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    The Franchise Affair
    The Franchise Affair
    The Franchise Affair
    Ebook341 pages5 hours

    The Franchise Affair

    By Josephine Tey

    4/5

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    Robert Blair was about to knock off from a slow day at his law firm when the phone rang. It was Marion Sharpe on the line, a local woman of quiet disposition who lived with her mother at their decrepit country house, The Franchise. It appeared that she was in some serious trouble: Miss Sharpe and her mother were accused of brutally kidnapping a demure young woman named Betty Kane. Miss Kane's claims seemed highly unlikely, even to Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard, until she described her prison -- the attic room with its cracked window, the kitchen, and the old trunks -- which sounded remarkably like The Franchise. Yet Marion Sharpe claimed the Kane girl had never been there, let alone been held captive for an entire month! Not believing Betty Kane's story, Solicitor Blair takes up the case and, in a dazzling feat of amateur detective work, solves the unbelievable mystery that stumped even Inspector Grant.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherScribner
    Release dateDec 25, 2012
    ISBN9781476733166
    Author

    Josephine Tey

    Josephine Tey began writing full-time after the successful publication of her first novel, The Man in the Queue (1929), which introduced Inspector Grant of Scotland Yard. She died in 1952, leaving her entire estate to the National Trust.

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    Reviews for The Franchise Affair

    4/5

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    • 5/5
      I enjoyed The Franchise Affair from the first to the last page; I was disappointed it ended! Very well written—unlike more modern books. In the middle of the book I was struck by the feeling that Miss Sharpe is Tey’s alter ego. No, not physically, exactly; just look at a picture of Tey and you will realize she would never live up to Marion’s mysterious beauty. Although Tey had a narrow face, just like her description of Marion’s, there the physical similarities ends. Yet, for some reason, I find Marion too much a “real human being” and wonder if Tey didn't transfer her personality to the character… Mrs. Sharpe was my favorite character, though. Her bluntness, straightforwardness reminds me a lot of someone I know quite well: myself! :-) Miss Tey's ideas on penal servitude (expressed through Robert's ruminations about lawyer Kevin McDermott's opinion) would most definitely not make her popular among the modern "learned" crowds... Anyway, this is an incredibly good, well written, well-thought book. Worth your time. I am looking forward to her other books.

      QUOTES:

      Nowadays, it was the untried who bore the pillory and the guilty went immediately into a safe obscurity. Something had gone wrong somewhere.

      Kevin’s idea of prison reform, Robert remembered, was deportation to a penal colony. An island community where everyone worked hard. This was not a reform for the benefit of the prisoners.

