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The Black Marble Pool
When you first notice it, something seems a bit unusual. Then it occurs to you that most, if not all, of the pools you’ve ever seen before were painted blue or white. The Captain’s House pool is black. Not painted black. But constructed of black marble and black tile. The marble has streaks of white that look like lightning bolts in a black sky. There is a sexiness to this pool; a personality. It looks and feels like a warm, wet blanket, surrounding and protecting you like a dark, quiet womb.
There’s a dead body at the bottom of a pool in the backyard of a guest house in Key West. Who is he? And what caused his untimely demise? Maybe it’s suicide. Or an accident. But more likely—murder! And who’s responsible? One of the guests, the people who run the guest house or one of those mysterious women in town?
A Lambda Literary Awards Finalist in 1991.
There’s a dead body at the bottom of a pool in the backyard of a guest house in Key West. Who is he? And what caused his untimely demise? Maybe it’s suicide. Or an accident. But more likely—murder! And who’s responsible? One of the guests, the people who run the guest house or one of those mysterious women in town?
A Lambda Literary Awards Finalist in 1991.
- GenresLGBT
Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 1991
About the author
Stan Leventhal
37 books2 followersStan Leventhal was an American writer and magazine editor. Primarily known as the editor in chief of Heat Publications, a publisher of gay erotic magazines including Mandate, Torso, and Inches, he also wrote and published several works of LGBT literature in the 1980s and 1990s. He published three novels and two short story collections during his lifetime; two additional novels were published following his death of AIDS in 1995.
In addition he founded Amethyst Press, a now-defunct publishing company which specialized in LGBT books, including his own books and titles by Dennis Cooper, Bo Huston, Steve Abbott, Kevin Killian, Patrick Moore and Mark Ameen.
He garnered three Lambda Literary Award nominations, in 1989 for Mountain Climbing in Sheridan Square, in 1990 for Fault Lines, and in 1991 for Black Marble Pool.
In addition he founded Amethyst Press, a now-defunct publishing company which specialized in LGBT books, including his own books and titles by Dennis Cooper, Bo Huston, Steve Abbott, Kevin Killian, Patrick Moore and Mark Ameen.
He garnered three Lambda Literary Award nominations, in 1989 for Mountain Climbing in Sheridan Square, in 1990 for Fault Lines, and in 1991 for Black Marble Pool.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 13, 2019
The Black Marble Pool
By Stan Leventhal
ReQueered Tales Edition, 2019, of original 1990 publication
Four stars
For writers my age, this book has special resonance. The time is the end of the 1980s. The author and the narrator – who is never named – as well as this reviewer, are all the same age. The place is Key West, one of the three legendary gay vacation meccas of the 1970s and 80s (Fire Island and Provincetown being the other two); and the eponymous pool of the title is in the garden of the most elegant gay bed & breakfast on the island.
Everyone born after 1980 should read this. What seems to be a straightforward, fairly casual murder mystery is in fact a metaphor for a generation.
The narrator has been sent to write a travel article about Key West as a gay destination – even though he is in fact a music critic. He is thirty-five, still young and attractive, and is determined to cheat on his lover (the word we used then), because, he tells us, his relationship has gone stale. Instead, he gets drawn into a murder when he finds a dead body at the bottom of the empty black marble swimming pool.
The reluctant sleuth seems to have it all: a prestigious career, a domestic life, and (never stated, but at the time clearly understood) his health. The fact is, however, he sees himself as something of a loser. What he yearns for is the freedom of his youth, when disco ruled and he was unattached, underemployed, and promiscuous to his heart’s content. He latches onto the murder investigation knowing that it’s giving him the kind of excitement his actual life doesn’t seem to offer.
The pool, you see, is a bleak metaphor for gay life in 1990, when the book was first published: because of the black marble and black tiles, even when it’s full it looks empty. Similarly, the book is populated with characters who lie, both to the narrator and to the people around them. One of those people dies in the pool. On the surface it has a sort of parallel to the cozy Miss Marple mysteries of Agatha Christie, but in that black pool there is a great deal of sadness, deception, and loss.
