I found this book in a list of best French romans policiers and it got like 4,000 very positive reviews. Since it's actually a Spanish book, I orderedI found this book in a list of best French romans policiers and it got like 4,000 very positive reviews. Since it's actually a Spanish book, I ordered the English translation, which seemed to be very good. I didn't really enjoy the book, but I can see how other readers might. The parts where it's the kind of autistic detective is in conversation with the disgraced policeman are fun and funny and interesting; but those chapters are interspersed with a lot of cruel killing and torture. There's enough of that in real life, I don't really enjoy reading made up incidents of it in fiction. So, I put it down. But I think other people might enjoy this book. ...more
Really very good and I enjoyed it all the way through and there were no weird sidetrips into strange things that made me wonder if I wasn't translatinReally very good and I enjoyed it all the way through and there were no weird sidetrips into strange things that made me wonder if I wasn't translating correctly. Interestingly, this book came out a few years after the Joel Dicker book The Harry Quebert affair, and they are VERY similar. I think this one is actually a better version of the story, it's a little tighter and there aren't as many weird anachronisms, and I say that as a big fan of Joel Dicker. This book definitely made me want to read more Musso books. I've read I think three or four of them, and they were all good but I think this might be the best one....more
This book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read itThis book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read it word for word and cover to cover, and yet I did. And I followed it up by reading his second volume about the notebooks. I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.
It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.
It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.
It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.
And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.
And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.
I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them.
This book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read itThis book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read it word for word and cover to cover, and yet I did. And I followed it up by reading his second volume about the notebooks. I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.
It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.
It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.
It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.
And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.
And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.
I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them....more
It's very sweet. I think for a certain kind of hard-charging urban person who has lost his or her understanding of the natural world, this is a reallyIt's very sweet. I think for a certain kind of hard-charging urban person who has lost his or her understanding of the natural world, this is a really good reminder to stop and literally smell the roses and pick the wildflowers etc. It's a little bit preachy, in the way that when someone stops smoking they suddenly become evangelical about how bad smoking is, for the smoker and everyone else on the planet. But it's largely a nice literary walk through a country field, with lots of cute rabbits and hares doing binkies and zoomies on every page....more
I find the summary of this book to be kind of deceiving; I don't really see how this could be her best written book, and I think the summary implies tI find the summary of this book to be kind of deceiving; I don't really see how this could be her best written book, and I think the summary implies that there's more action than there actually is.
This is a super long book, or at least felt that way. I particularly enjoyed it because a close friend is a kiwi and she's down under all through the Northern Hemisphere winter, so it was fun to read about her homeland while she's there.
The characters are interesting and the story is enjoyable but it takes a long time to get where it's going. It is more like a novel in the sense that this is a book primarily about the relationships of a small group of people in a confined community. It's less like an actual mystery story. The murder doesn't happen until fairly late in the narrative; and I wont spoil anything here but ... let's just say the ball gets rolling very slowly.
