The Peculiar Crime Unit Mysteries tend to be like Russian nesting dolls: there are layers within layers within layers. And one of the layers is always the Home Office effort to find a way to put the Unit out of business for good. Why? Well...it simply doesn't conform to anyone's idea of a government authority (nor was it ever intended to).In this episode, it appears that middle aged woman are dying in London pubs---but are they in fact being murdered. If so, by whom and why? Now this would seem

Our two elderly heroes, London Detectives Arthur Bryant and John May, with their Peculiar Crimes Unit, (PCU), are back in their 6th adventure. As their name suggests, the PCU is tasked with solving Peculiar Crimes using peculiar investigative tactics. This is a quirky, unique, witty and engaging series and The Victoria Vanishes is a very good addition to this excellent series.Protagonist Arthur Bryant has the air of the eccentric, absent minded professor about him – if you are familiar with the

Brilliant, as always.Unique series, only for connoisseurs.:)

This is yet another hugely enjoyable Bryant & May novel. It has all the ingredients we know and love: a seemingly impenetrable mystery, superbly drawn characters, real humour and a wonderful delve into the intricacies of London’s diverse history. Oh, and the Home Office trying to close down the Unit, of course.The Victoria Vanishes is largely about pubs. The plot is an intriguing one involving a number of murders in pubs, and Arthur actually seeing one of the victims entering a pub...which cease...

Another rollicking, amusing, witty, historically and geographically-descriptive tale from Mr. Fowler featuring his two most famous, elderly detectives, the finicky and frowsy Arthur Bryant, the elegant and urbane John May.In this one - and as the PCU is being discredited and removed from existence due to ridiculous, politically-correct notions of police work - Bryant and May investigate the deaths (murders?) of middle-aged women found in or near local pubs. The women are alone, possibly meeting

The closure of many historic pubs in London inspired the author to write the sixth Bryant and May mystery. Octogenarians Arthur Bryant and John May are the senior detectives of the Peculiar Crimes Unit. After four women fall over dead in the pubs around London, they suspect a serial killer. Meanwhile, there is a danger that the Peculiar Crimes Unit might be shut down by headquarters.The mystery is told with a quirky British humor. Lots of historical information about London is woven into the plo...

Another very enjoyable read about the wonderful Arthur Bryant and John May, the elderly detectives from the Peculiar Crimes Unit in London and their quirky crime-solving methods. A police procedural with a slant like no other I have read, I love the eccentric characters and that peculiarly British sense of humour. The City of London is the jewel in the crown of the Bryant and May series, and I wish that I still lived there so I could visit the pubs mentioned in the text and appreciate their inte...

Enjoyable impossible mystery, which when explained, doesn't seem so impossible but makes perfect sense! I enjoyed the interactions between the members of the PCU and their methods for solving their peculiar crime.Overall I enjoyed this book alot. Goofed and skipped the previous one so will read that one next.

Bryant and May are a pair of geriatric detectives working the mysterious streets of London, taking the time to puzzle over crimes whose patterns are not immediately obvious, finding connections that might be missed by a policeman working the beat and looking to meet his targets. In this, the first I've read in the series, their Peculiar Crimes Unit faces closure, their health deterioriates, and a man is murdering women in the middle of crowded pubs.Bryant and May are similar in many ways to Holm...

THE VICTORIA VANISHES (Pol. Proc-Bryant & May-London-Cont) – VG+Fowler, Christopher – 6th in seriesDoubleday, 2008, UK Hardcover – ISBN: 9780385610681First Sentence: She had four and a half minutes left to live.Pathologist Oswald Finch is dead, May has been diagnosed with a tumor on his heart and Bryant has submitted his resignation letter. On his way home from Finch’s wake, Bryant notices a woman going into a pub. The woman is later found dead and when they go to investigate, the pub is gone. I...

I think I've just run out of steam on this series. Tapping out.

I must start this review by stating that I had not read any other Christopher Fowler books, including the 5 preceding PCU books. With that in mind, I think this book would have been more satisfying had I read the prior books in the series.[return][return]Jumping in at book 6 is never ideal, but some authors set you up well to do so. In this case I felt a little blind. There were a fair bit of characters in the book being referred to by first or last name and little in the way of character traits...

I enjoyed this 6th novel in the series much better than the earlier ones, perhaps because the plot had more interesting twists and turns, or because I'm more attached to the various recurring characters, or even because of the History of London Pubs bonus. OK, maybe some details are rather far-fetched (Christ's blood, the Ministry of Defence conspiracy etc), but who cares? It has gradually become a delightfully quirky series with charming, eccentric characters and irresistible little tidbits abo...

If you like a classic British cozy, this has all the right stuff. Good characterization and a satisfying mystery. It has a bit of humor, too, which made it an entertaining read.

Sixth in the Bryant & May crime series and revolving around two too-old detectives too stubborn to retire in London, England.In 2009, The Victoria Vanishes was nominated for the Dilys Award and the British Fantasy Award for Best Novel.My TakeThis has been a very confusing story with all the flips and flops between Theseus, Masters, Kasavian selling the building, where all the women worked, what they did, and the killer's purpose. It is leavened by Fowler's sense of humor and all the personal act...

For a pair of geriatric detectives, the fabulous Bryant & May do not seem to age – ah, if only…. The pair at the heart of the Peculiar Crimes Unit find themselves faced with a classic conundrum, investigating the murder of woman Bryant recalls passing in the street on his way home; she fell not far from where he saw her – but, perplexingly, the pub that the night before was on the corner where she was found is nowhere to be seen. And then, more women die in pubs.Fowler’s inventiveness and arcane...

Although corpses abound in this novel, it moves at the pace of a Victorian novel, packed with the history of London and reflections on the drastic change wrought by the 21st century. This is typical of the Bryant & May series, which in this outing focuses on a group of London pubs that play a critical role as the murder locales. One of the detectives makes a distinction between pubs and bars:“You always get one or two by themselves in London pubs. That's the difference between a pub and a bar,"

The name "Peculiar Crimes Unit" pretty much says it all - -they're charming, unorthodox and incredibly effective. Whether the vanishing building in question is a figment of an addled older brain or not is just one of many odd things happening in this book. Will the unit stay together after solving this mystery (murders, not buildings vanished)? Only time will tell, but in the meantime, I'm going back to the beginning.

Wonderfully complicated murder mystery. Just right for Bryant and May. During it’s solution the Peculiar Crime Unit gets evicted, dead pathologist’s ashes get used for kitty litter and the boys discover a lost relic of Christ.

2 stars. I should not have to skim a book to endure getting through it at all as I did with this one. I have never made a habit of skimming.Frankly, this book gives the effect of the author's having had a thesaurus on hand that he pulled out every half-hour or so just for fun whilst writing, to inject some obscure term - I have a wide and somewhat eclectic vocabulary and always have had, even more so as an adult than as a child, but within the first hundred pages even I had to stop to check a di...