darbystouffer's review against another edition
3.0
Meh. Agatha Christie is better. That is all.
23 down, 81 to go!
23 down, 81 to go!
kari13's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
elizafiedler's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
judyward's review against another edition
4.0
The books in the Adam Dalgliesh series just keep getting better and better.
tombomp's review against another edition
1.0
At several points the main character is discussing the case with his assistant and, despite the fact they've already talked about the evidence and what they think and he's the current viewpoint character and we follow both of them through everything important they do, their important deductions are covered up with sudden reported speech, like "he said what had happened, his assistant said yes that's obvious". Like are you *kidding* me how lazy can you get
The book is OK enough but the denouement is pretty silly and is the sort of thing that makes 95% of the book feel like a total waste. There aren't enough clues for it to make sense and the ones given which do lead to the ending don't really feel consistent or reasonable. They try and link the ending to a character's personality and then right at the end do a "oh btw actually it's someone totally different" for who there are 0 clues given. Not horrible horrible but pretty typical mystery fare in that the ending may as well be detached from the rest of the book because the rest of the book isn't important.
EDIT: After thinking about it some more, decreased my rating to 1 star because of the above and
1) The ending is absolute nonsense. The motives given make no sense, the story of the identity of a character makes no sense and the entire book requires several characters to have acted with no intelligence or thought at all, even ignoring the typical mystery trope of "oh they avoided an easier way because of X unlikely idiosyncrasy"
2) The main character is dull as ditchwater. I remember hardly any of what he did. His assistant just had sex with a suspect (no lead up, no follow up) and made misogynistic+abusive comments about a witness. I'm not saying all characters have to be cool and likeable but scenes which are 15 pages of abusive, cruel thoughts about an old woman from someone who's seriously abused his position is horrible.
3) I could predict an event that happened near the end because it happened at near the exact same time and in a similar way to the other one of her books I read and, like that one, puts the character in incredibly serious danger and then pulls it out by having the dangerous person be a complete idiot and events to play out perfectly.
4) Physical attractiveness is treated as the most important part of each character to a large extent. Not surprising, but really crap.
So yeah this book stinks. A lot.
The book is OK enough but the denouement is pretty silly and is the sort of thing that makes 95% of the book feel like a total waste. There aren't enough clues for it to make sense and the ones given which do lead to the ending don't really feel consistent or reasonable. They try and link the ending to a character's personality and then right at the end do a "oh btw actually it's someone totally different" for who there are 0 clues given. Not horrible horrible but pretty typical mystery fare in that the ending may as well be detached from the rest of the book because the rest of the book isn't important.
EDIT: After thinking about it some more, decreased my rating to 1 star because of the above and
1) The ending is absolute nonsense. The motives given make no sense, the story of the identity of a character makes no sense and the entire book requires several characters to have acted with no intelligence or thought at all, even ignoring the typical mystery trope of "oh they avoided an easier way because of X unlikely idiosyncrasy"
2) The main character is dull as ditchwater. I remember hardly any of what he did. His assistant just had sex with a suspect (no lead up, no follow up) and made misogynistic+abusive comments about a witness. I'm not saying all characters have to be cool and likeable but scenes which are 15 pages of abusive, cruel thoughts about an old woman from someone who's seriously abused his position is horrible.
3) I could predict an event that happened near the end because it happened at near the exact same time and in a similar way to the other one of her books I read and, like that one, puts the character in incredibly serious danger and then pulls it out by having the dangerous person be a complete idiot and events to play out perfectly.
Spoiler
A strong person hits you hard in the head with a golf club and within a few hours you're pretty much fine? Ridiculous. Also pretty sure they could have struck twice.4) Physical attractiveness is treated as the most important part of each character to a large extent. Not surprising, but really crap.
So yeah this book stinks. A lot.
mbondlamberty's review against another edition
4.0
Very enjoyable mystery to read, close to a thriller in how gripping it is.
squishsquish's review against another edition
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0