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3.88 AVERAGE
3.88 AVERAGE
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
while the meta-murder mystery trope is an interesting one to explore, it was explored at the expense of robustness in the mysteries themselves. the "real-life" mystery, particularly, was so uninteresting to me (add to that the unlikability of the victim) that i wanted to skip past it to get back to the fictional one. good effort at trying something new in the genre, but execution leaves something to be desired.
This just fell short. A literary agent killing his most profitable author is very interesting to me. A book within a book is interesting. This *should* be interesting but ultimately it just wasn’t for me :(
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
mysterious
medium-paced
Interesting concept -- book within a book. Main character an editor -- but this needed an editor.
3 stars is generous. I was going to give it 2 stars, but the last 50 pages helped make it more interesting. Yes, the book was cleverly written, but I found it to be very slow. The story kept beating around the bush, taking forever to get to the point.
If you like murder mysteries, you'll definitely want to check out this novel. It's two murder mysteries for the price of one! Both solutions are incredibly clever, full of delightful red herrings, fiendish wordplay, and lots of descriptions of the English countryside. 4.5 stars.
Structured as a book within a book, this literary masterpiece is a tale of intertwining stories, multi-dimensional compelling characters as a magnifique homage to the crime writers of the golden age : Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.
Alan Conway is a bestselling crime writer of Cloverleaf Books and his creation Atticus Pond, is known to be a com-patriot of the mighty Hercule Poirot. When his new manuscript of Atticus Pond's next, "The Magpie Murders" reaches his editor Susan Ryeland, she immediately dives into it and is pulled into the story. The story like his previous works of the author is set on disturbing sleepy English village Saxby, Avon where he stumbles upon multiple deaths and generation old secrets.
Nevertheless, as narratives unfold, the manuscript culminates in a cliffhanger, wherein Susan discovers the absence of the final few pages that divulge the identity of the perpetrator. Compounding this impediment, a catastrophic event transpires, compelling the editor of Cloverleaf Books to rely on her acumen and resourcefulness in order to give the book its ending.
This was a thoroughly engaging literary work, replete with hidden references and clues, leaving me eagerly anticipating the next installment in the Susan Ryeland Series. For those with a penchant for captivating mysteries, this book may be a compelling choice, provided the length does not prove daunting.
Alan Conway is a bestselling crime writer of Cloverleaf Books and his creation Atticus Pond, is known to be a com-patriot of the mighty Hercule Poirot. When his new manuscript of Atticus Pond's next, "The Magpie Murders" reaches his editor Susan Ryeland, she immediately dives into it and is pulled into the story. The story like his previous works of the author is set on disturbing sleepy English village Saxby, Avon where he stumbles upon multiple deaths and generation old secrets.
Nevertheless, as narratives unfold, the manuscript culminates in a cliffhanger, wherein Susan discovers the absence of the final few pages that divulge the identity of the perpetrator. Compounding this impediment, a catastrophic event transpires, compelling the editor of Cloverleaf Books to rely on her acumen and resourcefulness in order to give the book its ending.
This was a thoroughly engaging literary work, replete with hidden references and clues, leaving me eagerly anticipating the next installment in the Susan Ryeland Series. For those with a penchant for captivating mysteries, this book may be a compelling choice, provided the length does not prove daunting.
3/5. Slow, but with a unique structure which I can appreciate.
It’s a book within a book. I only really liked one of the two books, and it’s the exact opposite of the opinion of most other reviews I’ve been reading…
Book 1 (the Outer shell): book editor Susan Ryeland gets the manuscript for the next novel from an author she works with, the final book in the Atticus Pünd mystery saga. She reads the manuscript and it unveils another real-life mystery that she sets out to solve.
Book 2 (the Inner): the actual manuscript itself. We read it all, all 250-ish pages of it, as its own 1950’s, Agatha Christie-inspired mystery story.
I didn’t like the Inner, the Pünd story. It was boring. The writing style was drawn out and the descriptions of the landscape and the characters were bland and lacking charm. Like it was described in black-and-white. It felt forced, laborious, buttoned-up. Plus, I wasn’t drawn into the mystery at all.
I did, however, enjoy the modern story, the Outer. I liked Ryeland as a main character, and found her investigation to be much more thrilling. I was actually invested in her uncovering the truth, but still, her story went on too long. I really liked her tone, her self-awareness as a bad investigator, so I could put up with it.
It’s a book within a book. I only really liked one of the two books, and it’s the exact opposite of the opinion of most other reviews I’ve been reading…
Book 1 (the Outer shell): book editor Susan Ryeland gets the manuscript for the next novel from an author she works with, the final book in the Atticus Pünd mystery saga. She reads the manuscript and it unveils another real-life mystery that she sets out to solve.
Book 2 (the Inner): the actual manuscript itself. We read it all, all 250-ish pages of it, as its own 1950’s, Agatha Christie-inspired mystery story.
I didn’t like the Inner, the Pünd story. It was boring. The writing style was drawn out and the descriptions of the landscape and the characters were bland and lacking charm. Like it was described in black-and-white. It felt forced, laborious, buttoned-up. Plus, I wasn’t drawn into the mystery at all.
I did, however, enjoy the modern story, the Outer. I liked Ryeland as a main character, and found her investigation to be much more thrilling. I was actually invested in her uncovering the truth, but still, her story went on too long. I really liked her tone, her self-awareness as a bad investigator, so I could put up with it.