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3.08 AVERAGE
3.08 AVERAGE
This, for the most part, was a fairly entertaining read, but the sudden introduction of murderer POV in a creepy monologue was unnecessary and mostly served to have me skip through the ending. Also, clumsy foreshadowing in places.
A flawed crime story which loses itself in unlikely plot developments and thoroughly annoying characters. Dead-end story lines come and go as if Ms Allende, having created them, just loses interest in them and can't be bothered to develop them. Ryan Miller's homophobia is unexplainable and unpleasantly described - I ended up feeling confused instead of enlightened. The long asides about the support characters serve only to confuse, not inform. Sorry, but my thumb points downwards.
It began with great promise then had odd moments of trashy harlequin writing and strayed away completely from where it began to completely unbelievable nonsense, but I did finish it so gets a two star. I do not recommend it.
Soy una gran admiradora de Isabel Allende y he leído bastantes obras de ella, siempre termino muy enamorada de sus historias, en esta ocasión no ocurrió, no quiero decir que me decepciono el libro, pero definitivamente no cumplió con mis expectativas. A mi modo de ver, este genero no le va a la escritora.
This book was 60% backstory, 40% extraneous tangents, 78% telling-not-showing, 45% improbabilities, 30% boredom, 25% plot holes, 10% long-winded villainous confessions, and 15% plot.
Yes, I know that adds to up to more than 100%. It’s 293% and that’s how positive I am that I wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone.
For our teenage sleuth, think the female, gothic, less charismatic version of Encyclopedia Brown with far more grisly crime . (PS I do not mean the comparison as a slight to Sobol’s memorable books from my childhood.)
Too many to list, here are the top complaints that I still remember...
* The author's excessive use of colons. She must favor this form of punctuation: she used it like she was being paid to. It got old after a while: colons are so grabby and they don’t stand back to let you enjoy the language. I do favor a good semicolon: trust me, she used those a lot too. But the colon should be used sparingly: it wasn’t here: it became irritating after the 4000th appearance.
* I especially loved the part where Ryan Miller took the safety off his Glock. Oh, wait a minute, that’s right--Glocks don’t have external safeties.
* Supposedly this book had a splattering of magical realism. Either I didn’t see it, or I can’t tell magical realism from story flaws. There were several plot holes and inconsistencies in this story, but I suppose I would rather call those things "magical realism" too.
* Is it common practice to hand over confidential open case files to your teen daughter to blab all over the internet, especially your "ace up the sleeve" police investigation details? Yeah, I didn't think so.
* Unrealistic, confusing characters that I didn’t care about. Examples...Alan Keller was always rich, but at first he was rich-frugal in a shabby suit, then he was excessive and spendthrifty. Bob Martin is a bright case-cracking star on the police force, but he’s never heard of Socrates or the word “nepotism.”
* Any unpredictability in the twists was not due to witty storytelling or plotting, but rather because the author pulled them out of her butt with no foundation and buildup. "Aha! Plot twist!"
* Kind of boring. And slow. Mostly due to backstory, irrelevant rambling, and peripheral characters trying to steal excessive page time.
The end. Probably wasted too much breath on this already. Disappointing first read by this author. Only possibility of me picking up another of her books is the extreme and widespread shock from other readers who insist this is not the typical caliber of Isabel Allende's work.
Yes, I know that adds to up to more than 100%. It’s 293% and that’s how positive I am that I wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone.
For our teenage sleuth, think the female, gothic, less charismatic version of Encyclopedia Brown with far more grisly crime . (PS I do not mean the comparison as a slight to Sobol’s memorable books from my childhood.)
Too many to list, here are the top complaints that I still remember...
* The author's excessive use of colons. She must favor this form of punctuation: she used it like she was being paid to. It got old after a while: colons are so grabby and they don’t stand back to let you enjoy the language. I do favor a good semicolon: trust me, she used those a lot too. But the colon should be used sparingly: it wasn’t here: it became irritating after the 4000th appearance.
* I especially loved the part where Ryan Miller took the safety off his Glock. Oh, wait a minute, that’s right--Glocks don’t have external safeties.
* Supposedly this book had a splattering of magical realism. Either I didn’t see it, or I can’t tell magical realism from story flaws. There were several plot holes and inconsistencies in this story, but I suppose I would rather call those things "magical realism" too.
* Is it common practice to hand over confidential open case files to your teen daughter to blab all over the internet, especially your "ace up the sleeve" police investigation details? Yeah, I didn't think so.
* Unrealistic, confusing characters that I didn’t care about. Examples...Alan Keller was always rich, but at first he was rich-frugal in a shabby suit, then he was excessive and spendthrifty. Bob Martin is a bright case-cracking star on the police force, but he’s never heard of Socrates or the word “nepotism.”