      Tomes have been written trying to define the criminal, but it is a very simple definition after all. The criminal is a person who makes the satisfaction of his own immediate personal wants the mainspring of his actions. You can’t cure him of his egotism, but you can make the indulgence of it not worth his while. Or almost not worth his while.
    • 4/5
      Really enjoyable mystery, a great example of Victorian mysteries.
    • 4/5
      This book offers an intriguing story, all the more intriguing because it is based on a real case from eighteenth-century Scotland. A teenage servant claims that she has been held against her will in the rural manor house of two elderly women. The home's owners, the mother and daughter Sharpe, cannot believe the charges, but they also have little ability to dispute them. Their lawyer, Robert Blair, seems to be the only person in the small town who believes in their innocence. In this book Tey has produced an excellent mystery. I was certainly riveted to see how the story would resolve. Tey presents the Sharpes' case as if they are innocent, but as the plot progresses it becomes more and more difficult to see how they could possibly not be guilty. The servant, Betty Kane, appears to have absolutely disappeared during the week when she claims to have been held hostage. I couldn't wait to find out what had really happened to Betty, and this is a mystery that keeps the reader guessing until the end. It also highlights the vagaries of small-town life, and the sort of gothic horror that can come from an entire town turning against you.
    • 4/5
      Robert Blair is a solicitor in the small English village of Milford. His ordered life changes when he is requested by Marion Sharpe to support them against charges of kidnapping and beating a 15 year old girl. Marion and her mother live in The Franchise, a large secluded house on a lonely road.Josephine Tey's writing is very easy to read with an underlying hint of humour.
    • 4/5
      This classic British mystery was an easy, enjoyable romp. Robert Blair is a likable "detective" (actually, an attorney) who lives with his aunt (actually, his cousin) and gets persuaded to assist Mrs. and Miss Sharpe (mother and daughter living alone in an isolated and dilapidated old house) as they are accused of abducting and abusing a teenage girl. Tey's writing is entertaining --- and more spare than I tend to think of mid-20th-century British crime novels as being. "The Franchise Affair" may be my favorite of the genre and era. It requires leaving some 21st-century sensibilities at the door, but not nearly so many as some of its generation.
    • 3/5
      Of course an English mystery is the perfect companion on a rainy day and The Franchise Affair is a book easily completed in a day. The story centers on a stodgy, middle-aged lawyer whose life takes a drastic turn when a woman and her mother ask for his assistance. Marion Sharpe and her mother, Mrs. Sharpe, become the witches of The Franchise, a run-down country house, when a teen-age girl accused them of kidnapping and assaulting her. Robert Blair and his family and friends jump into the melee to defend the Sharpes against this vicious accusation. Tey simplistically tells the story with many moments of comic relief. The house remains as the symbol of the Old Guard that is incapable of change. A delightfully fun story.
    • 5/5
      One of my favorite Tey's -- a mystery that doesn't involve murder, but still immensely satisfying when Marion Sharpe and her mother are cleared of all charges. Especially since it also involves exposing Betty for the liar that she is!!
    • 4/5
      Robert Blair is a sedate solicitor and the current head of a well established and respectable family firm in a small English town. He lives a quiet and predictable life and is content living with his aunt who feeds him well. One day, he receives a surprising phone call from Marion Sharpe, the current resident of The Franchise, a old and run down house just at the outskirts of town. She asks him for help in a strange case in which a young girl by the name of Betty Kane accuses Ms. Sharpe and her mother of having kidnapped her, imprisoned her in their attic and beaten her repeatedly, presumably in an attempt to induce her to become their servant. As strange and unlikely as the case may seem, the girl has a blameless reputation and is able to describe the house down to it's tiniest details to Scotland Yard, while the Sharpes on the other hand are none too popular in their small town. All the same, our solicitor decides the accused women cannot have committed such horrific acts and he sets out to prove their innocence. I had heard many good things about Josephine Tey, and they were all true. He characters are unusual, and there are plenty of strange elements which kept this reader on her toes. Although this is the third book in the Allan Grant series, he plays a very minor role in this novel, which makes it as good a start as any. Highly recommended.
