JohnR > Recent Status Updates

Let's just say I started it yesterday and now 1 day later on page 139.....
Which for me means lots of stars

One of those brilliantly written books, so evocative of the time that you learnt genuinely new things about the period, and with a start and an initial main character that draws you in from page 1....

Cork is the regular person of this serie btw. Bottle is a town also btw.

Why can't they write books like this anymore....

A new Agatha Christie I had never heard of. And a penguin first edition from 1953 in excellent working order :-)

Relative to the rest of the book, by page 122 you might say the book is getting "exciting". That is a positive comment btw, as there is often pleasure in calm, beautifully descriptive words.

Its magic is that while there may be more words about the game with the little squishy ball, at the same time there are also fewer pages about the game with the little squishy ball.

Still not really about a little squishy ball

Page 11 only, and it seems at this limited page number to be about much deeper things than a racket and funny squishy small ball - thank goodness.

The sentences have normal commas, along with full stops and heaven forfend it even has quite marks for speech - again thank goodness.

So far so good.

When Carter Dickson writes a good book, it can be very good indeed and of it's time. I have 80 pages to go and wish I had a lot less so I can complete and move on.

As you sometimes get with Carter Dickson, there are parts with pages and pages of chat and don't add materially to the tension, mystery or plot. With this book, every so often there are 10 pages of brilliance....

The, very, odd and excessive, use, of, commas and sometimes lack of commas made pages, 1-5 fairly, unreadable. I note that future, pages (randomly, selected), seem to, have moderated comma use but, sentences still, run, to half a page. On, that basis I, shall continue the book, but on, another day....

Love the writing and characters, not sure where plot is going except I suspect not a happy-ever-after ending.....

Unlike other C.Dickson's a little slow at the start. Disappointing so far for a Carter Dickson who is normally excellent.

Hmm. She writes very well. As ever the lack of quotation marks only bothers me when I don't like the book. I have only recently noticed we the lack of quotation marks..

A slow start, the end seems obvious, but Ruth Rendell rated it I am clearly mistaken!