I listened to this on audio; I think that if I'd been reading it in print, I might have put it down before getting halfway....more
I'd had this on my To Read list for years, never found it at a bookstore, not sure it was even on Amazon, and ended up ordering it from the excellent I'd had this on my To Read list for years, never found it at a bookstore, not sure it was even on Amazon, and ended up ordering it from the excellent Abe Books. Got a nice pristine copy and tore through it, so glad to have found it. The plot is kind of the standard template for a murder mystery, but it's handled well. The story moves pretty quickly, doesn't get stuck with its wheels in the mud too often (although... it does sometimes). The characters are interesting but a little bit amorphous. The love interest, Annie, is very Lauren Bacall and when he's with her, the detective Sam feels like Bogart; but when he's not with her, he doesn't seem so much like Bogart. What really puts this one above the average is the very interesting description of the anti British movement at this time when Gandhi and Das and Bose are whipping up the huge population of India into the state of resistance that will lead to the end of occupation. All in all, it holds together well, never gets silly and is a fast, enjoyable, and informative read....more
I listened to this on audio and really enjoyed it. I definitely missed parts as my attention turned to the road while driving, but I'll be happy at soI listened to this on audio and really enjoyed it. I definitely missed parts as my attention turned to the road while driving, but I'll be happy at some point to listen to it again, or to read it....more
Very disappointing, because it starts off GREAT and I thought it would get past its hackneyed plot (she stole someone else's manuscript and passed it Very disappointing, because it starts off GREAT and I thought it would get past its hackneyed plot (she stole someone else's manuscript and passed it off as her own! That's only been the plot of ... a dozen books?). But instead of doing something more interesting, she turns the last two thirds of the book into a whining wallowfest about how hard it is to be a published author, when the publishing house ignores you, and people troll you online, and anonymous strangers try to take you down and EVEN HAVE THE NERVE TO SAY YOU STOLE THE STORY (which she did) and that she's A WHITE WOMAN WRITING ABOUT A CULTURE SHE KNOWS NOTHING ABOUT (which she freely admits is 100% correct). She as a character doesn't do anything interesting with these truisms about the publishing industry, except to take petty delight in getting people fired if they're mean to her and to form a catty support group with two other successful older female writers (who just encourage her narcissism and whinging). I skimmed too much of the book to tell you whether she pulls it together by the end, but really by the time I hit the middle of this book I couldn't care less about what happened to the protagonist, and I had no faith that the author would land the plane in an interesting way. And of course ... now I'm one of the people the protagonist complains about, who criticize Their Art on 欧宝娱乐. Sorry not sorry....more
This is a five-star rating because five is the max number of stars but ... I'd have given it more. I LOVED this book. Normally I hate epistolary novelThis is a five-star rating because five is the max number of stars but ... I'd have given it more. I LOVED this book. Normally I hate epistolary novels, they seem tedious and endless, but this book races along; and the plot is so complex ... it's impossible to imagine how the story could have been told any other way than as letters flying back and forth across 16th century Italy. I had worried this book would be too intellectual and academic and hard to get interested in but it's the opposite; it's completely entertaining and I was wonderfully immersed in the story....more
SO great. It's unexpectedly a really compelling page turner, or it at least it was for me. Like the notebooks themselves, there is no consistent throuSO great. It's unexpectedly a really compelling page turner, or it at least it was for me. Like the notebooks themselves, there is no consistent throughline of the narrative, just little intriguing bits and pieces (and occasional images of Christie's completely illegible notebook pages). Each chapter warns of which stories there will be spoilers; I didn't really think anything was spoiled. There are so many Christie stories and I've read probably all of them and have watched all the tv and movie versions, usually more than once. For the most part I can't quite remember which stories are which and how they end; there are just too many of them. So as this book is describing in quick shorthand notes a story and how it came about, it was less spoiling and more appetizing and made me want to go back and re watch or re read. As a writer, I found the process of how she came up with her stories really interesting (even though, again, you have to kind of put together the story yourself, there isn't a lot of narrative throughline). I have the sequel to this; I'm looking forward to reading it. I did note that there is a lot more attention paid to Poirot than to Marple. I've been listening to a lot of Marple books on audio lately and I feel that really the Marple books are under appreciated. I'm hoping there will be more Marple in the sequel....more
