We already know pretty early on that Brat has been legally accepted, clearing his biggest hurdles, and Patrick’s death is overshadowed by the tension between Brat and Simon.

To lighten the boredom of convalescence, Inspector Alan Grant investigates a crime of the time of Richard III by reconstructing it and considering it with his critical policeman's eye.What a revelation is ‘Brat Farrar’ by Josephine Tey, a thoughtful mystery of assumed identity I didn’t want to put down. And then right at the end, there is a small twist, which explains much of what had previously seemed odd. Josephine Tey wrote a number of detective stories but her best work hardly comes under the heading of a whodunit. In most years, The Scapegoat would have been among my best reads – but 2020 had some truly brilliant reads.

After hearing rumours that he had made his way to Australia, she advertised widely in Australian newspapers, offering a reward for information about her son.He is familiar with the layout of Latchetts itself, and the village of Clare, and is convinced he can coach Brat on all the background details. If Patrick is still alive then he collects the inheritance, so the imposter and his chance aquaintance (through regular payments) stand a lot to gain.

Their centuries-old family estate is Latchetts, in the fictional village of Clare, near the south coast of England. It’s one of those cases where there is the kernel of a much better book at the heart of a good book. In this tale of mystery and suspense, a stranger enters the inner sanctum of the Ashby family posing as Patrick Ashby, the heir to the family's sizable fortune. We have begun to like this young man, and although what he is proposing to do is fraudulent - both criminally and morally reprehensible - we cannot help rooting for him. Because Brat’s likeness to Simon is so remarkable, Alec is sure he can teach Brat to impersonate the missing twin, Patrick, and thereby as the elder brother, claim the trust and the estate.

Patrick’s body had never been found, but it was assumed that he had drowned, jumping to his death off a cliff, leaving a pile of clothes behind. The Neoplatonic, medieval Christian theologian known as "Pseudo-Dionysus" posited that what comes from God - and all things come from God - is therefore good. Edmund Husserl, creator of Phenomenology, believed that to understand existence, we must stand back from it, we must pause and detach and reflect.