In The Black Butterfly, Queen Elizabeth II has just come to the throne and Lucifer Box is being shoved off his as he has retirement foisted upon him.  In spite of this, he finds himself compelled to investigate when perfectly sensible public figures start dying in reckless accidents.  Who is the mysterious Kingdom Kum?  And who or what is the Black Butterfly?  But someone does not want him to find out.

As each book in this trilogy is set in a different era, Lucifer Box naturally ages as the books progress.  I love the idea of  the aging spy, and seeing how he adapts and changes with time.  However, in practice I didn’t really think it worked.  Although Lucifer complains about his reduced capacity for action, there seemed to be no material difference between his abilities in this book and the earlier ones.  The only difference is that he’s more curmudgeonly about it all.  The sharp wit that I loved so much in the first book was sadly lacklustre in The Black Butterfly.

The plot was as amusingly ridiculous as I have come to expect from a Lucifer Box story.  In particular, I thought that the link to the Boy Scouts was wonderful and really humorous.  However, the primary attraction of this series to me is the central character and I found him diminished in this novel, so consequently my enjoyment was also diminished.  At just over 200 pages long, I don’t feel the time spent reading it was time wasted as it was mildly entertaining.  However, it’s definitely my least favourite of the series and I’m quite glad it’s come to an end.

Black Butterfly by Mark Gatiss.  Published by Pocket Books, 2009, pp. 204.  Originally published in 2008.

Title:

Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Published: Headline Review, 2006, pp. 146.  Original publication 1890.

Genre: Classic mystery fiction

Blurb: As the seamy streets of London drown in a sea of smog, Sherlock Holmes sinks into a drug-induced stupour.  That is, until Miss Mary Morstan presents him with a most intriguing case.  A terrible death, an unknown benefactor, stolen treasure and a secret pact between criminals stretching back to a mutiny-torn India, lead Holmes into an epic pursuit of the truth.

Where, when and why: I ordered this book from Amazon marketplace as soon as I finished the first one because I enjoyed it so much (in fact, I’ve not even recorded them in a mailbox post, so they’re both very recent purchases).  I picked it up to read because it’s small and light meaning that, unlike my current main read, it’s easy to read on the tube.

What I thought: Although I still liked this book, disappointingly I didn’t find it as enjoyable as A Study in Scarlet.  This was primarily because the mystery seems much more distant from the narrative this time and a lot of the interesting parts happened off-stage.  This story is a prime example of telling rather than showing: the reader sees very little detective work but instead the mystery is revealed in a lengthy, involved and rather irrelevant monologue from the culprit after he has been arrested; apparently all guilty people suddenly feel the urge to confess expansively.  I couldn’t help but feel rather cheated.

I also thought that the characters are not as well presented in this second Sherlock Holmes story.  Holmes disappears for a lot of it and so the reader misses out on his bizarre and erratic character, being left only with the much less interesting Watson.  I thought Watson’s love affair both unbelieveable and unnecessary and the book would have been much better without it.

Nevertheless, there are some wonderful set pieces in this book, notably the chase scenes.  The bloodhound and the police boat which are used at different points in the story to persue the suspected murder may not have the speed of modern equivalents, but Sir Arthur Conan Doyle writes tension-filled chases to rival those seen in James Bond films, full of twists and turns, obstacles and disappointments.  It’s parts like these that mean I’m definitely going to continue with the series, but I do hope that it improves.

Whether you’re a fan of Sherlock Holmes or not, I definitely wouldn’t recommend buying the edition I read, as throughout the book there are occasional superscript numbers for no apparent reason.  I presumed these  must be footnotes, but on turning to the back of the book I found no corresponding numbers and notes so I assume these must be printing errors.  It doesn’t get in the way exactly but it looks messy and when there are so many different editions of this story available it makes very little sense to buy a copy with mistakes.

Where this book goes: Given the irritation of this particular edition, I’ve decided to switch to the rather attractive Penguin Pocket editions for the rest of the series, three of which I picked up in a charity shop last weekend.  I’ll keep this book around until I manage to find a copy of it in my new preferred edition, but then it will be off to BookMooch.

