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A Death In Summer (2011)

by Benjamin Black(Favorite Author)

3.56 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

0805090924 (ISBN13: 9780805090925)

languge

English

genre

Mystery & Thriller

publisher

Henry Holt and Co.

series

Quirke

review 1: A really enjoyable series especially after a few books, we get to know the characters and their environment better. Quirke is the ideal anti-hero in a film noir world. He's like the Irish Wallander. The only thing I wish were different is that there are more clues that hint to the mystery's resolution instead of a quick wrap up in the last chapter. These are mystery books, but there is actually less focus on the 'mystery aspect' and solving it than characters and story development.
review 2: The series continues to disappoint. The first, Christine Falls, was a decent attempt at writing a crime novel, but the second and the fourth indicate that Banville is none the wiser and is learning little about the genre. Verging on the dull, the plot meanders without ever ... morecreating any sense of the other world that is indicated by a character in the book. Indeed, it is almost another world so far removed that the crime is like another work of fiction that the characters are reading about and not a part of. There is little in the way of investigation and the murderer is largely revealed by accident with an air of so what, as if we didn't know. All of this would be OK if Banville was actually saying something about his characters or the state of society, but apart from the bleeding obvious that has made up many pages of newspapers in recent years, there is nothing. It is not even well written, descending at times into the most dreary cliche, or over-extended description of place. And of course it's hot, because it's summer. less

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