    • 5/5
      Tremendously good read and I never expected that from the summary - the tale of two women being framed for a brutal kidnapping seemed incredibly far-fetched to me but I'd loved Miss Pym Disposes by the same author so I thought I might as well see if the rest of her work was as good.
      Well, it is, and then some. Her writing is astonishing. The book isn't thick but the amount of detail she manages to put in is quite stupendous. After reading a particularly well-written passage, I often caught myself thinking 'I feel completely different about this character than I did two pages ago, how did she do this?' A great deal of her genius has to do with knowing her characters inside out - not two characters in this are the same and they all have a very distinctive voice. We might follow Robert but I know as much about the Sharpes and Aunt Lin. This is also a masterpiece of a mystery novel - until very late in the book, the author makes sure we just don't know whether or not the Sharpes are guilty and since we spend so much time with them and they're so endearing, it's quite a feast. The investigation is realistic and suspenseful and Tey's sense of timing is impeccable - she does know when to drop us a bone and when to leave us in the dark, it's incredible. The end trial could have been a case of deus ex machina if it weren't so well crafted and it becomes not only plausible but the only solution to the plot. The end is interesting and totally unexpected like the rest of the book - the romance hinted at throughout the novel finds a very unusual open-ended conclusion and I loved that. I can't tell you how vivid and deeply witty Tey's writing is - I will not only miss Marion, Mrs Sharpe and Robert but I'll really miss The Franchise, too. You're left with a very good impression of what everything and everyone is and closing the book is like parting with friends. Amazing author - I'll never doubt her again.
    • 4/5
      This novel, while featuring Inspector Grant, relies on Solicitor Robert Blair to solve the case in court. A couple of women residing in the country have been accused by a teenage girl of locking her up in a room and beating her. The girl, who has a photographic memory, tells a believable circumstantial tale. In order to disprove the girl's story, they must find where the girl had actually been during the period in question and find a few holes in the story. Blair himself is not a criminal attorney and can only take the case so far. It will take a miracle to achieve Blair's goal of not only causing sufficient doubt but of discrediting the young girl. It took me awhile to get into the narrative. At times the narrative plods along, and at other times it moves more quickly. Readers are never told why the young girl picked this pair of women to victimize. I did, however, appreciate the fact that when Blair's aunt prayed, a breakthrough in the case occurred on multiple occasions. Overall, it's an enjoyable story, but I missed seeing Inspector Grant in action.
    • 5/5
      Tey does things with her apparently simple plots that no one, but no one else can manage. A deliciously sly woman.
    • 4/5
      Although this is listed as the third book in Tey's Alan Grant series, here he plays more of a background role rather than the main character. That honor goes toRobert Blair, a typical small-town English solicitor in the quiet village of Milford. His old and established legal firm, Blair, Hayward and Bennet, handles matters of "wills, conveyancing and investments." But with one desperate telephone call, Blair is thrust into a most bizarre case which takes him to a house called The Franchise.Upon his arrival, he is met by Marion Sharpe and her mother, the owners of the house, along with Inspector Grant of Scotland Yard. Grant is there investigating the story of Betty Kane, a demure young schoolgirl who claims that she had been kidnapped by the Sharpes one day after missing a bus and held prisoner in an attic room, where she was beaten when she refused to perform household duties. According to Kane, Mrs. Sharpe left the door unlocked one night, and Betty was able to make her escape. She was able to describe the inside of the house to a tee, down to the different types of suitcases in a closet, as well as the distinctive