Challenges – Page 38

Crime Fiction Alphabet – O is for One Good Turn

Published on April 18, 2011August 30, 2018 by Margaret8 Comments

We have reached the letter O in Kerrie’s Crime Fiction Alphabet and my book this week is:

One Good Turn (Jackson Brodie #2)

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

This is the second of her Jackson Brodie series. I read Case Histories, the first one, a few years ago and the third one, When Will There be Good News? just over 2 years ago, both of which I thought were excellent. So I had great expectations that this would be equally as good. Maybe it’s me, but I don’t think it is. It is good and I enjoyed it but I thought it was over complicated, especially at the beginning with so many different seemingly unrelated characters being introduced. It’s only near the end that you find out the connections and interactions between them all. And the ending did take me by surprise – a neat twist.

My problem with this book that I’d just get interested in one strand of the story and want to find out what happened next, when the action shifted to another set of characters. There is also too much detail, background information and flashbacks holding up the action for me to say it’s an excellent book.

But it is still a book that I had to finish; I had to find out what happened and work out the puzzle, because it is a puzzle. Like the Russian dolls within dolls (which also feature in this book), there is a thread connecting it all together. Set over four days an awful lot happens changing the characters lives for ever.

It’s summer in Edinburgh at Festival time when people queuing for a lunchtime show witness a road rage incident after Paul Bradley brakes suddenly to avoid hitting a pedestrian. The driver of the Honda behind him attacks his car with a baseball bat and then attacks Paul himself. The one good turn comes from Martin Canning, the author of the Nina Riley mysteries, who stops the attack by throwing his laptop bag at the Honda driver hitting him on the shoulder.

One of the people in the queue is Jackson Brodie, who doesn’t want to get involved but who nevertheless gives Martin his mobile number and noted the Honda’s registration number. Amongst other witnesses are Gloria, the wife of an unscrupulous property developer, and her friend Pam. I got to like Gloria, a very sympathetically drawn character. Numerous other characters are involved – Jackson’s actress girlfriend, a failing comedian, exploited Eastern European workers for a housecleaning/escort agency called Favours, and Sergeant Louise Monroe and her teenage son, Archie, amongst others.

It’s complicated and full of coincidences, a very cleverly plotted book and as Jackson says:

A coincidence is just an explanation waiting to happen.

One Good Turn is also my entry in Beth’s What’s In a Name Challenge – a book with a number in the title.

Paperback: 544 pages
Publisher: Black Swan; Reprint edition (22 July 2010)
Language English
ISBN-10: 0552772445
ISBN-13: 978-0552772440

Crime Fiction Alphabet – Letter M

Published on April 4, 2011June 11, 2022 by Margaret8 Comments

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie is my choice to illustrate the letter M in Kerrie’s Crime Fiction Alphabet.

This is Agatha Christie’s 6th book, published in 1926, one of her best known books and possibly one of the most controversial because of its solution to the mystery. I hadn’t read it before, but I knew a bit about it from reading Agatha Christie’s Autobiography, in which she wrote:

Of course, a lot of people say that The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is cheating; but if they read it carefully they will see that they are wrong. Such little lapses of time as there have to be are nicely concealed in an ambiguous sentence … (page 352)

I won’t write any more about the controversy – no spoilers!

Set in the village of King’s Abbot, the story begins with the death of Mrs Ferrars, a wealthy widow and the local doctor, Dr Sheppard suspects it is suicide. The following evening Roger Ackroyd, a wealthy widower who it was rumoured would marry Mrs Ferrars, is found murdered in his study.

Poirot has retired to King’s Abbot, to grow vegetable marrows, not very successfully. He’s missing Captain Hastings who is living in the Argentine, so when he is asked to investigate the murder he enlists Dr Sheppard, who lives next door with his sister Caroline, to help him and it is Dr Sheppard who narrates the story. Caroline is a most interesting character who takes a great interest in other people and likes to know everything that goes on in the village. She is, possibly, a forerunner of Miss Marple as Agatha Christie wrote in her Autobiography:

I think it is possible that Miss Marple arose from the pleasure I had taken in portraying Dr Sheppard’s sister in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. She had been my favourite character in the book – an acidulated spinster, full of curiosity, knowing everything, hearing everything: the complete detective service in the home. (page 448)

This has to be one of my favourite Agatha Christie books. It’s full of believable characters, suspects aplenty including Major Blunt, an old friend staying with Ackroyd, Flora, Ackroyd’s niece and her mother, his sister-in-law and poor relation, Geoffrey Raymond, his secretary, Ursula Bourne, a parlourmaid who may not be all she appears and Ralph Paton, Ackroyd’s adopted son who has large gambling debts.

The setting is that of the quintessential English village where Poirot appears as an mysterious foreigner. Dr Sheppard’s first impression of him is that he must be a retired hairdresser because of his immense moustaches. He also doubts his ability to solve the mystery and described his as

… ridiculously full of his own importance. It crossed my mind to wonder whether he was really any good as a detective. Had his reputation been built up on a series of lucky chances? (page 80)

Of course, it hadn’t and Poirot meticulously works through the timing of events, and disposes of all the suspects to find the culprit. It was only towards the end of the book that I began to realise who it had to be.