The writing is not fabulous, and the plot feels pretty makeshift, although Leventhal ties everything up quite neatly (in a messy sort of way) by the end. It does not have the literary quality of Joseph Hansen’s David Brandstetter mysteries, nor does it have the psychological intensity of books like Felice Picano’s 1979 “The Lure.” To be candid, I had trouble warming up to the narrator, possibly because he reminds me of too many men I’ve known. On the other hand, the narrator feels very real – an odd mixture of arrogance and insecurity. The author was himself an editor of several gay magazines, and his writing was part of the burgeoning world of popular gay literature in the 1970s and 80s. Like me, Stan Leventhal lived the life of the 1970s and 80s gay man; unlike me, he didn’t survive it. Maybe what bugs me is that I see in his narrator the very cloud of fear under which we all lived.
At first it felt strange to me that AIDS (and safe sex) is only mentioned in passing, even though by the time this book appeared the plague had devasted the gay community worldwide, and had thus seriously compromised the profitability of the gay consumer market (a fact also mentioned in passing). Then I reminded myself that this was our main survival strategy. We lived our lives, had our fun, hoped for the best. We went to Key West and Provincetown and Fire Island. We went to funerals and memorials and hospitals. It was the life we had, and we made the most of it. Those of us who lived through it look back with a mixture of gratitude and disbelief.
By Stan Leventhal
ReQueered Tales Edition, 2019, of original 1990 publication
Four stars
For writers my age, this book has special resonance. The time is the end of the 1980s. The author and the narrator – who is never named – as well as this reviewer, are all the same age. The place is Key West, one of the three legendary gay vacation meccas of the 1970s and 80s (Fire Island and Provincetown being the other two); and the eponymous pool of the title is in the garden of the most elegant gay bed & breakfast on the island.
Everyone born after 1980 should read this. What seems to be a straightforward, fairly casual murder mystery is in fact a metaphor for a generation.
The narrator has been sent to write a travel article about Key West as a gay destination – even though he is in fact a music critic. He is thirty-five, still young and attractive, and is determined to cheat on his lover (the word we used then), because, he tells us, his relationship has gone stale. Instead, he gets drawn into a murder when he finds a dead body at the bottom of the empty black marble swimming pool.
The reluctant sleuth seems to have it all: a prestigious career, a domestic life, and (never stated, but at the time clearly understood) his health. The fact is, however, he sees himself as something of a loser. What he yearns for is the freedom of his youth, when disco ruled and he was unattached, underemployed, and promiscuous to his heart’s content. He latches onto the murder investigation knowing that it’s giving him the kind of excitement his actual life doesn’t seem to offer.
The pool, you see, is a bleak metaphor for gay life in 1990, when the book was first published: because of the black marble and black tiles, even when it’s full it looks empty. Similarly, the book is populated with characters who lie, both to the narrator and to the people around them. One of those people dies in the pool. On the surface it has a sort of parallel to the cozy Miss Marple mysteries of Agatha Christie, but in that black pool there is a great deal of sadness, deception, and loss.
The writing is not fabulous, and the plot feels pretty makeshift, although Leventhal ties everything up quite neatly (in a messy sort of way) by the end. It does not have the literary quality of Joseph Hansen’s David Brandstetter mysteries, nor does it have the psychological intensity of books like Felice Picano’s 1979 “The Lure.” To be candid, I had trouble warming up to the narrator, possibly because he reminds me of too many men I’ve known. On the other hand, the narrator feels very real – an odd mixture of arrogance and insecurity. The author was himself an editor of several gay magazines, and his writing was part of the burgeoning world of popular gay literature in the 1970s and 80s. Like me, Stan Leventhal lived the life of the 1970s and 80s gay man; unlike me, he didn’t survive it. Maybe what bugs me is that I see in his narrator the very cloud of fear under which we all lived.
At first it felt strange to me that AIDS (and safe sex) is only mentioned in passing, even though by the time this book appeared the plague had devasted the gay community worldwide, and had thus seriously compromised the profitability of the gay consumer market (a fact also mentioned in passing). Then I reminded myself that this was our main survival strategy. We lived our lives, had our fun, hoped for the best. We went to Key West and Provincetown and Fire Island. We went to funerals and memorials and hospitals. It was the life we had, and we made the most of it. Those of us who lived through it look back with a mixture of gratitude and disbelief.
