abrswf 's review for:

The moonstone by Wilkie Collins, Wilkie Collins

5.0

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What a fun listen. It is awesomely well narrated by Peter Jeffrey, who somehow manages to pull off sounding like a bevy of cast members. The book itself, which was published in 1868 in serialized form in Charles Dickens’ magazine, is truly Victorian in tone, which I enjoyed very much. But the attitudes in it are remarkably progressive for the period: the narration is much more respectful than the attitudes of the era toward servants, to women, and to non-Christians and non-Whites. Collins also has lots of fun tweaking proselytizing Christians — just wait until you find out about the organization devoted to ruining trousers, for example. Best of all is the underlying story. This book is generally considered the first detective novel, and it has a fine mystery at its center, with a satisfying solution and conclusion. There are some flaws, of course. The medical details seem like plain nonsense, particularly the information about opiates, there is some baked in racism and chauvinism which is simply to be expected from this period, and everyone’s depicted emotions are VERY Victorian. Also, the male “hero” of the piece is at bottom something of a jerk. But these are details. I loved listening to this book.