( 10 reviews )
-
Posted: Jan 6 2009
Anne Perry has written several mystery books set back in the Victorian era. I don't know which is more thrilling the actual mystery or being placed in the middle of Victorian England. You actually feel like you are there. The main character, Monk, is worth getting to know. All in all a great read.
-
Posted: Jun 6 2008
In some ways, this latest installment of the William Monk high-Victorian murder mystery series is above average. While Perry has a habit of telegraphing the solution early in the narrative, this time the reader won't find out what really happened until almost the last chapter. On the other hand, there are virtually no clues provided to the reader, so the solution is something of an eyebrow-raiser. The plot involves the theft of prescription medicines from the hospital where Hester Latterly (now Mrs. Monk, since William proposed at the end of the last book and they've just returned from their honeymoon) is working, the murder of a blackmailing coachman in Hampstead, the pending marriage of the young scion of a wealthy family (who employed the coachman) to an somewhat older widow ("older" is an important clue), and the relationship of the widow to the nurse who was stealing the medicines. It's complicated but generally well worked out. There's also a good deal of description of the surprisingly amicable married life of two highly individual people whose previous relationship was seldom less than prickly.
-
Posted: Mar 31 2008
Anne Perry's Victorian mysteries just plod along, but that really captures the times. I call it a drip, drip read...perfect reading for lazy afternoons. I love her characters and the descriptions of the social niceties of the day. Both the William Monk and Thomas Pitt series are some of my favorite books, slow-paced, steady, but continually interesting.
