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A review by agnes_the_wyrm
Knife Edge by Andy Lane
3.0
Well, this book certainly had more potential than the rest in the series. For one thing, I liked that the plot was much more contained than the previous ones - instead of traveling through cities and countries, the plot was pretty much contained to one Irish castle. That downsized the suspect pool to the people in the castle, and made the reader feel more like a part of the plot, rather than just a viewer of it: much more reminiscent of a mystery novel. While this setup fell a bit short in its execution, I still feel the slightly less action-packed plot and the more gothic mystery vibes of the book felt truer to Arthur Conan Doyle's original Sherlock Holmes stories.
Furthermore, I found the concept of using occultism and psychics as such a major part of the book to be very clever and amusing, being familiar with Arthur Conan Doyle's passion and unwavering belief in the stuff. He probably would have hated this, but on the other hand, he also hated Sherlock Holmes, so...
I have to question though whether Andrew Lane has ever met an adult woman, because at least in fiction he doesn't seem to know what to do with them. Because this series centres children, there are obviously parental characters, including mothers in it. Or are there? Out of like five children in this series, four of them have mothers who are either dead or dying! While Matty is only established as an orphan without ever specifying what has happened to his parents (as far as I can remember anyways) the three remaining mothers all either suffer/have suffered from unnamed illnesses or tuberculosis, and consequently just wasted away.
It is absolutely beyond my understanding that Andrew Lane has written this exact same plotline three times, with every mother he has introduced, without seemingly realizing that he's reusing the same plot nor what it insinuates. Clearly, in his mind, there are only two roads for women to take: either become a mother, and when your purpose is fulfilled, (aka you've had a child), die; or, become a bitter, spiteful, miserable spinster in the likes of Mrs Eglantine. I also feel it worth noting that with the exception of Matty, all the children's fathers are both alive and rather central to the plot.
Furthermore, I found the concept of using occultism and psychics as such a major part of the book to be very clever and amusing, being familiar with Arthur Conan Doyle's passion and unwavering belief in the stuff. He probably would have hated this, but on the other hand, he also hated Sherlock Holmes, so...
I have to question though whether Andrew Lane has ever met an adult woman, because at least in fiction he doesn't seem to know what to do with them. Because this series centres children, there are obviously parental characters, including mothers in it. Or are there? Out of like five children in this series, four of them have mothers who are either dead or dying! While Matty is only established as an orphan without ever specifying what has happened to his parents (as far as I can remember anyways) the three remaining mothers all either suffer/have suffered from unnamed illnesses or tuberculosis, and consequently just wasted away.
It is absolutely beyond my understanding that Andrew Lane has written this exact same plotline three times, with every mother he has introduced, without seemingly realizing that he's reusing the same plot nor what it insinuates. Clearly, in his mind, there are only two roads for women to take: either become a mother, and when your purpose is fulfilled, (aka you've had a child), die; or, become a bitter, spiteful, miserable spinster in the likes of Mrs Eglantine. I also feel it worth noting that with the exception of Matty, all the children's fathers are both alive and rather central to the plot.