features of their car. But the problem is that both Marion and her mother swear that they've never set eyes on the girl, and they're absolutely baffled as to her knowledge of the house. Blair is positive that the women are innocent, and despite some misgivings, agrees to help, despite the insurmountable odds against success. And so it begins.Tey's characters are believable, the plot is engrossing, but what makes this novel work well is how she successfully plunges her readers immediately not only into the crime, but into the mounting tension surrounding the case up until the end. And although The Franchise Affair is set in the countryside, it is a sophisticated story, not just another English country house-based mystery.Although written in 1949, Franchise Affair is still a very good read, with some clearly recognizable elements (such as the power of the tabloids to fuel the fires of those who read them), and a completely different storyline than most of her earlier novels and of the novels of that period. Tey based this novel on a true crime of the 18th century focusing on another young girl, Elizabeth Canning. If you're at all interested, there are two fictional accounts of this 18th-century story that I'm aware of: [Elizabeth is Missing], by Lillian de la Torre and [The Canning Wonder], by Arthur Machen. For aficionados of classic mysteries, The Franchise Affair is definitely recommended. The end is a little sappy, but you won't care because the case is so satisfying.
    • 4/5
      the story was quite good but i found it a little slow. too much aunt harriet and the nephew and other stuff.too many people out of town or perhaps justice was faster then.saw it on tv a while ago and found it verrrrry slow. a better read.
    • 2/5
      I thought the premise was something, perhaps from the result of a dare, and the events relating to the conclusion to the mystery a little trite.
    • 3/5
      Quite entertaining, provides a fascinating picture if England in the late 1940s, and an intriguing plot.
    • 5/5
      In order to save his clients' reputations, country solicitor Robert Blair must prove false a teenage girl's convincing allegation of kidnapping and imprisonment. The drama is perfectly paced, with suspense gradually building toward the climax. Tey leaves just enough doubt to keep readers guessing. Milford reminds me of St. Mary's Mead. In both villages, observant amateurs notice similarities between the suspects and the locals whose vices and peccadilloes are known to them. Tey's witty and insightful comments about human nature and behavior provoke reflection. Some characteristic passages:...for all his surface malice and his over-crowded life, {he} found the will and the time to help those who deserved help. In which he differed markedly from the Bishop of Larborough, who preferred the undeserving.The less he knows about a thing the more strongly he feels about it.The criminal is a person who makes the satisfaction of his own immediate personal wants the mainspring of his actions. You can't cure him of his egotism, but you can make the indulgence of it not worth his while. Or almost not worth his while.Highly recommended for all classic mystery lovers.
    • 2/5
      Well written, at the phrase and sentence level, and opens intriguingly, but becomes an unpleasant read as the pages go on. It has the usual irritants of the Golden Age - class snobbery, sexism, the desperate conservatism of a passing social world - to an irksome degree.A teenage girl claims that two women, vulnerable outsiders in the local community, abducted and beat her. The hero-detective is convinced that the women are innocent, that the girl is a liar and, furthermore, that the girl is a fast little trollop, using the abduction story as cover for some indiscretion of her own. And so it proves. There are no twists. No errors in judgement. Just Good Middle-class Woman vs. Lying Little Trollop.Lavishly mixed in are swipes at the kind of beyond-caricatured bleeding-heart liberals who exist only in the mind of tabloid columnists. Plus the cosiest affirmation of eugenics I've so far seen in a post-war novel.
    • 5/5
      This was an excellently well-written story about the term justice". Two innocent women are accused of a crime. Instead of going through the legal system "innocent until proven guilty", they are stuck in the small-town mob mentality of "guilty until proven innocent". It was a wonderful psychological viewpoint of the media's influence on public opinion.
      "
    • 3/5
      Robert Blair is a staid lawyer settling into a comfortable middle age when he gets dragged into an odd kidnapping case.

