A review by usbsticky
The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons by Lawrence Block
3.0
This is my last Bernie book and after all this time, I just realized I like the books for the characters. The mystery or crime aspect isn't very good. Mostly they follow a formula where Bernie is tasked with stealing something, a dead body turns up and he is framed for it. Then he does a bunch of mysterious things without context, and finally summons everyone for a complex reveal with a few twists at the end.
It doesn't make for a very good mystery, just Block trying to amaze people with a complex plot that is unengaging because he made no attempt to engage the readers in it. Worse are the long stretched dialogs (mostly) between Bernie and Carolyn where a couple of sentences are stretched into 5-10 pages. But I've learned to live with those and am pretty glad to get to the end of this series. I probably won't read any more Block novels after I finish the last Bernie book which is a collection of short stories.
Spoilers:
This has a slightly different format, with two storylines that kinda come together. In story line 1 Bernie is tasked with stealing a book from a museum. With this book he gets into the apartment of an agoraphobic collector where he tries to steal a spoon. All of this for a button collector who in the end tries to scam Bernie without paying him.
In storyline 2, an elderly widow is found dead in her large brownstone after coming home from the opera. Her house appears to have been burgled. Ray (the cop) knows Bernie didn't do it but brings him in anyway to try to solve the case.
At the end, Bernie pays back the button collector and brings everyone into his bookstore to reveal the true story behind the case of the dead widow.
I enjoyed Bernie. He's a likeable character and I enjoyed his escapades plus some of the historical context behind some of them. Block sometimes includes real life events or items in this series. For example, he introduced me to Mondrian in one book. In this one, he introduced me to one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. So anyway, 3 stars for the series.
It doesn't make for a very good mystery, just Block trying to amaze people with a complex plot that is unengaging because he made no attempt to engage the readers in it. Worse are the long stretched dialogs (mostly) between Bernie and Carolyn where a couple of sentences are stretched into 5-10 pages. But I've learned to live with those and am pretty glad to get to the end of this series. I probably won't read any more Block novels after I finish the last Bernie book which is a collection of short stories.
Spoilers:
This has a slightly different format, with two storylines that kinda come together. In story line 1 Bernie is tasked with stealing a book from a museum. With this book he gets into the apartment of an agoraphobic collector where he tries to steal a spoon. All of this for a button collector who in the end tries to scam Bernie without paying him.
In storyline 2, an elderly widow is found dead in her large brownstone after coming home from the opera. Her house appears to have been burgled. Ray (the cop) knows Bernie didn't do it but brings him in anyway to try to solve the case.
At the end, Bernie pays back the button collector and brings everyone into his bookstore to reveal the true story behind the case of the dead widow.
I enjoyed Bernie. He's a likeable character and I enjoyed his escapades plus some of the historical context behind some of them. Block sometimes includes real life events or items in this series. For example, he introduced me to Mondrian in one book. In this one, he introduced me to one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. So anyway, 3 stars for the series.