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3.68 AVERAGE
3.68 AVERAGE
Well-constructed mystery, but tedious caricatures made for a tedious read.
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
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.
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.
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
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
mysterious
medium-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
Enjoyed re-reading it - oddly, remembered who-dun-it but didn't remember who got killed or why. And the first victim turned out to be a bit of a self-absorbed prick, but got folks all upset and "he was such a nice boy" - but the second, female victim had more of my sympathy and I did not understand why many of the main characters didn't like her. So some weirdness when the characters in the book don't react the same way to the deaths as the reader ... and I found the ending "Campion in danger" sequence to push my suspension of belief a bit, given I am not an expert in fine and obscure wines. The premise seemed ... a bit strained.
Probably one of the worst, most dull and moronic mysteries I've ever read. Even the title makes no sense. From start to finish, the police procedural (?) is lame and plodding. It spends too much time on the most boring characters and none on the ones who might be mildly interesting. It's marketed as a cozy: instead, it's grim and humorless.
*SPOILERS*
The entire half of the book you know who did it: the murderer is a stereotypical flamboyant art dealer. He is annoying. The detective is a very stupid man who allows the villain to get him drunk and almost push him under a train. He is tedious. Why so much attention and fawning over Belle, the famous painter's widow? I kept thinking at the beginning that she had done it, but, no, she just appears to have a melodramatic showdown (words only) with the villain and then sigh about it all at the end.
The plot moves at a molasses pace and the dialogue is insipid. The motive is boring. If I could give it less than 1 star, I would.
*SPOILERS*
The entire half of the book you know who did it: the murderer is a stereotypical flamboyant art dealer. He is annoying. The detective is a very stupid man who allows the villain to get him drunk and almost push him under a train. He is tedious. Why so much attention and fawning over Belle, the famous painter's widow? I kept thinking at the beginning that she had done it, but, no, she just appears to have a melodramatic showdown (words only) with the villain and then sigh about it all at the end.
The plot moves at a molasses pace and the dialogue is insipid. The motive is boring. If I could give it less than 1 star, I would.