Tea talk: Once again, this book was read on the train without tea.  I have got some longer reads coming up soon though, so hopefully I’ll have more interesting tea things to report.

Title:

Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Published: Headline Review, 2006, pp. 164

Genre: Classic mystery fiction

Blurb: Arriving in the wilderness of London and in need of lodgings, Dr John Watson finds himself living at 221b Baker Street with one Sherlock Holmes.  When a corpse is discovered in a derelict house Watson, fascinated by his brilliant, eccentric companion, is soon drawn into Holmes’ investigations.  There’s no sign of a struggle, no wounds on the body, yet scrawled in blood across the walls is the word RACHE — revenge.  Watson is baffled, but for Holmes the game is afoot…

Where, when and why: In The Thirteenth Tale the doctor prescribes Sherlock Holmes to the narrator as the antidote to reading too much sensational fiction.  Given my own recent reading habits I thought that I might enjoy the change of pace and style found in these stories as much as Margaret did, so I ordered the first one and started reading it as soon as it arrived in the office.  It also just sneaks in before the deadline for my last read for the R.I.P Challenge, qualifying me for Peril the First.

What I thought: Reading this book was a lot like watching an episode of a detective show on television: it was fast-paced, entertaining and I found it impossible to work out what had happened before it was finally revealed.  Specifically, it reminded me of ‘The Mentalist’ because of the way that Sherlock Holmes solved the mystery simply with close observation and knowledge of human nature, rather than with complicated science which always feels a bit like cheating to me.

I thoroughly enjoyed the character of Holmes, treading the precarious line between madness and genius and appearing to stray into the former more often than not.  The story seems to be more about his madcap antics than the process of solving the mystery, as his smug reticence when questioned about what he knows prevents anything being given away, but I found this a clever way of drawing out the suspense in a very short story.  Watson’s staid character and narrative style seem particularly appropriate as a counterpart to Holmes, not least because he seems just as baffled by proceedings as I was.

Readers seem to be divided on the efficacy of the long diversion towards the end of the book which explains the mystery, but I thought that it works and found it to be a welcome change.  The switch from detective story to personal history slows the pace of the narrative down and allows for some interesting development of the character of the murderer.  I liked the fact that the reader is provided with a more in depth explanation for the motives behind the murderer’s actions which changes the reader’s perspective.  I definitely look forward to carrying on with this series.

Where this book goes: As I enjoyed this book it looks as though I may end up starting a Sherlock Holmes collection, so naturally this one stays where it is.

Tea talk: This book was read entirely on the return train journey of the one on which I read Twist of Gold, so once again there was no tea.  I’m slowly working my way through some much longer books though, and there’s plenty of tea talk to accompany those.

Title:

Author: Wilkie Collins

Published: Penguin,1974, pp. 648

Genre: Classic mystery fiction

Blurb: Wilkie Collins’ sixth novel took the fashionable world by storm on its appearance in 1860 when everything from dances to dresses was named after the ‘woman in white’.  Its continuing power to fascinate stems in part from a distinctive blend of melodrama, comedy and realism; and in part from the power of its story.  Yet The Woman in White is more than just a classic thriller, and contemporary critics have found in it a feminist parable for our times.

When, where and why: I have no recollection whatsoever of buying this book, so I’m going to assume it’s been hanging around on my shelves for quite some time.  I picked it up to read now because there’s something about the colder weather which makes me want to read classic literature, and this one looked interesting.  It’s also book 23/50 for my Books Off the Shelf Challenge, and counts as 3/4 of my books towards the R.I.P. Challenge.

What I thought: After finishing this book I feel compelled to impersonate Mrs Bennet by throwing my hands into the air and exclaiming, “Oh, Mr Collins!”  I really enjoyed this book and, like so many authors I’ve discovered this year, I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to find out how good he is.  I have vague memories of reading The Moonstone when I was eleven (which I’ll now have to go back and reread) but I can’t remember enjoying it anything like as much as The Woman in White, probably because I was too young to appreciate it properly.

