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deepwinterodd 's review for:
The Anodyne Necklace
by Martha Grimes
And you know what? It very nearly worked.
So much of this book does, in fact, work. The tiny village with its tiny, interwoven lives and tiny, petty concerns, all interrupted by the arrival of crime and its detectives -- that all works. The minutiae of village life and the seclusion, the tea shop and the pub and the manor house and the village fête, they all work well, and Melrose Plant being extorted by a ten-year-old at every turn is brilliant.
And it all works so well that any time we're dragged back to London, the spell is broken. I understand I'm supposed to appreciate the contrast between twee village life and the grime of the East End, but that tension doesn't hold when the East End bits feel so ragged and thin in comparison to the amount of care that gets lavished on all the village bits.
So you wind up with things like the sudden appearance of Dungeons n' Dragons feeling anachronistic, and for me, unneeded. The same effect on the plot could've been achieved by staying in the village and recasting the game between some of the villagers.
Plus I thought the ending was a bit cheaty.
So much of this book does, in fact, work. The tiny village with its tiny, interwoven lives and tiny, petty concerns, all interrupted by the arrival of crime and its detectives -- that all works. The minutiae of village life and the seclusion, the tea shop and the pub and the manor house and the village fête, they all work well, and Melrose Plant being extorted by a ten-year-old at every turn is brilliant.
And it all works so well that any time we're dragged back to London, the spell is broken. I understand I'm supposed to appreciate the contrast between twee village life and the grime of the East End, but that tension doesn't hold when the East End bits feel so ragged and thin in comparison to the amount of care that gets lavished on all the village bits.
So you wind up with things like the sudden appearance of Dungeons n' Dragons feeling anachronistic, and for me, unneeded. The same effect on the plot could've been achieved by staying in the village and recasting the game between some of the villagers.
Plus I thought the ending was a bit cheaty.