January 4, 2021
My first read for 2021 and another great story from the late Stan Leventhal's canon thanks to ReQueered Tales republishing these amazing books. This time an unnamed narrator, a music critic travels to Key West to write a magazine article and sneak in some rest and fun. He's left his live-in lover/boyfriend back in NYC. Within minutes of arriving at the guest house, he discovers a dead body and so begins this amateur sleuth mystery. Leventhal leads him down all sorts of wrong paths. He bumbles through the discovery of clues and even the police tell him he shouldn't be doing this, but he can't help himself. When I read Leventhal's 1988 book Mountain Climbing in Sheridan Square earlier this year, I described his writing as "a sweet combination of cozy novel and beautiful literature. For me, it was the perfect kind of... read." I still think that although this book wasn't quite as perfect as the first. There were a few underdeveloped characters including the far-away boyfriend. The ending was also abrupt. But I moved quickly through the book and enjoy the author's writing, so when his next two books get re-released this year, I will add them to my to-read list. 4 out of 5 for The Black Marble Pool.
April 14, 2022
“THE QUESTIONNAIRE THAT IS MY LIFE”
I read The Black Marble Pool in one sitting. The unnamed narrator is in Key West on a writing assignment and enjoying a respite from his lover, Paul, who remains in New York. The morning after he arrives at his guesthouse, he discovers a dead man’s body in the swimming pool, which has been drained of water. As he becomes more involved in the mystery of how Walter Burgess, the dead man died, the narrator says, “Maybe by participating in whatever would happen I could fill in the blank spaces on the questionnaire that is my life.” The suspects include three gay men staying at the guesthouse, the owner of the house and her lover, the houseboy, and two mysterious women the narrator overhears talking about the deceased
The story moves fast with some fun twists and turns. I couldn’t predict who done it. (I find that when I read a mystery, the reveal of who done it, which I usually forget as soon as I put the book down, isn’t as important as the exciting roller-coaster ride to get to who done it.) After the mystery of Walter Burgess’s death is solved, the narrator has final encounters with those characters left standing, including a surprising second liaison with Officer Simon in an alley. The next morning he flies back to New York with no intention, I presume, to ever revisit Key West.
I’ll remember the following two things about The Black Marble Pool for a long time: (1) The narrator is always trying to find time to read a book by Anne Tyler. He mentions her at least five times but never reveals the title of her book, and (2) When Leventhal’s characters have to pee, they go pee. How many writers ever allow their characters to go to the bathroom?
After finishing The Black Marble Pool, I read Stan Leventhal’s other books. His stories contain a lot of warmth, heart, and humor, and, of course, sex. Friendship is important to his characters. His stories seem to be full of autobiographical elements. Leventhal reminds me of Ethan Mordden and William J. Mann, even Armistread Maupin, who were Leventhal’s contemporaries. Leventhal and these writers give us perceptive stories about how gay men lived their lives in the late 1980s and early 1990s. AIDS is a given in these men’s lives. Leventhal’s prose makes no pretense of being literary. It is clear and readable and keeps me turning the pages. A large part of why I love Leventhal’s stories so much is that while reading them I can revisit my younger gay self.
Stan Leventhal’s life and career were cut short by AIDS in January 1995. I sincerely hope that the republishing of his books by ReQueered Tales causes a renewed interest in his books.
I read The Black Marble Pool in one sitting. The unnamed narrator is in Key West on a writing assignment and enjoying a respite from his lover, Paul, who remains in New York. The morning after he arrives at his guesthouse, he discovers a dead man’s body in the swimming pool, which has been drained of water. As he becomes more involved in the mystery of how Walter Burgess, the dead man died, the narrator says, “Maybe by participating in whatever would happen I could fill in the blank spaces on the questionnaire that is my life.” The suspects include three gay men staying at the guesthouse, the owner of the house and her lover, the houseboy, and two mysterious women the narrator overhears talking about the deceased
The story moves fast with some fun twists and turns. I couldn’t predict who done it. (I find that when I read a mystery, the reveal of who done it, which I usually forget as soon as I put the book down, isn’t as important as the exciting roller-coaster ride to get to who done it.) After the mystery of Walter Burgess’s death is solved, the narrator has final encounters with those characters left standing, including a surprising second liaison with Officer Simon in an alley. The next morning he flies back to New York with no intention, I presume, to ever revisit Key West.
I’ll remember the following two things about The Black Marble Pool for a long time: (1) The narrator is always trying to find time to read a book by Anne Tyler. He mentions her at least five times but never reveals the title of her book, and (2) When Leventhal’s characters have to pee, they go pee. How many writers ever allow their characters to go to the bathroom?
