Scan barcode
A review by ashleylm
In the Last Analysis by Amanda Cross
2.0
Thank you Goodreads! Sometimes I'll be reading a book and thinking to myself "this isn't very good. Is it just me? Will it get better? What does Goodreads think?" and in this case, as of this morning, Goodreads thought 3.56. And given that most Goodreads reviews skew very positive (at least from my perspective), 3.56 is actually a rather lowish number.
So I feel emboldened to stop reading. I don't care about any of the characters—I'm well into it and for instance I still know nothing about the victim other than she's beautiful and a student and wanted a psychoanalyst, while the characters I do know something about are dull and/or unpleasant.
Our supposed detective is particularly annoying, combining the smug self-satisfaction of Patricia Cornwell's awful Kay Scarpetta, with the assertive pushiness of Murder She Wrote's Jessica Fletcher (who's adorable, but only because of Angela Lansbury ... if Kay Scarpetta were that pushy, she'd be even worse). She swoops into the scene of the crime (no one's ordered to leave, despite it being a crime scene, just because it's their home/office) and begins badgering her friends to tell their story in great detail.
Lots of things ring false to my ears, for instance after being told he had two hours free (two clients cancelled back-to-back) the analyst asserts he went for a jog. We're told that it's highly unlikely anyone would believe this. Really? What's he supposed to do, twiddle his thumbs for half an hour, then pace for forty-five minutes, then go back to twiddling? Why is "I shall go for a run, given my unexpected free time?" such an unlikely thing to do? If he were described as incredibly obese, and suggested he was going for a run for the first-time ever, then sure, it's a bit surprising, but he's just a normal guy who runs often and has running clothes.
So now we have unpleasant characters, and an author who's not too sure what's unlikely or not. Oh, and then she had the wife casually state something like "no doubt the killer waited until the last minute to cancel those appointments, or I might have have cancelled my own errand and we could have stayed in together making love in the morning," without any of the other characters present wincing and looking a bit embarrassed. Maybe that's on me (if Coco Chanel announced "I love making love in the morning," I'd take it in stride, but it just didn't seem natural as pleasant conversation among friends).
Oh, and of course there's the usual feeling of "this is NOT how people would behave when someone's been gruesomely murdered in the next room," but that permeates so many mysteries, I had to let go of that nit long, long ago.
Anyway, I'm stopping. I still have Peter Robinsons to read (the last one wasn't great, but usually I like them), and Joyce Porters (from the past), and I've yet to finish the Murder Most Unladylike series, and I'm re-reading Sayers and Christie—so good to know I'm not going to regret not trying the Kate Fansler Mysteries.
(5* = amazing, terrific book, one of my all-time favourites, 4* = very good book, 3* = good book, but nothing to particularly rave about, 2* = disappointing book, and 1* = awful, just awful. As a statistician I know most books are 3s, but I am biased in my selection and end up mostly with 4s, thank goodness.)
So I feel emboldened to stop reading. I don't care about any of the characters—I'm well into it and for instance I still know nothing about the victim other than she's beautiful and a student and wanted a psychoanalyst, while the characters I do know something about are dull and/or unpleasant.
Our supposed detective is particularly annoying, combining the smug self-satisfaction of Patricia Cornwell's awful Kay Scarpetta, with the assertive pushiness of Murder She Wrote's Jessica Fletcher (who's adorable, but only because of Angela Lansbury ... if Kay Scarpetta were that pushy, she'd be even worse). She swoops into the scene of the crime (no one's ordered to leave, despite it being a crime scene, just because it's their home/office) and begins badgering her friends to tell their story in great detail.
Lots of things ring false to my ears, for instance after being told he had two hours free (two clients cancelled back-to-back) the analyst asserts he went for a jog. We're told that it's highly unlikely anyone would believe this. Really? What's he supposed to do, twiddle his thumbs for half an hour, then pace for forty-five minutes, then go back to twiddling? Why is "I shall go for a run, given my unexpected free time?" such an unlikely thing to do? If he were described as incredibly obese, and suggested he was going for a run for the first-time ever, then sure, it's a bit surprising, but he's just a normal guy who runs often and has running clothes.
So now we have unpleasant characters, and an author who's not too sure what's unlikely or not. Oh, and then she had the wife casually state something like "no doubt the killer waited until the last minute to cancel those appointments, or I might have have cancelled my own errand and we could have stayed in together making love in the morning," without any of the other characters present wincing and looking a bit embarrassed. Maybe that's on me (if Coco Chanel announced "I love making love in the morning," I'd take it in stride, but it just didn't seem natural as pleasant conversation among friends).
Oh, and of course there's the usual feeling of "this is NOT how people would behave when someone's been gruesomely murdered in the next room," but that permeates so many mysteries, I had to let go of that nit long, long ago.
Anyway, I'm stopping. I still have Peter Robinsons to read (the last one wasn't great, but usually I like them), and Joyce Porters (from the past), and I've yet to finish the Murder Most Unladylike series, and I'm re-reading Sayers and Christie—so good to know I'm not going to regret not trying the Kate Fansler Mysteries.
(5* = amazing, terrific book, one of my all-time favourites, 4* = very good book, 3* = good book, but nothing to particularly rave about, 2* = disappointing book, and 1* = awful, just awful. As a statistician I know most books are 3s, but I am biased in my selection and end up mostly with 4s, thank goodness.)