peculiarities of the residents and their reason for being on the island. Is that where the answer lies?
Quarantined on the island because of infectious illness, a second murder ups the stakes. Tangled throughout the detection are the relationships between Kate and Benton, Dalgliesh and girlfriend Emma, and the detail and politics of policing.
Read more of my book reviews at http://www.sandradanby.com/book-reviews-a-z/ ( )

I must have missed something because I wasn't sure I followed the solution to this mystery. Its been awhile since I have read a PD James book and I didn't really enjoy this one. ( )

When a famous and unpleasant author is found hanging by rope from the top of a lighthouse on an isolated island retreat, Dalgliesh and two detectives are sent to determine if it was suicide or murder. When another death occurs that is definitely murder, finding the suspect from the limited possibilities on the island is complicated when Dalgliesh contracts SARS, ( )

I liked this book in that I hadn't a clue whodunnit until James told me so. There are plenty of twists and turns that keep one engrossed. It was a bit Agatha Christie (who I love) in that they'd be a murder and then they'd all sit down together for tea. Some of the description (such as what they were eating) became slightly distracting. However, she is a master of plot and most of the description, like that of the island, is highly original. Her characters are also believable and interesting, especially the young homeless girl, but I'll spill no more beans! I recommend this book to people who like traditional detective stories. ( )

I thoroughly enjoyed this, just a nice to read mystery with some (not too hard) puzzles to work out and the evolving relationship of Adma and Emma, which is always warming. I hope Kate and Piers end up with a nice romance as well, in future books. There doesn't seem to be a new one since this came out, I hope something is due soon, I'm in a nice Dalgliesh mood now.

I picked this up because I can't take any more crime books that are full of brutal murders and torture. And I guess this did fit the bill - very old style Agatha Christie with all the characters stuck on an island with a mix of rich people, servants and a priest. And it had a lighthouse for my lighthouse theme. Did have some brutal murders and a lot of torture of characters by their parents (mostly historical) but as the characters were all pretty wooden (and a lot of them rich) it didn't get under the skin.
I passed it on to John who is grateful for something really unchallenging. Sends him to sleep within minutes! ( )

Set on a fictional island off the English coast, Dalgliesh and his team are called in to investigate a murder. And while there, another one. Untangling the threads of enmity that most of those on the island held against the first victim finally leads to solving both cases.

This was my first Adam Dalgliesh mystery. Though apparently a title that’s near the end of the series, I felt that it stood well enough on its own and I enjoyed it that way. ( )

I keep picking up PD James, thinking that the books can't be as unsatisfying as I remember. PD James is lauded for her intricate plotting and her impressive ability to channel her personal experiences in the Home Office to create a realistic portrait of a police investigation. But, as always, I simply rediscover that I underestimated just how much I dislike these books.

At the end of a PDJ novel, including this one, I find that I hate all the characters. Each character dying off is almost a relief. I am left with the feeling, as Agatha Christie would put it, that they are all "nasty people". I always feel soiled after reading a PDJ novel. The people involved are so awful, so corrupt, so cold, so conscienceless, including PDJ's darling detective, Adam Dalgliesh. Dalgliesh is slightly reminiscent of Javert from Les Mis, but without Javert's redeeming qualities; he is truly an awful human being, so much so that she sticks on the artificial appellation of poet to his character, like one of those facades added to add architecture to those boxlike government buildings. Dalgliesh is conscienceless, he is cruel to the victims to get information, and he is unfeeling to his detectives, playing them off against each other to further his cause. It is fine for a character to be flawed, but clearly, PDJ takes no issue with this; she applauds him. I hate the fact that he is involved with a woman who has no connection with his life and is upper-class. PDJ has her paper-cut-out racial/class-issue characters, but they don't feel like real people to me--just talking stereotypes.

I guess, honestly, what irks me most about PDJ isn't her books; it's her comments about other members of her genre. Like Raymond Chandler before her, PDJ takes pot shots at Agatha Christie, calling her simplistic and fantastic. Yet, in every novel I have EVER read by PD James, (and I've made it through at least 10) she always resorts to a MURDERER's CONFESSION. In at least 3 cases that I recall off-hand, for some unknown reason, the murderer literally taped a confession on audiocassettes and sent it to Dalgiesh posthumously. Seriously???!!! That in itself is unforgivable; yet even worse is the fact that PDJ criticizes Christie as simplistic and contrived. AC's crimes at least can be solved without forcing a murderer's posthumous confession. Whereas in an AC, I find I really like all of the characters; caricatures though they may be, they are human enough to breathe and live and be uncertain in nature. The suspense in Agatha Christie's books comes from us not wanting to sacrifice the characters we have grown to love, while still unwillingly seeing that they are capable of murder. AC may be xenophobic and racist and classist and sexist, but her characters still breathe.

The Lighthouse continues in the same vein as the previous stories. Dalgliesh and his lady love are cold and uninvolved. Kate, the lower-class cutout, is still sympathetic and pining for her boss. The mystery itself is interesting, but the conclusion felt forced and utilizes (wait for it) a murderer's confession. Not my type of story, but I concede that if I were not so heavily biased about the Agatha Christie issue and did not find the characters so unsympathetic, I could appreciate the lyrical language and intellectual mystery. ( )

Adam Dagliesh is called out to a private island that caters
to famous, powerful or wealthy people who crave privacy to
investigate the murder of a famous writer. The suspect pool
is small and everyone has motive and opportunity. The case
is complicated by a second murder and characters suddenly
taking ill. As even Dagliesh falls ill, his Detective Inspector, Kate Mishkin, is tapped to take over the investigation. This book had a very different feel that the others I have read in the series, though I have been reading the series out of order and think that I have missed a lot of the character development.

On a remote island off the coast of Southwest England, used as a getaway by the influential, the famous novelist Nathan Oliver is found one morning murdered -- hanged from the topmost railing of the island's fastidiously restored lighthouse. Since there were fewer than a dozen people on the island at the time, and since it's unlikely anyone could have come ashore secretly, the task of solving the murder would seem a simple one for Alan Dalglish and his crew. Yet lots of old coals have to be raked over, and a great deal of James's cumbersome prose negotiated, before the fairly unsurprising solution is revealed. There's plenty of clumsy dialogue, too, of the "You know all this already but I'm going to tell it to you anyway" variety. Aside from a rock-climbing sequence that's genuinely suspenseful, events just sort of . . . lumber on. Even so, the book's moderately enjoyable; just a shame that all the time I was reading it I was thinking it could have been done far better at half the length. ( )

Clever as you would expect in the construction of the plot, and equally clever to manage to write a detective story set in the first decade of the 21st century that includes a butler, a housekeeper, a cook, a maid and a boatman in its cast of characters without it seeming totally implausible. And a Defrocked Clergyman and an Old Family Solicitor, to boot. The setting on This-Is-Not-Lundy makes a change from fictitious East-Anglian headlands, but not a very big change.

The actual detection process this time is a bit Maigret-like: Dalgleish does nothing in particular for the first three hundred pages except listen to the suspects, then wakes up in his sickbed with a flash of psychological insight, knowing who did it. A pity: I was rather hoping one of the sidekicks would be allowed to solve the mystery whilst the boss was out of action... ( )

A favorite favorite author and character.
I read the all!
Read in 2006. ( )