After finishing The Black Marble Pool, I read Stan Leventhal’s other books. His stories contain a lot of warmth, heart, and humor, and, of course, sex. Friendship is important to his characters. His stories seem to be full of autobiographical elements. Leventhal reminds me of Ethan Mordden and William J. Mann, even Armistread Maupin, who were Leventhal’s contemporaries. Leventhal and these writers give us perceptive stories about how gay men lived their lives in the late 1980s and early 1990s. AIDS is a given in these men’s lives. Leventhal’s prose makes no pretense of being literary. It is clear and readable and keeps me turning the pages. A large part of why I love Leventhal’s stories so much is that while reading them I can revisit my younger gay self.
Stan Leventhal’s life and career were cut short by AIDS in January 1995. I sincerely hope that the republishing of his books by ReQueered Tales causes a renewed interest in his books.
June 4, 2020
A fun, quick murder mystery about a death in a B & B in Key West, Florida. The author wrote deft character studies of the various participants and kept me guessing until the final denouement. There was also some discussions about the state of America, gay relationships and being out. It made me want to revisit Key West.
August 26, 2019
Overwritten.
The lead walks into a disco:
"As I stood there, caught between the Scylla and Charybdis of nonchalance and eagerness, I drifted into a memory vortex."
The end was very messy.
The lead walks into a disco:
"As I stood there, caught between the Scylla and Charybdis of nonchalance and eagerness, I drifted into a memory vortex."
The end was very messy.
August 9, 2019
More accurately it's 4.5 stars.
I received an ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review.
This review has been originally posted at Gay Book Reviews - check it out!
What a refreshing read! Maybe not the best book ever written, maybe not the most breath-taking murder mystery, but nice and fun, perfect for your holidays, while you’re lounging on a nice beach or near a swimming pool (preferably made of black marble, it goes without saying) with scarcely clad hunks around you and a cold drink in your hand. Not my case, currently—do I have to add “alas”? Sigh.
Anyway. We follow the amateur sleuth investigations of an unnamed first-person narrator, a journalist writing music reviews and critics, who’s been asked by his NY-based newspaper to stand in for one of their travel journalists, fly down to Key West, and write a paper about the place. The book starts with our MC starting his first morning by… discovering a dead man in the empty black marble swimming pool of the B&B he’s staying in. The police rule it to be a suicide and leave it at that. But our MC is intrigued. Why would the swimming pool have been emptied the previous night? Why does nobody seem to have noticed? Who among his fellow vacationers has a reason to kill Walter Burgess, the victim, owner of a couple of gay clubs and bars in the NY area? How is the young hustler Skip linked to Burgess? Who are the two women the MC overhears discussing a certain Walter he’s certain must be the victim?
I like holiday murder mysteries, and this is certainly one of them. Light and funny, with some kinky twists (not too kinky, mind you), closeted police officers, opaque possible murderers, a falsely gay murder victim, sun, palm-trees, almost romantic dinners, mistaken come-ons, dancing in nightclubs… The MC does everything a single gay man would like to do in any given summer resort all over the world (well, we learn that he’s not single at all, but hey, his lover Paul is far away in New York, and a thirty-something young man who doesn’t believe in monogamy has those urges, see?). And the death of Burgess as well as the police’s inaction puzzle him enough to make him pursue his own, private investigation, which turns out more dangerous than he would have bargained…
What is almost funny is how clueless the MC seems to be. Of course, he asks the appropriate questions, comes to well-thought-out conclusions, follows the right clues, and has the right reactions. Most of the time, that is. There’s a moment he spends in paranoid panic, closed off in his room in the B&B. But other scenes are rather hilarious (for instance when he searches a room together with the closeted local police officer, and the occupant of the room comes back with a hook-up, forcing the two to hide in a wardrobe and wait until the two unknowing guys have finished shagging). I was rather fond of my MC without name: not very handsome, not very successful in life, not very happy in his relationship, not very successful with his hook-ups, the average dude who’s too nosy for his own good. The ending is almost unexpected (for everyone, including the MC), and the culprit turns out to be someone you’d maybe not suspect… well, almost, as there aren’t many characters in this book, so of course any reader of murder mysteries ends up at some point suspecting that person as well. Yep, another good and satisfying read ReQueered Tales has had the excellent idea of republishing.
I received an ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review.
This review has been originally posted at Gay Book Reviews - check it out!
What a refreshing read! Maybe not the best book ever written, maybe not the most breath-taking murder mystery, but nice and fun, perfect for your holidays, while you’re lounging on a nice beach or near a swimming pool (preferably made of black marble, it goes without saying) with scarcely clad hunks around you and a cold drink in your hand. Not my case, currently—do I have to add “alas”? Sigh.
