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Alex Pavesi book was a slow burn for me that kept getting better and better as I read it, It was well written and very original! The stories it's a tale within a tale have an Agatha Christie like feel to them.
The Eighth Detective is a fascinating puzzle with eight murders involved, If you are a fan of oldtime murder mysteries, you are in for a treat! It was genuinely a joy to read and I would recommend it, no consider it a mandatory read, for any mystery reading enthusiast!
I would like to thank Netgalley and Henry Holt amp Company for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Remember that Ive rejected the view of detective stories as logical puzzles, where the clues define a unique solution and the process of deriving it is almost mathematical.
Its not, and they never do, Thats all just sleight of hand, The central purpose of a murder mystery is to give its readers a handful of suspects and the promise that in about a hundred pages one or more of them will be revealed as the murderers.
Thats the beauty of the genre, It presents the reader with a small, finite number of options, and then at the end it just circles back and commits to one of them.
Its really a miracle that the human brain could ever be surprised by such a solution, when you think about it,
Thanks to NetGalley and Henry Holt amp Company for sending me an ARC of The Eighth Detective in exchange for an honest review.
Thirty years ago, Grant McCallister wrote a mathematical paper titled “The Permutations of Detective Fiction,” which set out to prove the ingredients of every murder mystery.
As part of demonstrating the papers arguments, he wrote seven murder mysteries later published in a collection called The White Murders, Now, Julia Hart meets with Grant on a remote island to review and edit the stories so that the collection can be republished.
But Julia keeps finding subtle, deliberate errors in the stories, What do those errors mean Are they clues showing some connection between the collectionand Grantand a long ago unsolved murder
Its a good setup, but not a unique one.
Instead, the first thing that sets The Eighth Detective apart is the structure of the novel, The chapters alternate between the collections seven short stories and the conversations between Grant and Julia following each story, The seven stories are clever, old school murder mysteries, and the book only work because each story stands up on its own merits as an entertaining mystery.
More importantly, The Eighth Detective is quite unusual because its incredibly subversive about the murder mystery/detective genre, Little is as it seems in this novel, and the final third contains numerous earned twists, and no less than two endings that nicely illustrate the books theme.
The Eighth Detective is an original, clever, and subversive take on classic murder mysteries, Recommended.
Curious about those ingredients Theyre in the first comment, :stars!
I've been going back and forth on how I wanted to rate this for a few days now, I ended up going a bit higher that my gut says because I applaud authors for going for the gusto, This is one of those stories, It is so unique which is good, but can also frustrate others and turn them off, but I live for these books! I really appreciate authors who make risky decisions and think outside the box.
The Eighth Detective definitely does that,
So, what's it about Well, this is a short story collection within a book, We meet a young editor, Julia, who has been sent by her publisher to interview a recluse author who published a slim book of seven perfect detective stories thirty years ago.
We get to read these seven stories and in between each story, we also witness Julia interviewing the author on each story after it is read.
As we go, Julia begins to notice some discrepancies and she is perplexed when the author is unable to answer or address her questions.
We learn there may be more to the author than meets the eye, What is he hiding Why is he living the life of an exile You just have to read to find out!
Let me tell you I sometimes struggle with short story collections.
The common problem is that the stories you love don't last long enough and the stories you don't like kind of drag along.
I found that issue here, BUT I was not prepared for the last third of the book, I had initially wanted to rate this a little lower, but I'm telling you, you need to stick around for the end.
It was SO COOL and so well done, I was thrilled with the ending, I cannot wait to read his next book and I hope many of you consider reading this one!
Thank you so much to Netgalley, Henry Holt and Co.
and Alex Pavesi for the opportunity to read and provide an honest review!
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I adored this book and read it pretty much in one sitting.
Titled "The Eighth Detective" in the UK this is a Christieesque puzzle that offers not just one crime tale but several, as an editor works with an author on a book of short stories.
. . these stories all together offer up a particularly intelligent formula that doesn't show it's true face until the end, Eight Detectives is clever, involving and has a practically styled prose that keeps you immersed throughout,
What DOES make a good crime novel this is the theme Eight Detectives explores throughout it's twisty narrative, where the stories themselves speak to a wider mystery and the effect of reader and author is key
I haven't read a book like this before and as a huge Agatha Christie fan it was a genuine joy to read offering a homage to that greatest of crime novelists whilst also being entirely it's own thing.
Definitely one to watch in, Highly Recommended. You know when youre relieved to have finished a book that it wasnt a good experience, The premise of this book is that a young female editor visits an elderly author who lives on a Mediterranean island to edit a collection of murder mysteries he wrote decades beforehand.
She reads each out loud to him before they discuss it, The author of the stories had also written a research paper on the mathematical definition of the components of the classic murder mystery.
You might think this would result in something clever but no! Its as simple as there has to be a victim or victims, a murderer or
murderers, and so on.
Each story is dissected to explain how it fits in with his theory, The ending aims to surprise the reader with a twist but any intelligent reader is going to be way ahead of this.
For me, this was a clunky, poorly written book, It is possible that the short stories are written badly on purpose, I hope so because theyre distasteful on the whole and full of dreadful metaphors, Having said that, I dont think the rest of the book is well written either, Its clear that the intention was to write a clever variable on classic murder / detective mysteries from The Golden Age but, in my opinion, it fails on all counts.
It didnt give me any pleasure whatsoever,
With thanks to NetGalley and Michael Joseph for a review copy in exchange for an honest review, .