I found The Woman in White to be a very skilfully written work as it is presented from so many different perspectives.  The story is set up as evidence for the mystery of the eponymous woman in white, and so it is necessary for a string of characters to take charge of the narrative as the story progresses in order for the reader to be presented with a first hand view of important events.  Impressively, each character has a different and appropriate narrative style, with just the voice and preoccupations I would have imagined for them: Walter Hartright is romantic, emotional, and prone to waxing lyrical about things; Miss Halcombe is precise and detailed; the lawyer is sparse and abrupt.  I thought that the use of these different voices adds texture to the novel and helps to create suspense, as the individual characters reveal their information separately for the reader to piece together.

In Marian Halcombe, Collins has created a great female character.  She is resourceful, intelligent and strong-willed while still being constrained by her position in Victorian society.  She’s the sort of character I was was real because if she was, I’d want to have her round for tea and be her friend.  Had I been Walter Hartright, I would have fallen in love with Marian instead of Laura Fairlie (I notice that Collins is careful to state how ugly Marian is when she is introduced, which I assume is an attempt to explain this preference).  Where Marian seems real and lively, Laura Fairlie is a typical, insipid woman-written-by-Victorian-man; it works well in the context of the story, but I wish she’d been a bit more interesting.  Like Marain, Count Fosco is also a brilliant creation, but to say more would give too much away.

The story itself is engrossing.  Perhaps it’s due to my not reading many mysteries, but I found myself falling for every trap and red herring that Collins wove into the narrative.  This certainly didn’t diminish my enjoyment of the story; in fact, I found myself relishing being led around by Collins while convinced (incorrectly) that I had figured out the solution to the mystery.  I liked the slow, drawn out pace with which the narrative progressed (presumably partly due to its original publication in serial) and thought that it added to the suspense, as I had to wait until Collins was good and ready to reveal what happened next.

My only criticism of this novel is the way in which Collins solved the mystery.  It wasn’t the conclusion that I objected to at all, but the bizarre way in which Walter Hartright eventually uncovered it, completely unconnected to anything else in the text so far.  I couldn’t have been more flummoxed if a talking unicorn had suddenly popped up and solved everything for him.  While this seemingly strange addition was probably an enjoyable twist for Collins’ contemporary readers who enjoyed sensational literature, I found it out of character with the rest of the book and I wish the mystery had been concluded in a less surprising way more in keeping with the narrative so far.  However, I understand that I’m looking at this as a modern reader and so with different priorities.  Nonetheless, this didn’t diminish my enjoyment of the novel and I can’t wait to read more by this author.

Where this book goes: The old Penguin copy I read was quite tatty before I began and had fallen apart by the time I finished reading it.  However, I enjoyed the book far too much not to have a copy of it to keep around and so ordered a more durable looking hardback Everyman edition from Amazon Marketplace.

Tea talk: Until recently when I managed to guilt someone into sorting it out by subtly walking past the facilities manager wearing my coat, scarf and hat, there’s been no heating in my office at all.  Consequently, I’ve been drinking Lapsang Souchong in an attempt to make myself feel warmer.  I’ve decided this is the perfect winter tea, because it smells like sitting in front of an open fire.  Expect many more tea notes waxing lyrical about this smokey tea.

Title:

Author: Diane Setterfield

Published: Orion, 2007, pp. 470

Genre: Historical gothic mystery

Blurb: Angelfield House stands abandoned and forgotten.  It was once the imposing home of the March family – fascinating, manipulative Isabelle, Charlie, her brutal and dangerous brother, and the wild, untamed twins, Emmeline and Adeline.  But Angelfield House conceals a chilling secret whose impact still resonates…

Now Margaret Lea is investigating Angelfield’s past — and the mystery of the March family starts to unravel.  What has the house been hiding?  What is its connection with the enigmatic author Vida Winter?  And what is it in Margaret’s own troubled past that causes her to fall so powerfully under Angelfield’s spell?