Anyway. We follow the amateur sleuth investigations of an unnamed first-person narrator, a journalist writing music reviews and critics, who’s been asked by his NY-based newspaper to stand in for one of their travel journalists, fly down to Key West, and write a paper about the place. The book starts with our MC starting his first morning by… discovering a dead man in the empty black marble swimming pool of the B&B he’s staying in. The police rule it to be a suicide and leave it at that. But our MC is intrigued. Why would the swimming pool have been emptied the previous night? Why does nobody seem to have noticed? Who among his fellow vacationers has a reason to kill Walter Burgess, the victim, owner of a couple of gay clubs and bars in the NY area? How is the young hustler Skip linked to Burgess? Who are the two women the MC overhears discussing a certain Walter he’s certain must be the victim?
I like holiday murder mysteries, and this is certainly one of them. Light and funny, with some kinky twists (not too kinky, mind you), closeted police officers, opaque possible murderers, a falsely gay murder victim, sun, palm-trees, almost romantic dinners, mistaken come-ons, dancing in nightclubs… The MC does everything a single gay man would like to do in any given summer resort all over the world (well, we learn that he’s not single at all, but hey, his lover Paul is far away in New York, and a thirty-something young man who doesn’t believe in monogamy has those urges, see?). And the death of Burgess as well as the police’s inaction puzzle him enough to make him pursue his own, private investigation, which turns out more dangerous than he would have bargained…
What is almost funny is how clueless the MC seems to be. Of course, he asks the appropriate questions, comes to well-thought-out conclusions, follows the right clues, and has the right reactions. Most of the time, that is. There’s a moment he spends in paranoid panic, closed off in his room in the B&B. But other scenes are rather hilarious (for instance when he searches a room together with the closeted local police officer, and the occupant of the room comes back with a hook-up, forcing the two to hide in a wardrobe and wait until the two unknowing guys have finished shagging). I was rather fond of my MC without name: not very handsome, not very successful in life, not very happy in his relationship, not very successful with his hook-ups, the average dude who’s too nosy for his own good. The ending is almost unexpected (for everyone, including the MC), and the culprit turns out to be someone you’d maybe not suspect… well, almost, as there aren’t many characters in this book, so of course any reader of murder mysteries ends up at some point suspecting that person as well. Yep, another good and satisfying read ReQueered Tales has had the excellent idea of republishing.
September 7, 2021
I first heard of Stan Leventhal in
The Gentrification of the Mind: Witness to a Lost Imagination
(2012) by his friend Sarah Schulman. She admits he was never going to be a great writer but still laments how he and other gay creatives dead of AIDS so quickly fell into obscurity. Thankfully, his 1991 mystery novel The Black Marble Pool has since been re-released by ReQueered Tales, a small press dedicated to preventing such cultural losses to the LGBTQ+ community. While I agree with Schulman's assessment of Leventhal's mediocre talent, this book is nevertheless a treasure trove of historic details about the gay vacation mecca of Key West in the 1980s, from the types of fashions worn to how people behaved in clubs and found hookups. Definitely worth a read for that alone. It's very short.
Perhaps forty years of gay fiction – and notably gay and lesbian mystery, detective and suspense fiction – has been teetering on the brink of obscurity. Orphaned works, orphaned authors, many living and some having passed away – with no one to make the case for their creations to be returned to print (and e-print!).
Until now. That is the mission of ReQueered Tales: to bring back to circulation this treasure trove of fantastic fiction which, for one reason or another, has fallen by the wayside. In an era of e-books, everything of value ought to be accessible. For a new generation of readers, these mystery tales are full of insights into the gay world of the 1960s, ’70s, ’80s and ’90s. And for those of us who lived through the period, they are a delightful reminder of our youth and reflect some of our own struggles in growing up gay in those heady times.