* Any unpredictability in the twists was not due to witty storytelling or plotting, but rather because the author pulled them out of her butt with no foundation and buildup. "Aha! Plot twist!"
* Kind of boring. And slow. Mostly due to backstory, irrelevant rambling, and peripheral characters trying to steal excessive page time.
The end. Probably wasted too much breath on this already. Disappointing first read by this author. Only possibility of me picking up another of her books is the extreme and widespread shock from other readers who insist this is not the typical caliber of Isabel Allende's work.
I hated this book. Long winded and disappointing. The book needed an editor to slash about 200 pages from the text. I listened to the Audio Book, the narrator was not the greatest buy the story was so boring that I'm not sure any one could have breathed life into it. Eventually after days of listening to the book, I was so impatient to just finish the book I borrowed the ebook and barreled through. There is not much to say other than I want all those hours back that I spent listening to this droll novel. How could you do this to me Allende....
i loved the middle of this book. not the beginning, not the end.
Link al blog: http://dreaminglifebooks.blogspot.it/2016/02/il-gioco-di-ripper.html
Ho iniziato "Il gioco di Ripper" per prendere fiato durante una delle letture più noiose che mi sian capitate negli ultimi anni e non avrei potuto fare una scelta più azzeccata: il romanzo è un mix tra un thriller e un romanzo familiare e quello che nelle mani di uno scrittore normale si sarebbe rivelato un pasticcio inimmaginabile, con la fantastica abilità narrativa della Allende si è trasformato nel thriller più emotivamente approfondito che abbia mai letto. Il motivo per cui di solito non leggo thriller, infatti, è proprio la sproporzione tra l'importanza della trama e l'approfondimento dei personaggi, che nel 90% dei casi non esiste perché l'essenziale in un thriller è l'azione. Si, centra anche il fatto che sono una fifona e la tensione del thriller mi fa venire l'ansia, ma per la maggior parte i miei problemi con questo genere riguardano la scarsa empatia. Con questo romanzo non si corre questo rischio perché a costo di rallentare un po' il ritmo (soprattutto per chi cerca tanta azione) la Allende ci regala un ritratto molto intimo dei suoi personaggi, che diventano degli amici da cui è difficile separarsi una volta chiusa l'ultima pagina. In realtà credo che i tempi del romanzo siano comunque stati gestiti come sempre molto bene: è vero che in proporzione la parte "poliziesca" è minore rispetto quella più narrativa ma per quanto mi riguarda non ha mai compromesso la tensione del romanzo quando era necessaria e l'intimità della scrittura quando serviva per creare più atmosfera.
Rispetto al suo solito, l'elemento di realismo magico è quasi assente, dico quasi perché ogni tanto in qualche immagine particolarmente evocativa o qualche capacità extrasensoriale salta fuori (la Allende non ce la fa proprio ad eliminarla del tutto), però il romanzo non si inserisce assolutamente nel suo filone "classico", il che per me è un bene, perché è giusto che uno scrittore ogni tanto si metta alla prova ed esca un po' dal seminato, specialmente se dotato e abile come lei.
E adesso parliamo del finale:
Ho iniziato "Il gioco di Ripper" per prendere fiato durante una delle letture più noiose che mi sian capitate negli ultimi anni e non avrei potuto fare una scelta più azzeccata: il romanzo è un mix tra un thriller e un romanzo familiare e quello che nelle mani di uno scrittore normale si sarebbe rivelato un pasticcio inimmaginabile, con la fantastica abilità narrativa della Allende si è trasformato nel thriller più emotivamente approfondito che abbia mai letto. Il motivo per cui di solito non leggo thriller, infatti, è proprio la sproporzione tra l'importanza della trama e l'approfondimento dei personaggi, che nel 90% dei casi non esiste perché l'essenziale in un thriller è l'azione. Si, centra anche il fatto che sono una fifona e la tensione del thriller mi fa venire l'ansia, ma per la maggior parte i miei problemi con questo genere riguardano la scarsa empatia. Con questo romanzo non si corre questo rischio perché a costo di rallentare un po' il ritmo (soprattutto per chi cerca tanta azione) la Allende ci regala un ritratto molto intimo dei suoi personaggi, che diventano degli amici da cui è difficile separarsi una volta chiusa l'ultima pagina. In realtà credo che i tempi del romanzo siano comunque stati gestiti come sempre molto bene: è vero che in proporzione la parte "poliziesca" è minore rispetto quella più narrativa ma per quanto mi riguarda non ha mai compromesso la tensione del romanzo quando era necessaria e l'intimità della scrittura quando serviva per creare più atmosfera.