Where, when and why: I bought this book up from a charity shop after it was chosen as a group read on Goodreads.  By the time a copy turned up in my locale British Heart Foundation shop the group read had finished, but it looked like such an interesting book that I wanted to read it anyway.  Perhaps it’s the cold weather, perhaps it’s the R.I.P. Challenge making me more aware of it, but I’ve been on a bit of a gothic fiction kick recently and this book fitted the bill rather nicely.

What I thought: This is the sort of novel that I finished and was instantly disappointed that it was the author’s debut, because I already want to read more and Diane Setterfield rather inconsiderately hasn’t written anything else yet (with the exception of some intimidating French literary criticism, which probably isn’t for me).  This book is atmospheric, intriguing and a very enjoyable read.

The Thirteenth Tale is a story within a story: dying author Vida Winter relates the story of her childhood to bookshop owner and amateur biographer Margaret Lea.  This narrative frame facilitates the build-up of mystery and suspense as the reader receives Miss Winter’s tale in fits and starts as she relates the tale to Margaret in installments for as long as her strength to withstand the pain of her illness will allow.  Miss Winter’s narrative is also fiercely chronological, resisting all temptation to look ahead to later on in her life and reveal more than she should.  Consequently, the reader finds out details as Margaret does and it just as tantalised by the snippets of information and speculation which she manages to garner elsewhere.  I also enjoyed the fact that the story refuses to be contained, but spills over into the frame narrative, Margaret’s own life and emotions connecting with those she is recording.

Miss Winter’s story is delightfully gothic, encompassing such topics as death, insanity, mental illness, incest, domestic violence and self-harm.  Emmeline and Adeline are eerie and chilling in their childish lack of remorse or morality, something which is established well by Diane Setterfield showing the twins through the eyes of various characters who try to influence them: the governess, the doctor, the housekeeper, the gardener and more.  The reader is kept firmly outside their insular, interior world and so they always appear strange and uncanny, and Diane Setterfield’s very precise use of pronouns and perspective help to accentuate this.  That their twisted family history is full of possible excuses to explain their behaviour sets them apart even more rather than offering an opportunity to sympathise with them.  Angelfield itself provides the perfect, typical decaying stately home setting, beloved of gothic novels and the setting for the frame narrative is equally atmospheric, the damp and chill of the Yorkshire Moors permeating the story.

My only slight problem with this book is Margaret, the first person narrator relating the story to the reader.  I don’t feel that her character is developed sufficiently; although the reader is supplied with numerous details with which to flesh her out, the central issue of her own missing twin and her accompanying bouts of mental instability are haphazard rather than developing consistently to a climax.  The climax comes, but out of the blue without any significant build-up.  I would have liked Margaret’s issues to feel more real for their own sake rather than as a way of tying her to Miss Winter and her story.  Nevertheless, this was a very good read and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it.

Where this book goes: This book is staying on my shelves along with my ever-growing collection of gothic fiction.  It may even come out again next year when the weather starts to turn cold and the days get shorter.

Tea talk: This book called for more warming smoked tea.  I’ve nearly exhausted my Russian Caravan supplies, so I might treat myself to some Lapsang Souchong this week for comparison.

Author: Donna Andrews

Published: St Martin’s Paperbacks, 1999, pp. 311

Genre: Contemporary mystery

Blurb:So far Meg Langslow’s summer is not going swimmingly.  Down in her small Virginia hometown, she’s maid of honor at the nuptials of three loved ones — each of whom has dumped the planning in hercapable hands.  One bride is set on including a Native American herbal purification ceremony, while another wants live peacocks on the lawn.  Only help from the town’s drop-dead gorgeous hunk, disappointingly rumoured to be gay, keeps Meg afloat in a sea of dotty relatives and outrageous neighbours.

