brokentune
Written on Apr 17, 2020
I have tried to finish this book so many times this week, but The Monogram Murders is not only utterly crap it's also bloody endless. It drags, and drags, and drags.
The last 30% of the book just felt like...Read more
0.5*
I have tried to finish this book so many times this week, but The Monogram Murders is not only utterly crap it's also bloody endless. It drags, and drags, and drags.
The last 30% of the book just felt like the story of who did what changed on every page and I completely lost track of what happened.
You know, that fabulous spoof of the mystery genre that is Murder by Death (the film)?
Every character comes up with a different version of the solution, and they are all wrong.
In this book, the same thing happened, but the different versions were not put forward by different characters but by the book's version of Poirot (a poor shadow of Christie's original creation), which made the last 30% of the book absolutely unbearable. And unlike Murder by Death, this book was not a spoof of the genre.
No. The only word that comes to my mind to describe this book was: painful.
None of the plot made sense. Poirot is not Poirot. The writing lacks the complexity and charm and atmosphere that Christie's books have.
The portrayal of women in this book didn't work for me - it was in parts downright offensive - and it certainly did not do a book justice that is supposed to be a continuation of Christie's oeuvre.
The romance subplots were ridiculous.
And last, but definitely worst of all, was that the book was narrated from the POV of a character that has no justification of even being in the story. He's the most incompetent policeman or even amateur detective that I can imagine.
Needless to say, I have no interest in reading any other books in the series.
I have tried to finish this book so many times this week, but The Monogram Murders is not only utterly crap it's also bloody endless. It drags, and drags, and drags.
The last 30% of the book just felt like the story of who did what changed on every page and I completely lost track of what happened.
You know, that fabulous spoof of the mystery genre that is Murder by Death (the film)?
Every character comes up with a different version of the solution, and they are all wrong.
In this book, the same thing happened, but the different versions were not put forward by different characters but by the book's version of Poirot (a poor shadow of Christie's original creation), which made the last 30% of the book absolutely unbearable. And unlike Murder by Death, this book was not a spoof of the genre.
No. The only word that comes to my mind to describe this book was: painful.
None of the plot made sense. Poirot is not Poirot. The writing lacks the complexity and charm and atmosphere that Christie's books have.
The portrayal of women in this book didn't work for me - it was in parts downright offensive - and it certainly did not do a book justice that is supposed to be a continuation of Christie's oeuvre.
The romance subplots were ridiculous.
And last, but definitely worst of all, was that the book was narrated from the POV of a character that has no justification of even being in the story. He's the most incompetent policeman or even amateur detective that I can imagine.
Needless to say, I have no interest in reading any other books in the series.