All Roads Lead to Murder Monday
Sep. 18th, 2017 08:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
evelyn_bWhat I've Finished Reading
Cards on the Table is excellent, of course. Even if it weren't, it has Ariadne Oliver in it, which is an excellence all its own. Mrs. Oliver is wrong about everything, but still manages to solve a hefty portion of the case while giving herself a stomachache from eating too many apples and fending off nonsensical compliments from inattentive readers. My only real beef with Cards is that I don't like Col. Race being right about the suspect who is too upright and "white" a fellow to commit murder. There's none righteous, guys! Haven't you been paying attention?
The Case of the Constant Suicides by John Dickson Carr begins and ends as a hilarious rom-com about academics who meet on a train after feuding for several months in the Letters page of the Sunday Watchman. In between, there's a murder mystery with Dr. Gideon Fell. The mystery is all right (someone has tried to defraud an insurance company, with extraordinarily convoluted results) but it crowds out the story of the Letters Page nemeses who are forced by devilish circumstance to share a sleeping compartment, which I liked a little better and which had to be wrapped up abruptly as a postscript to the murder business. It's funny, though, and fast-moving.
What I'm Reading Now
Dumb Witness is one of the few Christie title changes that I really like. The original title was Poirot Loses a Client, because the old woman who wrote an anxious, evasive letter to Poirot at the start of the book is dead by the time he receives it. "Dumb Witness" focuses attention on the book's most likable character, a good dog who has been ignominiously framed for someone else's attempted murder. Hasting's affinity for and friendly conversations with the dog (a terrier called Bob) are by far my favorite part of this story, which is otherwise fairly typical - grasping heirs, knee-jerk xenophobia, big crumbling houses, wide-eyed lady's companions, bluff untrustworthy doctors, and so on. Not that I'm complaining! But Hasting's imaginary dog monologues really are a special treat. He makes the dog sound exactly like Hastings if Hastings were a dog.
What I Plan to Read Next
Aristotle Detective, the amazingtrue story of Aristotle, the ancient philosophy guy, who also solves fictional murders, or at least one murder. The back-cover blurb claims that Aristotle is "the best detective to come along since we said good-bye to Nero Wolfe and Hercule Poirot." WE'LL SEE.
Cards on the Table is excellent, of course. Even if it weren't, it has Ariadne Oliver in it, which is an excellence all its own. Mrs. Oliver is wrong about everything, but still manages to solve a hefty portion of the case while giving herself a stomachache from eating too many apples and fending off nonsensical compliments from inattentive readers. My only real beef with Cards is that I don't like Col. Race being right about the suspect who is too upright and "white" a fellow to commit murder. There's none righteous, guys! Haven't you been paying attention?
The Case of the Constant Suicides by John Dickson Carr begins and ends as a hilarious rom-com about academics who meet on a train after feuding for several months in the Letters page of the Sunday Watchman. In between, there's a murder mystery with Dr. Gideon Fell. The mystery is all right (someone has tried to defraud an insurance company, with extraordinarily convoluted results) but it crowds out the story of the Letters Page nemeses who are forced by devilish circumstance to share a sleeping compartment, which I liked a little better and which had to be wrapped up abruptly as a postscript to the murder business. It's funny, though, and fast-moving.
What I'm Reading Now
Dumb Witness is one of the few Christie title changes that I really like. The original title was Poirot Loses a Client, because the old woman who wrote an anxious, evasive letter to Poirot at the start of the book is dead by the time he receives it. "Dumb Witness" focuses attention on the book's most likable character, a good dog who has been ignominiously framed for someone else's attempted murder. Hasting's affinity for and friendly conversations with the dog (a terrier called Bob) are by far my favorite part of this story, which is otherwise fairly typical - grasping heirs, knee-jerk xenophobia, big crumbling houses, wide-eyed lady's companions, bluff untrustworthy doctors, and so on. Not that I'm complaining! But Hasting's imaginary dog monologues really are a special treat. He makes the dog sound exactly like Hastings if Hastings were a dog.
What I Plan to Read Next
Aristotle Detective, the amazing
no subject
Date: 2017-09-18 04:55 pm (UTC)I really must find some more by him, because this also sounds like fun, and I really enjoyed And So To Murder too. (Again, probably more for the rom-com elements, but that's fine by me. If only he had realised that his true purpose was to write screwball comedies!) For some reason, he's really hard to come by at the moment, though, and his books are ridiculous prices on Amazon even second hand. Blah.
The back-cover blurb claims that Aristotle is "the best detective to come along since we said good-bye to Nero Wolfe and Hercule Poirot." WE'LL SEE.
Copywriters should be careful about these things. It's just asking for trouble and unfair comparisons. Also Poirot is sceptical.
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Date: 2017-09-18 06:45 pm (UTC)I wonder why Dickson Carr is so hard to come by? I found this one in a used bookstore for $3 (and had the bookstore guy set up an alert for me, though who knows whether he'll remember). He seems like he ought to be more popular. I'll send you this one in the mail, if you want! - just let me know.
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Date: 2017-09-18 07:37 pm (UTC)<3
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Date: 2017-09-18 09:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-09-19 12:40 pm (UTC)