All posts tagged: Mystery

‘The Monogram Murders’ by Sophie Hannah ~ A Review

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Let me preface this by saying, I’m a huge Agatha Christie fan (my absolute favorites being Poirot mysteries). One might be tempted to believe that this would make me less inclined to appreciate any effort to add to the little Belgian detective’s legacy. On the contrary, I was so freakin’ excited to hear of the first new (Agatha Christie Estate sanctioned, no less) Poirot novel that I couldn’t wait to sink my teeth into it – and picked it up with the very best of intentions. I mean, it was Poirot… how bad could it be? The answer, unfortunately and soul crushingly is quite… Now, you will probably come across glowing reviews as well but this just didn’t do it for me. Poirot felt like a crude caricature of himself, while his “sidekick”, Catchpool (a.k.a. why, oh why, could we not have also resurrected Hastings?) was the sorriest excuse for a detective that I have personally ever come across. As for the rest of the characters they were flat and underdeveloped, bearing no semblance to …

‘The Silkworm’ by Robert Galbraith ~ A Review

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Having greatly enjoyed Galbraith’s/ Rowling’s 1st installment of the Cormoran Strike series (a well written and fast paced mystery) I had actually pre-ordered this immediately, and so received it on the day it was published. No sooner had it appeared on my Kindle than I had downloaded it and sunk my teeth in. In that sense, I guess you could say my expectations were (just the tiniest tad) high… ‘The Silkworm’ got my favorite duo involved in a case much grittier than the first one (squirmish readers please be warned: this is quite graphic). Novelist Owen Quine has gone missing and his distressed wife calls on Cormoran Strike to investigate. Pretty soon the writer turns up, brutally murdered – and Strike must figure out who (& why) did it. Once again the setting was atmospheric, the characters were quirky & engaging and the plot was pretty decent (if not what I’d call groundbreaking). The pace, which was quite slow at first, picked up throughout the book – with most of the action/ suspense featured in …

‘The Cuckoo’s Calling’ by Robert Galbraith ~ A Review

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Let me begin by saying that when I picked this up I had absolutely no idea it was written by J.K. Rowling. Of course I am neither prejudiced against nor in favor of her work (like many people seem to be), so realizing would hardly have made much difference. To be honest I would probably just have felt intrigued, with regards to how well she could handle such a different (compared to her Harry Potter Series) genre. Moving on to the actual review, I found this 1st installment of the Cormoran Strike Series to be a competently written, intricately plotted story – which, despite not being amazingly original, managed to keep me hooked until the end. Both the male and female leads were well- rounded & relatable – really getting you to care what happens to them next (so much so, in fact, that I have already pre- ordered the next book in the series). The cast of supporting characters was greatly varied and equally well- developed, while the myriad of clues scattered along the …

‘The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher or The Murder at Road Hill House’ by Kate Summerscale ~ A Review

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Let me start by saying that I had this on my TBR list for quite some time before I actually got around to it. I finally picked it up at a point when I felt like sinking my teeth into a good “who dunnit” – thinking that a real- life, locked-house, Victorian murder mystery would make for a riveting read. I guess I had higher expectations than I should have, mainly influenced by all the rave reviews on the inside cover (both front and back!!). Alas, I was bitterly disappointed! Mr. Whicher, the supposed main character, never managed to find his voice and the end result was way too over- researched and all over the place to actually be enjoyable. I do realize than one of the writer’s aims was to illustrate how the Road Hill case influenced budding detective work and gave rise to detective novels as such but I’m pretty sure this could have been achieved using much less detail, thus allowing the story (that was a gruesome child murder and the subsequent …

Press Play: Audible Weekly (4/11- 10/11/2013)

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About a year ago I registered for an account on Audible. I remember thinking that some insta- gratification of both my book & shopping obsessions couldn’t hurt – in fact it sounded like great fun. Well, guess what? It kinda did, hurt that is… My ever-growing book and e-book “To be Read” list has been added to at quite an alarming rate these last few months (at least 3-5 audiobooks per week) – to the point where I’ve actually started wondering if I’ll ever manage to get through it all. “Press Play: Audible Weekly” will make a point of documenting audiobooks that capture my attention online & hopefully offering “upcoming read” ideas to any of you fellow book-aholics out there. It will also feature links to the full reviews, if & when mentioned titles are in fact read. So, here comes the first installment, which for no particular reason seems to be Crime- Suspense- Thriller themed: The Misletoe Bride and Other Haunting Tales by Kate Mosse From Audible: A wonderfully atmospheric collection of stories from …