2021/048: The Moving Toyshop -- Edmund Crispin

2021/048: The Moving Toyshop -- Edmund Crispin

[Cadogan on poetic inspiration] It’s a curious passive sensation. Some people say it’s as if you’ve noticed something for the first time, but I think it’s more as if the thing in question had noticed you for the first time. [loc. 2580]

Set in Oxford in 1938, this is nominally a detective story -- featuring eccentric professor Gervase Fen and his friend, poet Richard Cadogan -- but relies more on coincidence and humour than on deduction and observation.( no spoilers )