Hardcover: 237 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins; Facsimile edition (2011)
Language English
Source: My own copy, part of an issue of The Agatha Christie Book Collection partwork published by Agatha Christie Limited

Reading Challenges Update

Published on March 4, 2011 by Margaret3 Comments

I always find it difficult to keep track on where I am with the reading challenges I’ve joined, so as two months of the year have already gone I thought I’d check up on what I’ve read so far.

The Agatha Christie Reading Challenge – open ended

The Daphne Du Maurier Challenge ‘“ May 13, 2010- April 19, 2011

The Breaking Point: Short Stories

The 2011 Global Challenge

Europe – I’ve read 2 books:

Scotland – Payment Deferred by Joyce Holmes
France – Perfume by Patrick SÃ¼skind

The Seventh Continent – History

True Grit by Charles Portis

The Victorian Reading Challenge

Currently reading The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

Ireland Reading Challenge

Molly Fox’s Birthday by Deirdre Madden – review to follow

What’s in a Name 4

So far I’ve read 1 book from the category:

A book with travel or movement in the title

Exit Lines by Reginald Hill

All Things Alcott Challenge

Published on December 24, 2010 by Margaret6 Comments

I joined Margot’s challenge back in April, full of good intentions to re-read some of Louisa May Alcott’s books and to read Eden’s Outcasts: the Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father by John Matteson, which has been on my bookshelves since last year. It was only yesterday that I suddenly realised that it’s nearly December 31 and I haven’t read a single book for this challenge. Better late than never, I began reading Eden’s Outcasts. There’s no way I’ll finish it by the end of December (what with Christmas in between) but at least I’ve started it.

It begins with Bronson Alcott, who was born in 1799. Yesterday the Booking Through Thursday question was about books that change your life and I couldn’t specify just one book or even pick out a few. Bronson Alcott had no such difficulty. For him it was The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan. It captivated Bronson:

He called it his ‘dear delightful book” and later claimed that it was his most efficient teacher and the dictionary by which he learned the English tongue. … [he wrote] “It is associated with reality. It unites me with my childhood and seems to chronicle my Identity. How I was rapt in it. (page 18)

If I remember correctly The Pilgrim’s Progress features strongly in Little Women, so it seems he passed on to Louisa his love for the book. I can see that I will be getting Little Women out to read again very soon. This is one reason I like ‘challenges’ – they spur me on to read new books and to re-read old favourites.

I expect this will be my last post until after Christmas, so I wish everyone who reads my blog a very Merry Christmas.

Attacking the TBR Tome Challenge – result

Published on December 22, 2010 by Margaret6 Comments

Emily’s challenge Attacking the TBR Tome is coming to an end. The challenge was to read or attempt to read 20 books from your TBR pile and to post on each one. And it was also not to buy any new books, or borrow any books from the library until you had read the 20 TBR books. I knew at the outset that I couldn’t do that and I didn’t.

I did, however, read 25 books during the year, all of which I owned before December 1st 2009. I only read two of the books on my original list (the first two listed below), but I did give myself the option of reading other books from my TBR piles and I read the following books. I’ve written about all of them except the last one, which I only finished reading yesterday.

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Be Near Me by Andrew O’Hagan
Drood by Dan Simmons
Let it Bleed by Ian Rankin
Black and Blue by Ian Rankin
The Pale Horse by Agatha Christie
Can Any Mother Help Me? by Jenna Bailey €“ see also here
The Hanging Garden by Ian Rankin
The Warrior’s Princess by Barbara Erskine
The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey
Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? by Agatha Christie
Hearts and Minds by Amanda Craig
Faithful Unto Death by Caroline Graham
Bad Science by Ben Goldacre
The Falls by Ian Rankin
Resurrection Men by Ian Rankin
Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie
Portrait of an Unknown Woman by Vanora Bennett
Fleshmarket Close by Ian Rankin
The Naming of the Dead by Ian Rankin
The ABC Murders by Agatha Christie
Exit Music by Ian Rankin
Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
Reflex by Dick Francis

I’ve signed up for a few challenges for next year that should help me reduce my TBR piles even further – except, of course, that I have added more books to the piles this last year.

The Victorian Literature Reading Challenge

Published on December 15, 2010 by Margaret13 Comments

Completed – see end of post.

Following on from my decision to take part in more reading challenges in an attempt to reduce my tbr list I’ll also be taking part in the Victorian Literature Challenge in 2011. This is hosted by Bethany at words, words, words.

Bethany writes: Queen Victoria reigned from 1837-1901. If your book wasn’t published during those particular years, but is by an author considered ‘Victorian’ then go for it. We’re here for reading, not historical facts! Also, this can include works by authors from other countries, so long as they are from this period.

Choose from one of four levels:

Sense and Sensibility: 1-4 books.
Great Expectations: 5-9 books.
Hard Times: 10-14 books.
Desperate Remedies: 15+ books.

Again, I’m choosing my books from my tbr list. All these were written in the Victorian period. I’m aiming for the Sense and Sensibility level and if I complete that I’ll go for the next level and so on.