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catherine_t's review against another edition
3.0
Lady Callandra Daviot hires William Monk to look into the murder of Prudence Barrymore, a nurse at the Royal Free Hospital where Lady Callandra is on the Board of Governors. A woman who nursed alongside Florence Nightingale in the Crimea, Prudence was by all accounts dedicated to her profession, possibly the best, if most outspoken, nurse in the hospital. Could her outspokenness have been the cause of the murder? Monk, along with Hester Latterly, another former Crimea nurse, digs deep into the matter.
I enjoyed meeting once again with Monk and Hester, and Oliver Rathbone, who also makes an appearance in the book. However, I seemed to be well aware of what a vital clue meant, when all of the characters involved were clearly on the wrong track, and I'm afraid that may have tarnished my enjoyment of the mystery itself.
I enjoyed meeting once again with Monk and Hester, and Oliver Rathbone, who also makes an appearance in the book. However, I seemed to be well aware of what a vital clue meant, when all of the characters involved were clearly on the wrong track, and I'm afraid that may have tarnished my enjoyment of the mystery itself.
macthekat's review against another edition
4.0
I just finished the book and it is way to late or should I say early? Another great book in the Monk series. Not quite as good as book 3 but still a very enjoyable read!
tresdem's review against another edition
3.0
I think that it's a well-written book, technically good and well constructed. I really liked the opening and the mystery there. But as the story got further away from Monk I lost interest and I was completely bored by the courtroom scenes. In fact I skimmed a few pages of it. There was nothing wrong with it per se, but it just wasn't for me. The resolution of the mystery was kind of boring, but not bad. I just wish the mystery aspect had a little more oomph.
sarahshoo's review against another edition
4.0
For a brilliant detective, Monk sure misses a lot. But I love the characters, so I'll keep with the series.
asmyr42's review against another edition
5.0
Anne Perry's work has always had the admirable, if uncomfortable, quality of historical honesty that nearly all (including my own) Victorian historicals lack. The sheer impotence of most people, and the crushing injustice, are hardly the escape detective fiction usually is. And yet, for the historian, who loves the period for all its wild paradoxes, it really is quite remarkable.
Perry must share with me a delicious sense of the perverse that would lead us to instantly like or loathe each other. She took the precaution, early on in this series, to have an innocent man hanged- largely due to the convenience of his low station - while the protagonist and his friends raced to find the truth. They did, eventually, but the poor footman was no less dead for all that the truth of fratricide tearing apart an aristocratic family brought a different sort of justice to the actual killer. By hanging that footman, Perry accomplished what few mystery writers can do - I can never trust her to spare the innocent, and hang only the guilty. (Was Perry consciously checking our privilege before we knew to use the terminology? I rather hope so.) It gives the reader one more way to experience the chest-clenching fear of injustice and powerlessness that our Victorian counterparts enjoyed. Brava.
Perry must share with me a delicious sense of the perverse that would lead us to instantly like or loathe each other. She took the precaution, early on in this series, to have an innocent man hanged- largely due to the convenience of his low station - while the protagonist and his friends raced to find the truth. They did, eventually, but the poor footman was no less dead for all that the truth of fratricide tearing apart an aristocratic family brought a different sort of justice to the actual killer. By hanging that footman, Perry accomplished what few mystery writers can do - I can never trust her to spare the innocent, and hang only the guilty. (Was Perry consciously checking our privilege before we knew to use the terminology? I rather hope so.) It gives the reader one more way to experience the chest-clenching fear of injustice and powerlessness that our Victorian counterparts enjoyed. Brava.
veronica87's review against another edition
3.0
So I accidentally skipped over the third book in this series. It didn't greatly affect my ability to follow the story outside of some references to things that undoubtedly happened in the last book and of which I have no knowledge. In any event, like previous books this plays out rather like a Victorian era version of Law & Order with the first two thirds or so dealing with Monk's investigation into the murder of a nurse- with the most capable help of Hester - and the last third showcasing the trial.