Rispetto al suo solito, l'elemento di realismo magico è quasi assente, dico quasi perché ogni tanto in qualche immagine particolarmente evocativa o qualche capacità extrasensoriale salta fuori (la Allende non ce la fa proprio ad eliminarla del tutto), però il romanzo non si inserisce assolutamente nel suo filone "classico", il che per me è un bene, perché è giusto che uno scrittore ogni tanto si metta alla prova ed esca un po' dal seminato, specialmente se dotato e abile come lei.
E adesso parliamo del finale:
Spoiler
devo ammettere che mi ha spiazzato, prima con Carol e poi con Gary... lui poi non mi sarebbe mai venuto in mente! C'è da dire che io sono una pippa allucinante nei gialli e non indovinerei il colpevole nemmeno se mi ballasse nudo davanti agli occhi, però effettivamente mi ha stupita. Mi è dispiaciuto invece moltissimo per il povero Ryan: la sua fine è credibile, non posso criticarla, però mi è dispiaciuto un sacco e una piccola parte di me avrebbe desiderato il tanto agognato lieto fine... leggere l'epilogo mi ha quasi fatta piangere!
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This review and others can be found on Cozy Up With A Good Read
I have heard a lot of great things about Isabel Allende's writing so being able to pick up her newest novel had me excited. The part of this book that truly got me interested was how this is a book about a group of people working together as a group to solve murders happening in San Francisco. Now going into this without knowing too much, I thought I was kind of getting into something kind of about Jack the Ripper, I was definitely wrong, and yet I was not completely disappointed by the story, though I had my issues.
This novel goes through many different perspectives, at times it felt that there were too many voices for this one story. I felt that for a book that was supposed to be about murders and a group of people solving them, that plot kind of fell to the background a little bit. Every once in a while there would be a mention of it, but for the most part this book is about Indiana and the people that her life revolves around. Indiana has a lot of people around her that really love her, but her relationship with her daughter, Amanda is what makes this book. They have a very strong relationship and are there always there for each other, they are each other's best friends (almost like a Rory and Lorelai relationship is what I saw).
Ryan is another character that really helps move the story along, he is someone with a lot of personal issues that Indiana helps through things, and in a way he opens up Indiana's life and shows her there is more to the eye. I love the contrast between all the characters, Indiana is someone who wants to see the good in everybody she comes in contact with, whereas those around her are more into the darker side of things, especially Amanda, and as the book continues, this seems to cause some trouble.
There are some interesting twists that Allende brings out in the book, it was closer to the end where things really start to get interesting and truly where the story picks up. I was close to giving up on this book a couple of times, but that is around the time that a new murder would occur and I would be brought back in. I did find this to be an interesting story at times, but I just felt that what the story was supposed to be about lacked and was overshadowed by other plots, that didn't seem as important. Sadly, it just didn't end up being the best book for me.
I have heard a lot of great things about Isabel Allende's writing so being able to pick up her newest novel had me excited. The part of this book that truly got me interested was how this is a book about a group of people working together as a group to solve murders happening in San Francisco. Now going into this without knowing too much, I thought I was kind of getting into something kind of about Jack the Ripper, I was definitely wrong, and yet I was not completely disappointed by the story, though I had my issues.
This novel goes through many different perspectives, at times it felt that there were too many voices for this one story. I felt that for a book that was supposed to be about murders and a group of people solving them, that plot kind of fell to the background a little bit. Every once in a while there would be a mention of it, but for the most part this book is about Indiana and the people that her life revolves around. Indiana has a lot of people around her that really love her, but her relationship with her daughter, Amanda is what makes this book. They have a very strong relationship and are there always there for each other, they are each other's best friends (almost like a Rory and Lorelai relationship is what I saw).
Ryan is another character that really helps move the story along, he is someone with a lot of personal issues that Indiana helps through things, and in a way he opens up Indiana's life and shows her there is more to the eye. I love the contrast between all the characters, Indiana is someone who wants to see the good in everybody she comes in contact with, whereas those around her are more into the darker side of things, especially Amanda, and as the book continues, this seems to cause some trouble.
There are some interesting twists that Allende brings out in the book, it was closer to the end where things really start to get interesting and truly where the story picks up. I was close to giving up on this book a couple of times, but that is around the time that a new murder would occur and I would be brought back in. I did find this to be an interesting story at times, but I just felt that what the story was supposed to be about lacked and was overshadowed by other plots, that didn't seem as important. Sadly, it just didn't end up being the best book for me.