Eight Detectives is cleverly structured. It is seven short stories within an overarching eighth story. It brought to mind Christie and Conan Doyle style set ups.

Julia Hart is a publisher who travels to a secluded island to meet an author who self published seven short, in some places gruesome, stories 30 years previously. She wants to republish the book of stories and delve deeper into his “mathematical rules for murder mystery” research paper, the basis for his short stories.

As she delves into his past the author, Grant McAllister, becomes increasingly less forthcoming. Why? This leads to her becoming the eighth detective.

Each short story is interspersed throughout, as the author and publisher go through each one. Julia points out what she feels are discrepancies in each story, trying to elicit information from Grant as to why he put them into his stories.

I do not want to give spoilers, however I will say I was left feeling short changed when information that had previously been hidden from me as reader was revealed towards the end. This went against the rules as set out by Grant in his theories of murder mystery by numbers. It would not have spoiled enjoyment of the book, or given anything major away, had readers been given a hint of what Julia was actually up to.