Short & Sweet Treats discussion

"Richard Hannay’s boredom with London society is soon relieved when the resourceful engineer from South Africa is caught up in a web of secret codes, spies, and murder on the eve of WWI. When a neighbor is killed in his flat, Richard, suspected, decodes the journal, runs to the wilds of his native Scotland in disguises and local dialects, evades Germans and officials."

Here's a free Amazon version: http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...
And an illustrated version: http://smile.amazon.com/Thirty-Nine-S...

Project Gutenberg: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/558

Oh, it looks like the Hichkock movie version is available for Amazon Prime, and I spotted it on Youtube too.

Maybe I could watch the movie to refresh my memory for the discussion. I read this last year but have forgotten what it was about other than it being an old thriller/spy novel.

thank you, Melanti!

I didn't look closely but other than the formatting, it should be the same. Often the Amazon free books are just Gutenberg books with things like tables of contents added.

I included the Gutenberg link for the people with non-Kindle e-readers. Gutenberg has a ton of different file formats available so they're compatible with most devices and in a pinch you can just read with a web browser.

Just started reading this one for this month of October

Mary wrote: "I ran into Guttenberg site and found the legend of sleepy Hollow."

Project Gutenberg is a great resource for the pre-1928 books. If I'm ever having trouble finding a free version of an old classic, that's the next place I check.

I finished it last night and enjoyed the story!

I recently listened to the audio book. It was enjoyable, if a little symplectic by today standards. At least you don't need a degree in techno-babble to follow the plot, unlike many the Espionage novels these days!

Simplistic is a great way to describe it!

I was going to call it "dated" earlier but it really isn't dated so much as it's just outshone by later more elaborate examples of the genre.

Now, if you want a dated spy thriller, go check out Casino Royale in all its misogynistic glory.

LOL! I'm not Bond fan. I leave that to my hubby . He swears he watches the films for the acting. Admittedly it's they've got a lot better in recent times but OMG the innuendos! !

I've never seen a Bond movie, but I'm sure the books are worse!

In the first one, Bond likes sleeping with this woman because she wasn't very demonstrative in bed or otherwise so each time he slept with her had "the sweet tang of rape."

And yes, that part in quotation marks IS a direct quote. I giggled my way through most of the "women belong barefoot and pregnant in a kitchen" bits (there's plenty of those) but that one line stopped me cold. Bond's a pretty vile guy in the first book...

Thanks Melanti, added to my Kindle this evening.

Melanti wrote: "I've never seen a Bond movie, but I'm sure the books are worse!

In the first one, Bond likes sleeping with this woman because she wasn't very demonstrative in bed or otherwise so each time he slep..."

Ouch - that's nasty! ¥

See my review of The 39 Steps here.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

Dressing up like the milkman? Genius!

Nicola wrote: "Karen wrote: "See my review of The 39 Steps here.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1..."

The Bond books are dated, I would say pre-neolithic laughs Howe..."

Hey Nicola- didn't we also see this at the Arts Club few years back?

I read this book over the summer funnily enough. I had seen most of the film and TV adaptations and thought I'd better go back to it. To be honest, I was a little disappointed with it by the time I got to the end, but I put that down to having seen so many versions of it that my opinion was rather skewed...

Having said that, Richard Hannay is a great hero. A man who really wants nothing to do with espionage (or even England for that matter) drawn in to a battle to protect it. Masterful characterisation in that respect.

I wrote a short blog post a while ago about anti-detectives which includes Richard Hannay if anyone is interested in my expanded opinion of him...

https://nickrbtingley.wordpress.com/2...

Nicola wrote: "Kris - My Novelesque Life wrote: "Nicola wrote: "Karen wrote: "See my review of The 39 Steps here.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1..."

The Bond books..."

Too funny!! :)

Nicola wrote: "Kris - My Novelesque Life wrote: "Nicola wrote: "Karen wrote: "See my review of The 39 Steps here.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1..."

The Bond books..."

As I was reading the book it all came back to me, lol.


I love old time radio mysteries and old movies so this was right up my alley :) I was hooked from the beginning and enjoyed it. I might read the rest of the series.

It reminds me of a comical North by Northwest. Not sure why I find it funny, perhaps some of the absurdity?

http://www.cbsrmt.com/synopsis.html

I used to listen to the radio mystery hour. I enjoyed them. It really makes you use your imagination, good clean fun!!

Lol, Jen I found it funny too...the play adaptation I went to played up the humour of the story.

Oh good, then I'm not alone ;)

Nicola wrote: "Jen ƸӜƷ wrote: "Oh good, then I'm not alone ;)"

Yeh Kris nailed it, it does have an element of high jinx about it, it get's a bit daft, with an underlining serious theme of murrrder, and wotnots."

I picture a comedic duo forging a path through the heather :D

I could see that Jen!

Thanks Nic!

April wrote: "Jen ƸӜƷ wrote: "I picture a comedic duo forging a path through the heather :D ."

Nice analogy! I must finish up later today. I keep juggling with other reads."

I've been doing the same, April, I decided last night to finish the story.