Actually a six-star book or maybe 10. Such a great book. At first I was worried it would just be a list of "then they tried to break out this way, theActually a six-star book or maybe 10. Such a great book. At first I was worried it would just be a list of "then they tried to break out this way, then they tried to break out that way," but it ended up being a real page turner that gets you deeply into the minds of the men in this prison. I was intrigued and I have to say glad that Macintyre distinguishes between the german guards and security officer, who followed the maxim of "This is a prison for gentlemen, run by gentlemen." It was interesting toward the end of the war that the prisoners AND the german army were all scared of what the crazier SS and Gestapo and Hitler inner circle were going to do. Im glad to know that most of the German soldiers were not automatically horrible and cruel. I'm not a huge WW2 buff, and I am very squeamish about reading about torture and horror and I found this an easy and wonderful book to read. ...more
Im listening to this on an audiobook and it's only a semi decent version, punctuated awkwardly with cheap ads that roar in at weird moments at high voIm listening to this on an audiobook and it's only a semi decent version, punctuated awkwardly with cheap ads that roar in at weird moments at high volume, which is distracting. But in spite of these impediments I feel anyway that this is a nice story to pass time with but is not really worthy of Agatha Christie. It feels like an early story, and feels like she's experimenting a little with a different style of tale. It's kind of like reading a John Buchan, but with a heroine instead of a hero. I wouldn't run out to the store to buy a copy of it but it's an enjoyable story to listen to while baking....more
As I go back and read the descriptions of this book again, I realize that I have no reason to be disappointed; I was warned. But there is so much enthAs I go back and read the descriptions of this book again, I realize that I have no reason to be disappointed; I was warned. But there is so much enthusiasm for this book, which is lovely but in my opinion extremely boring and obvious. Ive given up after just a few chapters and perhaps something really interesting is about to happen but ... as I go back and read the descriptions of this book again, it seems that ... this is all there is, nothing else is going to happen. The basic concept is that a little girl is born and think she's a space alien sent to Earth to report on humans and all their funny little quirks, to help the powers that be on her own dying planet decide if they want to do some kind of merger with Earth. Her somewhat negligent parents stick an old fax machine in her bedroom and she uses this to communicate with her contacts on her own planet. This is less interesting than you might hope. Mostly what this book seems to be is an author trying to be innocent and original in her observations of humanity, with the device of creating a character who is a space alien. I'd say stick to Mork and Mindy if that's what you're looking for. If I have missed something by not finishing this book, I would be happy to hear from other readers....more
This has the potential to be an interesting story, but at the hands of Philip Miller it's just a plodding mess with no center. It was interesting enouThis has the potential to be an interesting story, but at the hands of Philip Miller it's just a plodding mess with no center. It was interesting enough that I finished reading it. It foreshadowed a lot of stuff but it never followed through; even at the end I was waiting to find out what had happened and why. The things that seemed intriguing at the beginning of the book never really turned into actual plot points. Miller threw in a couple stupid attacks on some of the characters that were notably unexciting and did nothing to further the story line. It's like it was written by a primitive version of Chat GPT. I didn't like any of the main characters, except Shona's dad, a retired reporter. Actually the best parts of the book are the ones where Miller talks about the death of journalism, which he perfectly describes. THAT's the actual only interesting murder mystery in this book....more
I think if I'd read this while on vacation in Brittany, I would have LOVED it, but at home with a pile of things to do and books to read it seemed a lI think if I'd read this while on vacation in Brittany, I would have LOVED it, but at home with a pile of things to do and books to read it seemed a little too frivolous to devote time to. But it's well written, nice characters, a solid genre mystery....more
It's not that this book wasn't well-written and interesting; it was, actually. I especially loved the descriptions of 1970s Manhattan. But the essentiaIt's not that this book wasn't well-written and interesting; it was, actually. I especially loved the descriptions of 1970s Manhattan. But the essential action of the story is about spy activity involved NATO and the Warsaw Pact and ... I couldn't get excited about the outcome. I guess that's why we all love World War 2 stories, we know what's at stake and we know how it ended. A spy novel about Nato and the warsaw pact is only interesting if the human participants are so compelling that we care what happens to them. In this story, by the third or fourth chapter I felt the characters were fairly cardboard cutout....more
It's fun and I enjoyed reading it, but it falls apart at the end. There are a lot of different strands, and instead of pulling them together in a way It's fun and I enjoyed reading it, but it falls apart at the end. There are a lot of different strands, and instead of pulling them together in a way that's surprising and delightful, it just kind of trails off. She introduces a farcical murder mystery theater troupe at the end and everyone interesting just becomes kind of a superficial character. It's disappointing, but still was an enjoyable read. I expected a little more complexity from her; this is just ... anyone reasonably talented could have written this. ...more
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