The latest P D James
28 June 2006 @ 10:46
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I have just finished the new P D James, The Lighthouse. Usually James is my favourite of the crime writiers I read and I especially like the Dalgliesh books, so I was really looking forward to reading it. Sadly, I found it a little bit disappointing. The writing was still excellent - in particular in the world of crime writers, naming no names (ahem, Elizabeth George, ahem) - as always managing to be hugely discriptive without using many words, but the plot, thqat lacked James’ usual brilliance. Dalgliesh seemed half out of it and, as I have always found his officers - Kate Miskin and Benton-Smith - rather unbelievable as characters go, I found their vaugue developments rather annoying. The set-up of the novel was exciting and swept one along, but then, once the murder was commited the scene - an isolated island - left one feeling the lack of suspects. It all ended up rather Agatha Christie, including the conclusion of the story. Shame, really… Not a patch on The Murder Room. |
Who else do you read? My all time favourite is Michael Dibdin, with his Italian set Aurelio Zen mysteries that seem to have reached a sunnier plateau after some deeply unpleasant stuff. Next is Walter Mosely set in 50s and 60s US with Easy Rawlins trying to make a living in a divided country… Christopher Brookmyre for laugh out loud romps with a rich cast and truly awful shaggy dog stories. Janet Evanovitch and the Stephane Plum books are good fun, even though they all have more or less the same story and plot, and love the serial exploding car/apartment.
On a more serious note there is the brilliant Henning Mankell, Ian Rankin and finally the wonderful Kinky Friedman, well he had to be on the list.
But when do I have time to read the other stuff, I begin to wonder?