A review by is_book_loring
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

3.0

The Moonstone was probably as much a study in characters as it was a detective story, because the narrative by half a dozen persons, albeit being very distinctive in tone and style, was written unnecessarily long and mendearing and most of the time had little to do with the central mystery, but more with the people themselves. It was skillfully done, still I couldn't help to sometimes jump over paragraphs. Perhaps if some of them hadn't irritated me so much with their annoying prejudices bordered on mysogny (I know, I know it's Victorian era, but Ms Clark's was insufferable and the butler's was not amusing to me), perhaps if the view taken on the native, original owners of the jewel who just wanted their sacred artifact stolen from them back as dark, sinister, alien thief, savage murderer, criminal, blabla was not overdone, maybe if the experiment to solve the mystery by the end made more sense, I might liked this first detective novel more. Well, at least the Indian people got their jewel back.