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A Strange Disappearance (1901)

by Anna Katharine Green(Favorite Author)

3.57 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

1604246790 (ISBN13: 9781604246797)

languge

English

genre

Fiction

publisher

Book Jungle

series

Mr. Gryce

review 1: I was a little bit disappointed by this after enjoying The Leavenworth Case so much. A K Green is hailed as the Mother of Modern Crime Fiction but it didn't take me long to work out what was going on here. Added to this, I was disappointed to find that Police Inspector Ebenezer Gryce (the Sherlock Holmes of his time) hardly appeared, leaving the detective work to his assistant, Q. And the main female character was so wishy-washy, unassuming and saintly that I wanted to shake her - but I do appreciate that I was looking at her not with an 1880s glance but with 21st Century eyes. On the plus side, I liked the way the book is divided into numerous short revelatory chapters where all is explained by a character to those of us who might have missed something. But on the negativ... moree side, I listened to this on a (paid for) LibriVox audiobook and, while feeling very grateful indeed to the volunteers who give their time to record, this particular recording involved numerous voices, male and female, which made listening to the book a very disconnected experience. The sound level changed with each reader, there was birdsong in the background of some and one reader's rendering was so flat, monotonous and error-filled that I dreaded hearing that voice again. However, "reading" a crime novel published in 1880 and depicting the methods used at that time to solve a crime - no DNA evidence, no fingerprints, no Police Station interviews, etc - was an interesting experience and I will definitely go on to read some more of Ms Green's work.
review 2: Anna Katherine Green is considered the ’mother’ of mystery novel writing in US. I downloaded a bunch of books by her and “A Strange Disappearance” is the first one that I read.I really did enjoy the book.It was very ‘Wilkie Collins’ in its style but less obtuse. The mystery was fairly simple. A young maid has disappeared in odd circumstances from the house of a famous diplomat, Mr. Blake. The only who seems to care is the old housekeeper Mrs. Daniels. She approaches the police and is helped my Mr. Gryce , the police detective and his junior assitant. The novel is narrated by this assistant. Thuogh Mr Blake does not issue an investigation, the assitant on his own accord, decides to observe the goings on at Mr. Blake’s residence to get to the bottom of the mystery. We follow him follow Mr. Blake around the town and in the countryside and discover pieces of information that all seem to tie back to the disappearance of the young girl.Several questions arise in the first few pages – What was the realy identity of the girl who has disappeared? Why does Mr. Blake haunt the alleys of New York? Who is the woman in the potrait in his study? What’s the secret in the abandoned innhouse?The story is interesting and quite a page turner for that style of writing. The descriptions are very effective – I felt the hair stand on my neck quite a few times. less

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