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mestarling's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
silkmoth's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
lighthearted
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
This installment of the Campion series is unlike any of the previous books. On one level it's a much more traditional murder mystery. However Allingham has played with the format, such that most of the people involved, including the police, are sure "whodunnit" fairly early on. But the how and the why and the proof are much harder to obtain.
nbarton82's review against another edition
3.0
Well-constructed mystery, but tedious caricatures made for a tedious read.
vstewart76's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
hbcbray's review against another edition
4.0
An engaging and complex story, but here our Albert is emotional and vulnerable. I missed the vague young man behind enormous spectacles, who always sends a step ahead of the action.
jodonjo's review against another edition
4.0
I thought this book was delightful. The different characters really come alive as you're drawn into this interwar art-set world. Dear old Belle, keeping court in Little Venice; the bombastic and cattish Max Fustian striding around; Linda scowling and incandescent; and the wonderfully bizarre collection of ageing models.
As a detective, Campion does very little detecting, he has a few clever insights but spends the whole novel on the backfoot. The mystery is more in uncovering the whys, than the hows or whos. For me this made a rather neat contrast with Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers. Christie is famous for the whodunnit, culminating in a denouement where the reader might pause and try to work out if they've figured it out themselves. The books are puzzles of detection, and the characters and settings aren't as strongly drawn as Allingham manages here. I've only read Unnatural Death by Sayers, and in that Wimsey does a good deal more detecting (often via proxies as he's too famous to make an appearance himself), but you basically know who committed the crime and more-or-less why, the mystery is in how it was done and how the killer almost gets away with it. In Death of a Ghost, the hunting for clues mostly happens off-page by the police, Campion's role is an observer of a social world.
The ending has a delightful sequence at a party and then on a drunken night wandering, but the actual resolution was more of the same passivity. So as a detective story, it's clearly inadequate. And yet! I really did enjoy it on a scene-by-scene level.
As a detective, Campion does very little detecting, he has a few clever insights but spends the whole novel on the backfoot. The mystery is more in uncovering the whys, than the hows or whos. For me this made a rather neat contrast with Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers. Christie is famous for the whodunnit, culminating in a denouement where the reader might pause and try to work out if they've figured it out themselves. The books are puzzles of detection, and the characters and settings aren't as strongly drawn as Allingham manages here. I've only read Unnatural Death by Sayers, and in that Wimsey does a good deal more detecting (often via proxies as he's too famous to make an appearance himself), but you basically know who committed the crime and more-or-less why, the mystery is in how it was done and how the killer almost gets away with it. In Death of a Ghost, the hunting for clues mostly happens off-page by the police, Campion's role is an observer of a social world.
The ending has a delightful sequence at a party and then on a drunken night wandering, but the actual resolution was more of the same passivity. So as a detective story, it's clearly inadequate. And yet! I really did enjoy it on a scene-by-scene level.
sklepia's review against another edition
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
3.0
fhackland's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
teresac's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75