The Reading Vent & Rant Thread

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Renate

You've discouraged me.
I was already working on writing the third volume.
Now I'm giving it all up.

Nooooo!

I wanna read a murder mystery where someone is killed with a two-handed Highland sword!

(Well, actually I have read a murder mystery where the murder victim was beheaded with a sword - the first book in the Matthew Shardlake series. But I wouldn't mind another!)

[nana77]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Yes, quite common.

And in one case it was a scheme to kill all the guests!

Novels from the mid '800 have plenty of those, I guess. Allan Edgar Poe is a master in that grotesque, and even in those stories where the object is not hidden from the start, but the reader won't guess where it was till the end.

From the "Sacred and Terrible Air" what impressed me the most was that the investigations that take place on the plot, searcing for the three girls disappeared 30 years ago, from three old friends whose shared them infance together, leads to an explanation (no spoilers) where the reader still will ask him/herself what suggestions given follow: since the novel is written by the prospective of various characters, my personal guess was still if that has had been a murder, or to take the sci-fi parts of it.
And there is where I think that novel is kinda majestic: finding oneself asking if to believe and follow a maybe-lay-sci-fi plot, or a very grotesque manic murder, etc...

[Witty Username]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

If someone says they're soon to retire, you know they won't survive the story.

Happy to report that in this case life doesn't imitate art
I retired last week and I'll admit this scenario did cross my mind when I told work my finishing date.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I've read plenty of mysteries where one of the guests was killed, not the host.

One murder mystery I was watching on TV last week had a murder at a murder mystery party. It was the star of the event who was murdered.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Yes, quite common.

And in one case it was a scheme to kill all the guests!

That sounds like an Agatha Christie book. Guess which one.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Renate

You've discouraged me.
I was already working on writing the third volume.
Now I'm giving it all up.

Call it an editing decision to change the sword as the table leg to something else.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Nooooo!

I wanna read a murder mystery where someone is killed with a two-handed Highland sword!

(Well, actually I have read a murder mystery where the murder victim was beheaded with a sword - the first book in the Matthew Shardlake series. But I wouldn't mind another!)

I did once read a book where the murder weapon was an icicle. Very ingenious as it's no longer available as evidence after it's melted.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I did once read a book where the murder weapon was an icicle. Very ingenious as it's no longer available as evidence after it's melted.

Yeah, an icicle would make a perfect weapon. People have actually died in real life from being hit by an icicle.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Yeah, an icicle would make a perfect weapon. People have actually died in real life from being hit by an icicle.

That they have.

I have a book for you with a really ingenious weapon. Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I have a book for you with a really ingenious weapon. Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl.

Read it just now (as it's a short story).

[ownedbycats]

The ink-black sky was full of stars, and the moon was huge, like a big silvery medallion on the chest of a celestial Bee Gee.

That's not exactly the first comparison I would think of.

[DrNefario]

Originally Posted by Renate

Rant: The problem with all mystery type things is that sometimes the foreshadowing is done with a sledge hammer.

Made-up example:

"Jeffers noticed a two-handed Highland sword that was used to prop up one corner of the kitchen table.."

Well, you know that in a hundred pages they'll be pulling that sword out of somebody.

One that always jumps out to me is when the author tries to hide it in a list:

"On the mantlepiece was a gold carriage clock, a pair of antique duelling pistols, and some silver candlesticks."

Yeah, nice try.

There are just things that are obvious when you read too much mystery fiction:

No body? - not dead
Disfigured? - not who you think it is

[DNSB]

With the candlestick in the parlour.

[Solitaire1]

Originally Posted by DNSB

With the candlestick in the parlour.

But who dood it? Was it Dr. Orchid or Colonel Mustard?