And, in a whirl of summer parties and picnics, Southern hospitality is strained to the limit by an offensive newcomer who hints at skeletons in the guests’ closets.  But it seems this lady has offended one too many when she’s found dead in suspicious circumstances, followed by a strong of accidents — some fatal.  Soon, level-headed Meg’s to-do list extends from flower arrangements and bridal registries to catching a killer — before the next catered event is her own funeral…

When, where and why: In spite of my love of books, cats, tea and other traditional trappings of spinsterhood I am in fact getting married next year.  In the time between now and then I’ve embarked on a mission to find novels about weddings which actually have a decent plot and interesting characters rather than supposing that excessive amounts of tulle, lace and flowers are suitable substitutes for these.  To this end, I’ve been picking up a whole variety of wedding themed books and this one arrived recently from BookMooch (so recently in fact that I’ve not listed it in a Mailbox post yet).  I started reading it now because I’m not enjoying my main book very much (review to follow shortly) and I needed a quick read that I could be fairly sure of finding entertaining as a break from that.

What I thought: This is the sort of comfortable mystery which doesn’t make many demands on the reader: the murder victim is sufficiently unknown and unlikeable that the death isn’t distressing; the plot unfolds gently without any dramatic turns; and the solution, while not obvious, is easy enough to work out, even for someone like myself who doesn’t read many mysteries.  However, just because it was uncomplicated does not mean it was a bad read, and I thoroughly enjoyed the relaxation of reading this book.

Because the weddings serve as the backdrop for this novel rather than its raison d’etre, I found that it avoided the usual trap of losing plot and characters beneath enormous white dresses.  The story, while simple, was good fun and the characters were well-drawn and enjoyable.  Narrator Meg Langslow’s array of eccentric family and neighbours added a levity and humour to the standard mystery plot.  I was continually amused and how unfazed these residents of small-town Virginia are by the initial murder and continuing attempts on the lives of and her family and friends.  Her father is positively delighted at the chance for some amateur sleuthing, Meg’s mother seems oblivious, and Meg herself is more concerned with organising three increasingly demanding weddings.

In Meg herself, Donna Andrews has created a character with a very pleasant narrative voice.  She is wry and intelligent and her observations made me chuckle on numerous occasions.  Unlike the heroines of many chick lit books, she manages to be single without being either bitter or desperate.  She is exasperated by the various brides’ indecisions, demands and dithering without being scathing or dismissive, and the same is true of her attitude towards her family.  It makes a welcome change to read a book narrated by someone who is mocking and funny without being sarcastic and unkind.

Where this book goes: I’ve loaned this book to my mother, as I’m fairly sure she’ll enjoy it.  After that I think it will be back on BookMooch looking for a new home, as it’s not one I’m ever likely to read again after this year.

I was hugely disappointed with this book. I enjoyed its predecessor ‘The Vesuvius Club’ so much that I raced through it in a day and went straight onto the second in the series. Unfortunately it suffers by comparison. A lot.

What made the first book such a good read was the dry humour of the narrative style and the characterisation of the delightfully bad Lucifer Box, but both of these key features were decidedly patchy in ‘The Devil in Amber’. It has moments of brilliance (who could fail to be drawn in by the fantastic opening line, ‘He was an American, so it seemed only fair to shoot him’?) but these are well-hidden among standard dross. Mark Gatiss seems to do a lot more telling the reader what was happening than letting us see it coloured through Lucifer’s disdainful perspective. It was like reading a book written to be made into a film rather than read and appreciated as a novel. It remains a fun read, but I sincerely hope that the third installment lives up to the standards of the first book and not the second.

The Devil in Amber by Mark Gatiss.  Published by Pocket Books, 2006, pp. 248.  Originally published in 2006.

N.B. This is an old review written in 2010 and posted on Goodreads and LibraryThing before I started keeping track of all the books I read here at Old English Rose Reads.  I’ve decided to keep copies here so that this remains a complete record of my reading since I started reviewing books for my own pleasure.

Meet Lucifer Box: Equal parts James Bond and Sherlock Holmes, with a twist of Monty Python and a dash of Austin Powers, Lucifer has a charming countenance and rapier wit that make him the guest all hostesses must have. And most do.  But few of his conquests know that Lucifer is also His Majesty’s most daring secret agent, at home in both London’s Imperial grandeur and in its underworld of despicable vice. So when Britain’s most prominent scientists begin turning up dead, there is only one man his country can turn to for help.  (Goodreads Summary)

I liked everything about this book, from the bizarre but neatly self-contained plot to the delightfully improbable character names. Lucifer Box is an enjoyably depraved anti-hero with the louche, disaffected air of one of Oscar Wilde’s creations. His wry first person narrative style was amusing and easy to read, so I sped through this book in less than a day. The book was missing the final sparkle and wit of Wilde’s writing, but it seems unfair to criticise one author for not being enough like another, and this did not detract from what was a thoroughly entertaining mystery.