December 10, 2019
The Black Marble Pool was first published in 1990 and is being brought back by ReQueered Tales. Its author, Stan Leventhal, was lost to AIDS in 1995. The protagonist of the story, a music critic on assignment in Key West, is staying at a guest house known for catering to gay men. He wakes on his first morning at the house to find that the pool has been drained, and the body of a man is at the bottom of the pool in a puddle of blood. The journalist is curious and somewhat titillated by the crime, and decides that investigating a murder is far more interesting than writing the travel article that he’d been assigned. He’s not sure whether he should consider his fellow houseguests as suspects or as dating material, and is also conflicted about cheating on his lover, Paul, who’s back home in Manhattan. One of the guests gives him the dead man’s diary, then it disappears from his room; he meets the dead man’s wife in town, who supposedly doesn’t yet know that her husband is dead; and he has a brief encounter with one of the investigating police officers in a dark alley. Leventhal’s descriptions of Key West and the Florida heat and humidity are spot on; the mystery is full of suspicious characters with tangled stories; and the conclusion is both surprising and satisfying.
I received a copy of this book in return for an honest and impartial review.
I received a copy of this book in return for an honest and impartial review.
August 27, 2019
Round up to 3.5 stars.
To open, this is not a romance novel. This is a mystery, with elements of gay life such as hook-ups, relationships and infidelity.
Set in Key West, the plot revolves around Walter Burgess, found dead in an empty pool and the question of who did the nefarious deed. The murder/mystery settles firmly into “cozy” category. The execution of the murder itself, implausible (thus “cozy” sub-genre) - it’s the writing that makes this story rather brilliant.
The author deftly weaves a plot of ambivalent police (why aren’t they investigating the murder?), secrets that people want to keep secrets, while questioning one’s motivations and intents. The cast of characters is reminiscent of an Agatha Christie novel, the setting a little bit John Hemingway, and the topics are timeless.
I’m finding writing this review a bit difficult, as I really don’t want to inadvertently drop any spoilers. There are aspects that didn’t dawn on me until I sat down to draft my review. The brilliance in this book lies in the details, the subtlety and execution, in its humanity. If you are inclined toward a mystery with gay elements and a literary emphasis, this would be a book for you.
Review is cross-posted at Gay Book Reviews
A copy of the book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!
To open, this is not a romance novel. This is a mystery, with elements of gay life such as hook-ups, relationships and infidelity.
Set in Key West, the plot revolves around Walter Burgess, found dead in an empty pool and the question of who did the nefarious deed. The murder/mystery settles firmly into “cozy” category. The execution of the murder itself, implausible (thus “cozy” sub-genre) - it’s the writing that makes this story rather brilliant.
The author deftly weaves a plot of ambivalent police (why aren’t they investigating the murder?), secrets that people want to keep secrets, while questioning one’s motivations and intents. The cast of characters is reminiscent of an Agatha Christie novel, the setting a little bit John Hemingway, and the topics are timeless.
I’m finding writing this review a bit difficult, as I really don’t want to inadvertently drop any spoilers. There are aspects that didn’t dawn on me until I sat down to draft my review. The brilliance in this book lies in the details, the subtlety and execution, in its humanity. If you are inclined toward a mystery with gay elements and a literary emphasis, this would be a book for you.
Review is cross-posted at Gay Book Reviews
A copy of the book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!
November 8, 2019
I was given a free copy of The Black Marble Pool in return for an honest review.
The book was originally published in 1990 but has just been republished by Requeered Tales.
The Black Marble Pool is a murder mystery but it didn't really work for me in this context. There were too many gaps and the story did not flow particularly well.
Where the book does work for me is in regards to the social history of the time. The Black Marble Pool gives a glimpse into the lives of the characters who lived during this time. I look back and wonder how people had the strength to fight the system and fight the prejudices which faced them in every aspect of their lives. Human resilience is so special.
What I also found very moving was 'meeting' the author at the end of his life. This little snippet at the start of the book was so special and suggested to me that he was unique man.
Highly recommended.
The book was originally published in 1990 but has just been republished by Requeered Tales.
The Black Marble Pool is a murder mystery but it didn't really work for me in this context. There were too many gaps and the story did not flow particularly well.
Where the book does work for me is in regards to the social history of the time. The Black Marble Pool gives a glimpse into the lives of the characters who lived during this time. I look back and wonder how people had the strength to fight the system and fight the prejudices which faced them in every aspect of their lives. Human resilience is so special.
What I also found very moving was 'meeting' the author at the end of his life. This little snippet at the start of the book was so special and suggested to me that he was unique man.
Highly recommended.
June 16, 2013
It was ok. I am not a mystery reader. The story was ok. I didn't care in the end who did it. I guess this is because i am not into mysteries.
October 4, 2019
This was a good read. The ending was a little abrupt and unexpected. And what happened to that travel article our protagonist was supposed to be writing?
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews