The Impossible Fortune (Thursday Murder Club #5)

Our favorite Cooper’s Chase residents Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron and Ibrahim are back and once again a mystery has found them. Only these four could take something as simple as the wedding of Joyce’s daughter and end up embroiled in a situation involving 350 million pounds in Bitcoin, a missing groomsman, a car bomb, an ex-con and her teenage protege and a cokehead with murderous intentions! 

Being with these four, despite the crazy circumstance, always feels like being back with friends, and now that Richard Osman has started writing a new series We Solve Murders, the wait to see them again was even longer! 

Elizabeth went through a huge life change in the last book and seeing her find her way through it and back to the joy of using her unique investigative skill set was fun. She’s a formidable woman and you just know she’ll land on her feet, regardless of the circumstances.

Joyce, bless her, is still her own special brand of human. I love her! She acts kind of ditzy with her free flowing, hilarious train of thought diary entries, yet under that daffy veneer is a deceptively strong and wise woman who always seems to cut right to the simple truth of things!

Ron’s past dealing with labor unions and a rougher set have given him a more, shall we say, “flexible” view of how to deal with complicated situations, but under that occasionally salty exterior, he’s a man who’d go to any length for his friends and family - something that’s put to the test in this book.

Ibrahim is such a gentle, lovely soul. He’s loved greatly and lost and now feels the pain of loneliness, but he’s the voice of wisdom when cooler heads need to prevail and his willingness to see the good in people who others might dismiss is touching. His continuing interactions with ex-con Connie and a new teenage character Tia were one of the highlights of this book.

Once again Osman’s humor and warmth shine bright. Our main four, along with returning characters Bogdan, Connie, PC Donna De Freitas, DCI Chris Hudson, Ron’s girlfriend Pauline and a slew of colorful new characters made this fifth book in the series another stellar entry to an already amazing series. The audio narrated by Fiona Shaw is the ONLY way I can imagine doing this series. It’s excellent in print, but it’s even MORE phenomenal on audio, and if you can do both like I did … well, I’ve run out of superlative adjectives, but you get the idea!

★★★★ ½ 

Thanks to Viking Penguin | Pamela Dorman Books, NetGalley and author Richard Osman for this digital ARC to honestly review and to Audible for the audio. It’s out now.