The Vesuvius Club by Mark Gatiss.  Published by Pocket Books, 2005, pp. 240.  Originally published in 2004.

N.B. This is an old review written in 2010 and posted on Goodreads and LibraryThing before I started keeping track of all the books I read here at Old English Rose Reads.  I’ve decided to keep copies here so that this remains a complete record of my reading since I started reviewing books for my own pleasure.

This book felt like the best possible combination of an exciting mystery and a really interesting history lesson. Lindsey Davis has obviously spent a great deal of time and effort researching Rome, the empire and everyday life at the time and it shows. The setting of the book is rich, believable and exactly how I imagine ancient Rome would have been. She also has an useful device of making more knowledgeable characters explain things to less knowledgeable ones, so that details which the reader might not know or understand (such as the process of casting silver pigs) are fully explained without it seeming contrived or out of place. The book managed to walk the delicate line of being educational without being didactic.

I also enjoyed how the author turned all the detective stereotypes around and created a really original character in Falco. Detectives usually have no family: Falco is at the centre of a huge Italian family of chattering women, complete with overbearing mother. They usually have troubled pasts: Falco has a slightly embarrassing one that he’d rather no one mentioned. The list of his interesting characteristics goes on, and his wry observations made him a perfect first person narrator. The other characters in the book are equally well thought out: bold, brash and full of life. I look forward to meeting them again in subsequent books, as I’ll definitely be reading more of this series.

The Silver Pigs by Lindsey Davis.  Published by Arrow, 2000, pp. 318.  Originally published in 1989.

N.B. This is an old review written in 2010 and posted on Goodreads and LibraryThing before I started keeping track of all the books I read here at Old English Rose Reads.  I’ve decided to keep copies here so that this remains a complete record of my reading since I started reviewing books for my own pleasure.

I think I need to start my review with the disclaimer that, despite what I’m going to say, I did enjoy this book. It was pretty standard thriller fare and I found it an entertaining read for the train journey to and from work. In terms of the story, I thought it was better than ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo‘ and the translation seemed to have far fewer awkward phrases this time, which made for a much more pleasant read.

Now for the criticism. I thought it was incredibly ironic, given how often praise was given to the skillful editing provided by the characters inside the book, how desperately this book needed a good editor. The plot was really slow to get going and, when at last it did, it was filled with irrelevant details which didn’t add anything significant and so became increasingly irritating as the book progressed. For example, I didn’t care what Lisbeth decided to buy from Ikea and the inventoried list of her purchases (complete with model and number) was just dull. Even if I had cared about her shopping habits, just stating that ‘she bought furniture from Ikea’ would have been sufficient for me to assume that she bought chairs and a table and so on and so forth, without being told this explicitly. The spoon feeding was a bit much. Similarly, there were long passages of dialogue that could also have benefited from being tightened up so that they were sharper and less protracted. Perhaps the reader was supposed to feel as frustrated as the characters did at the inability to get to vital information, but it just left me with large portions of book that my eyes slid over with lack of interest.

That aside, I thought that the whodunnit portions of the book, when I finally reached them, were well thought out and provided the reader with an excellent insight into the character of Lisbeth Salander. In this book she becomes a bit more sympathetic, but still remains mysterious enough to make me look forward to reading book three.

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson.  Published by Quercus, 2009, pp. 569.  Originally published in Swedish in 2006.

N.B. This is an old review written in 2010 and posted on Goodreads and LibraryThing before I started keeping track of all the books I read here at Old English Rose Reads.  I’ve decided to keep copies here so that this remains a complete record of my reading since I started reviewing books for my own pleasure.