Scan barcode
A review by oashackelford
The Night in Question by Liz Lawson, Kathleen Glasgow
3.0
This time Alice Olgilvie and Iris Adams are going to play it safe. Solving a crime that has happened in the past should be fine, however the past can come back to haunt you. During a school dance at Levy castle, and while they were investigating tragic movie star Mona Moody, a girl named Rebekah Kennedy gets stabbed and hit over the head. When Alice comes upon the scene her friend Helen Park is the one standing there holding the knife, but Alice is pretty sure she is innocent. In another race against the clock, she and Iris have to prove Park's innocence before her reputation is left in ruins.
I thought that this is one of those rare sequels that makes more sense and is better than the original. I think that both books struggle with pacing problems. I think that both books tried a little too hard to be an Agatha Christie novel, but the authors don't quite have what it takes to pull that off. I don't normally compare crime novels to Christie because I think it is unfair, but when you invite the comparison over and over again and then don't live up to it, then I think it is fair to say that it doesn't catch enough of the essence of a Christie novel to achieve anything. In the books written by Agatha Christie I am led to believe that the killer really could be any one of them, only being revealed after Poirot gives the one or two clues that mean that it could only ever have been one of them. In this book they reveal one of the attempted murderers less than halfway through the book and then they never really make you believe that it is someone else while they try and solve it. I guessed who it was about two thirds of the way in and then ended up being right about it. Christie would have given me some detail to lead me on the wrong track and I would have guessed each suspect did it at least once without even getting to close to being right.
I thought that this is one of those rare sequels that makes more sense and is better than the original. I think that both books struggle with pacing problems. I think that both books tried a little too hard to be an Agatha Christie novel, but the authors don't quite have what it takes to pull that off. I don't normally compare crime novels to Christie because I think it is unfair, but when you invite the comparison over and over again and then don't live up to it, then I think it is fair to say that it doesn't catch enough of the essence of a Christie novel to achieve anything. In the books written by Agatha Christie I am led to believe that the killer really could be any one of them, only being revealed after Poirot gives the one or two clues that mean that it could only ever have been one of them. In this book they reveal one of the attempted murderers less than halfway through the book and then they never really make you believe that it is someone else while they try and solve it. I guessed who it was about two thirds of the way in and then ended up being right about it. Christie would have given me some detail to lead me on the wrong track and I would have guessed each suspect did it at least once without even getting to close to being right.