"The Man Who Died Twice" by Richard Osman

Having (finally!) caught up on my book club obligations for the next while, I was free to read something completely of my own choosing. "The Man Who Died Twice" by Richard Osman has been in my TBR pile since shortly after its release in late September, and I was happy to FINALLY dust it off. I woke up very early (way too early) on Monday/yesterday morning and couldn't get back to sleep, so I finally got up, took out my e-reader and started reading. I got 3/4 of the way through the book before reluctantly heading off to bed, and finished it this afternoon.  

"The Man Who Died Twice" is a sequel to one of my very favourite books from last year, "The Thursday Murder Club" (reviewed here), and picks up shortly after the last book left off, with a familiar cast of characters, and a few new ones too. I don't want to give too much away... suffice to say the plot involves an old friend of Elizabeth's (and I can only ever picture Helen Mirren when I read about Elizabeth) and 20 million British pounds' worth of stolen diamonds. 

"The Man Who Died Twice" features more of everything that I loved about "The Thursday Murder Club" -- the wonderful septuagenarian characters (all residents of Cooper's Chase, an upscale retirement village outside of London), the clever writing, the (frequent!) laugh-out-loud humour, the sharp observations (about life, death, aging, justice and so many other things), the clever plot twists & turns (and twists again)...  

Sequels don't always live up to the original. This one did. (For me, anyway.) Pure escapism, and just a whole lot of fun. Five stars on Goodreads.  

This was Book #4 read to date in 2022 (and Book #4 finished in January), bringing me to 9% of my 2022 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal of 45 books. I am (for the moment, anyway...!) 2 books ahead of schedule. :)  You can find reviews of all my books read to date in 2022 tagged as "2022 books."