      It's told well--I really like Tey's quiet, understated writing style. And the characters and their interactions are delightfully old-fashioned. But old-fashioned is precisely my problem with this story--it all hinges on slut-shaming, bad-seedism (that concept that some people are just born totally evil, blegh) and classism, which kept rankling as I read. I just don't believe that "the lower classes" are crass and lack tact, and either live to serve or are evil. And without sharing that belief, the story reads less naturally and believably. And, as all too often happens in mystery novels, all is revealed in a sensational confession.

      But it's still a good story.
    • 3/5
      The Franchise Affair by Jospehine Tey - Good

      Written in 1949, this is another period piece and, like Agatha Christie, suffers from a few 'ouch moments' where language and non-pc attitudes are concerned, but don't let that put you off.

      This is billed as an Inspector Grant story, but he hardly comes into it, certainly he has a lot of mentions, but very few appearances. It is, instead, more about Robert Blair of Blair, Hayward and Bennet, a solicitor in a small town... and in a rut. Out of the blue he is called to help and then defend two ladies accused of kidnapping a girl, holding her hostage and beating her. This is where Inspector Grant comes in as he is the Investigating Officer. He's pretty confident of his case, so it is down to Robert to investigate the girls claims, try to find the truth and defend the ladies.

      A nice little book, you just need to gloss over the non-pc stuff (attitudes to women, class, education and assumptions made on appearance) and regard it as a window on the times.
    • 5/5
      For any years I would have said this was Tey's best mystery, and I still think it is still one of her bet. Inspector Grant appears in it as a minor character,.but he is not the "detective; in the sense of the one who solves the case. The leading figure is a quiet country solicitor. Robert Blair, who is asked for help by Marion Sharpe, an attractive woman about his own age (40) (they gradually fall in love). She and her mother (a very sharp-tongued shrewd old lady) are accused by a young girl of having abducted and beaten her. The girl shows an amazing knowledge of (parts of) their house, which very few people have access to, and the police eventually do put them on trial. In the end (spoiler warning) the girl is proved a liar., not so much by brilliant deduction but simply by a chance recognition of a photo of the girl by a man at whose hotel she was staying with her lover while supposedly the prisoner of the two women. THe case is based rather loosely on an 18th century one which was also used in one of Lillian de la Torre's Doctor Johnson mysteries. On subtheme (as in Brat Farrar) is the importance of heredity --the girl clearly took after her sluttish mother despite the good influence of her adopted parents.
    • 4/5
      The Franchise AffairJosephine TeyMonday, March 18, 2013 9:08 PMA Folio edition, a tale of a lying teenager defaming two woman who live alone in a large inherited house. The description of Milford, England, and the life of the post-war era is exact and comical. The mystery is satisfyingly tidied up at the end.
    • 4/5
      Josephine Tey is a pen name for Elizabeth Mackintosh who died in 1952, so this is an 'old' mystery written by an award-winning author. Although noted as one of her Inspector Alan Grant series, Grant plays a very minor role in this story in which the task is not to prove whodunit but to disprove an early accusation. The text is well written and holds the reader's attention well and it is certainly worth exploring this and other works by Ms. Tey if you can find them.
    • 4/5
      A 'how done it'. First published in 1949, this seems strangely contemporary, dealing as it does with being judged by the press and public opinion.
    • 4/5
      A fascinating book, based on an earlier real life story about two eccentric and unpopular women, accused of kidnapping and mistreating a young schoolgirl. Robert Blair, a settled, respectable country lawyer is called in to assist them and finds himself drawn in to the bizarre case and the lives of his clients. Although initially a reader may find it a little dated, and conservative in outlook, the book is also is a hymn to decency and justice, in the face of a sentimental press, ill-informed do-gooders and a prejudiced public. Highly recommended.
    • 5/5
      This has become one of my favorite mysteries of all time.A young girl named Betty Kane accuses a mysterious middle aged woman and her mother of beating and kidnapping her. Everyone believes the sweet young girl, except the local lawyer Robert Blair. Blair is determined to prove the girl a liar, and his quest turns his quiet predictable life upside down.This is an Alan Grant mystery, but he is rarely mentioned. When he is mentioned, he is presented as 'the bad guy' because he is prosecuting the case. There is also no murder. How unusual! This non-formulaic approach is one reason I loved the book. Every character is this book is endearing (well, almost every character). I could see them as I read, and they left me wanting more.I stayed up way past bedtime because I could not put the book down. Riveting stuff.
    • 4/5
      An excellent story, & quite witty too. I enjoyed Ben Carly's & Kevin Macdermott's bon mots. Inspector Grant is a regular in Tey's works but all the other characters are new. How horrible to be unable to disprove the girl's claims, & what a nasty piece of work she is. I do enjoy Josephine Tey's books, & they are so well-written.
    • 5/5
      A charming style, nicely set in its time. A crime story with a distinctly difference - thoroughly readable
    • 5/5
      The Franchise Affair is a miracle of a book. It is a mystery about with two older women accused of abducting and harming a sixteen year-old girl which turns on their being proved innocent of a crime of which they did not commit, but have absolutely no evidence that can prove this. The lawyer in the case, Robert Blair, reluctantly becomes detective because he believes them. How this impossible situation is resolved is beautifully told by the author. It is both an intelligent and immensely enjoyable mystery.
    • 4/5
      While it is an interesting mystery, it mostly concerns the lawyer Robert Blair and his growth as a person and his asking of questions about the rut he's in.The mystery at the centre, and the catalyst for change, is a accusation of beating and kidnapping on the part of two reclusive women, one of whom attracts Robert. But who is right and who is wrong? It's more racist than sexist but it is reflective of the time. I often tell people who wonder what life was like at a certain time to read contemporary fiction, it offers an insight into the psyche of the time that is often interesting and instructive.The world it shows is quite stratified and quite strange to modern eyes and some of the description shows the bias of the author. But it was interesting, not as much for the mystery, but for the characters.

    Book preview

    The Franchise Affair - Josephine Tey

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