I like Perry's writing style as it imbues the story with a sense of formality that befits the time period it is meant to depict. It's true that it tends to get a bit introspective at times but I don't mind too much...although that is also a reason why this is not a series I could ever binge read. The trial portion of the story is not my favorite simply because the lawyers tend to restate and re-ask the same things and that can get tedious. And while I liked the story I can't help but feel a bit disappointed in how straight forward it all turned out to be. I think the author could have thrown in some better curve balls and not made everything so comfortably black and white, both for the victim and the guilty party. I also felt that Monk and Hester missed making some pretty obvious connections. Ah well, this series still remains one of my comfort reads and I look forward to reading about Monk and Hester butting heads again soon.
I like Perry's writing style as it imbues the story with a sense of formality that befits the time period it is meant to depict. It's true that it tends to get a bit introspective at times but I don't mind too much...although that is also a reason why this is not a series I could ever binge read. The trial portion of the story is not my favorite simply because the lawyers tend to restate and re-ask the same things and that can get tedious. And while I liked the story I can't help but feel a bit disappointed in how straight forward it all turned out to be. I think the author could have thrown in some better curve balls and not made everything so comfortably black and white, both for the victim and the guilty party. I also felt that Monk and Hester missed making some pretty obvious connections. Ah well, this series still remains one of my comfort reads and I look forward to reading about Monk and Hester butting heads again soon.
smcleish's review against another edition
2.0
Originally published on my blog here in December 1999.
The first of Perry's William Monk detective stories to be published in the U.K., A Sudden Fearful Death does not read like the first of a series. The reader is given the impression that they should already know some of the characters, and be familiar with other events and cases. I do not know if there is a precursor to the novel, but if there is not, it is an interesting way to make the reader feel part of something ongoing.
Unfortunately, A Sudden Fearful Death is rather a weak novel, as Perry gets carried away by her mission to expose the unpleasantness of Victorian England. There is no denying that for many people, particularly women, it was a place with much suffering. But the hypocrisy of the period is what marks it out, and it is what obsesses Perry in her other series, featuring Inspector Pitt. Here, it is exposed more publicly, in a trial scene which would surely have become one of the most celebrated cases in the nineteenth century, with at least one extremely unlikely aspect to it dictated by a desire to provide a dramatic ending. (There were surely mechanisms, even then, to present new evidence which comes to light after the conclusion of the prosecution case.)
The other weakness of the novel is that several characters behave inconsistently, particularly the man accused of the murder and his family. Things become known which a much greater effort would have been made to hush up, where Pitt should have a much harder time breaking through the veils of secrecy to find the clues he needs to work out the solution. Most disappointing.
The first of Perry's William Monk detective stories to be published in the U.K., A Sudden Fearful Death does not read like the first of a series. The reader is given the impression that they should already know some of the characters, and be familiar with other events and cases. I do not know if there is a precursor to the novel, but if there is not, it is an interesting way to make the reader feel part of something ongoing.
Unfortunately, A Sudden Fearful Death is rather a weak novel, as Perry gets carried away by her mission to expose the unpleasantness of Victorian England. There is no denying that for many people, particularly women, it was a place with much suffering. But the hypocrisy of the period is what marks it out, and it is what obsesses Perry in her other series, featuring Inspector Pitt. Here, it is exposed more publicly, in a trial scene which would surely have become one of the most celebrated cases in the nineteenth century, with at least one extremely unlikely aspect to it dictated by a desire to provide a dramatic ending. (There were surely mechanisms, even then, to present new evidence which comes to light after the conclusion of the prosecution case.)
The other weakness of the novel is that several characters behave inconsistently, particularly the man accused of the murder and his family. Things become known which a much greater effort would have been made to hush up, where Pitt should have a much harder time breaking through the veils of secrecy to find the clues he needs to work out the solution. Most disappointing.