The world is ending, civilizations are falling apart, societies and orders are breaking down, cities become ruins; in such a grim backdrop, a detectivThe world is ending, civilizations are falling apart, societies and orders are breaking down, cities become ruins; in such a grim backdrop, a detective and his female assistant encounter a 17 years old girl, who begs them to go to the Mansion of Clocks to solve the mysteries of the murderous Hopping Man that has haunted her family for decades.
The detective accepts her request and the three travel to the remote Mansion of Clocks, only to find the army is hot of the young girl's trail and the girl's father and the other residents of the Mansion have more or less turned their backs on her.
The world is ending, with the shortage of food and resources, murder is nothing shocking and the police system has long broken down, still a mysterious killer has chosen to strike down one victim after another and beheading all of them. Is the killer and the mysterious mystical Hopping Man one and the same? What does the killer want to achieve by killing those victims when there seems to be no future for the entire human kind?
Murder At the Mansion of Clocks is a bit of a mixed bag. The author came up with highly unusual ideas: a serial murder case with The End of the World as its backdrop (so what is the point of finding the killer when there is hardly any Law & Orders left?), an equally unusual Mansion of Clocks and its eerie residents--these are highly imaginative, plus the explanation for the impossible Perfect Crime and the set up of false alibi are clever too.
However, I'm frustrated to find the explanation for the killer's motivation and some of the strange phenomena within the Mansion to look very forced and inorganic. I know, the world is ending and many strange things can happen...still I'm dissatisfied with the ending.
PS: yet, the detective and his female assistant and the relationship between them are pretty cool.
Merged review:
The world is ending, civilizations are falling apart, societies and orders are breaking down, cities become ruins; in such a grim backdrop, a detective and his female assistant encounter a 17 years old girl, who begs them to go to the Mansion of Clocks to solve the mysteries of the murderous Hopping Man that has haunted her family for decades.
The detective accepts her request and the three travel to the remote Mansion of Clocks, only to find the army is hot of the young girl's trail and the girl's father and the other residents of the Mansion have more or less turned their backs on her.
The world is ending, with the shortage of food and resources, murder is nothing shocking and the police system has long broken down, still a mysterious killer has chosen to strike down one victim after another and beheading all of them. Is the killer and the mysterious mystical Hopping Man one and the same? What does the killer want to achieve by killing those victims when there seems to be no future for the entire human kind?
Murder At the Mansion of Clocks is a bit of a mixed bag. The author came up with highly unusual ideas: a serial murder case with The End of the World as its backdrop (so what is the point of finding the killer when there is hardly any Law & Orders left?), an equally unusual Mansion of Clocks and its eerie residents--these are highly imaginative, plus the explanation for the impossible Perfect Crime and the set up of false alibi are clever too.
However, I'm frustrated to find the explanation for the killer's motivation and some of the strange phenomena within the Mansion to look very forced and inorganic. I know, the world is ending and many strange things can happen...still I'm dissatisfied with the ending.
PS: yet, the detective and his female assistant and the relationship between them are pretty cool....more
A standard crime and mystery short stories collection published in 1981 by a Beijing publisher (this book is out of print by now, I Rating: 3.5 stars.
A standard crime and mystery short stories collection published in 1981 by a Beijing publisher (this book is out of print by now, I guess)! All the stories are penned by well-known Japanese crime and mysterious novelists and the stories themselves are obviously aged but are they still up for the test of time?
Basically, these are a bunch of crime and mystery stories from the 1970s, they are decent and a few of the tricks are pretty clever.
The first short story is about a murder that is related to the power struggle within a company, a man is framed with a cigarette butt belonging to him, and he has no eyewitness to prove his innocence, what can he do to save himself?
The second story is quite good, nothing too surprising, but the writing and the plot are decent.
Another tale has WWII, treasure-hunting and a complicated revenge plot involved, and I quite enjoy how the revenge is played out!
There is another story about commercial crime and computer science, the science is really outdated, but I still like this story!
The final story is called 'The Hotel of Misfortune', it's quite clever too! Of course, the main plot is, you guessed it, how to murder your wife in order to be with your younger lover, hahaha! (in the end, (view spoiler)[ the wife did die (hide spoiler)] but how did it happen isn't the way you might imagine!)...more
So it's supposedly the last Matthew Scudder's mystery!? That's it and then supposedly our dear old Matthew would fade into old age and then, final curSo it's supposedly the last Matthew Scudder's mystery!? That's it and then supposedly our dear old Matthew would fade into old age and then, final curtain!
(But who knows? Maybe Mr. Block will pick Matthew up again, just maybe.)
I just learned the first Matthew Scudder's mystery novel was first published in 1976 so our detective has been around for 40+ years! (and I first read this series from more than 10 years ago as well) And I do like how Matthew would mature and age through each book, the people around him also would age or then died, even New York City, the main background of this remarkable series, has also gone through her many stages of development, leaving a lot of memories behind for our main character, Mr. Scudder and those around him.
It's a short story, once I turned the first pages, I was hit by the familiarity of everything that made a Matthew Scudder mystery, the same tone, the same hard-boiled attitude, the same down-to-earth method of crime investigation, the same sense of humor, etc.
Still, I must confess the ending is a bit weak, it's a reasonable ending but it's still a bit weak, so one star got knocked down.
If you are already a fan, read it! But if you are new to the series, don't start your romance with Matthew Scudder and Co. with this book, do try the earlier books like The Sin of the Fathers....more
Premise: The second novel featuring George Smiley takes Smiley and us readers to a small British town, the wife of a local high ended private school's teacher had just been murdered, surprisingly the victim had previously sent out a letter foretelling her own death, plus a local crazy homeless woman claimed she had seen the 'devil' near the crime scene. Murder mystery and small town scandal ensured.
Note 1: it's more of a classical murder mystery novel than the usual spy stuff which Mr. le Carre is well known for.
Note 2: A Murder of Quality is clearly not a masterpiece but it still puts a lot of nowadays murder mystery novels into total shame.
We learn a little more about Smiley the retired ex-spy and his past. The murder mystery itself is decently played out, a few suspects had been thrown in to cover the real killer's track but the story as a whole is very 'to-the-point' without being long-winded or overly complicated. The explanation of how and why the teacher's wife was killed is logical.
What I also like is how the prejudice and arrogance of the upper class people is described through the story. I can get a clear sense of how those characters are like and I don't think they are exactly hateful but goddamn it, they judge everyone with their family background and upbringing it is really annoying. If you come from a public school? Then you're second-classed citizen even when you try to dress, talk and think like the upper class.
Again I like the cool, no nonsense, observational way of Mr. le Carre's writing....more
Premise: It's a short stories collection with all stories connected with an urban legend about a mystical Goat Eyed Woman who resideRating: 4.8 stars.
Premise: It's a short stories collection with all stories connected with an urban legend about a mystical Goat Eyed Woman who resided in an abandoned mansion, who supposedly cut off different men's legs to keep them in her house. Rumors also had it that if you went to the mansion and pray to the Goat Eyed Woman, she would kill your hated enemy for you within seven days.
However, according to some other rumors, the Goat Eyed Woman would only help to cover up your crime for you after *you* killed your enemy by your own hands, and she would kill you if you fail to kill your hated enemy within seven days.
PS: This story is also a sequel to Sheep of Greed, Kazune Miwa's previous book.
I read this book within 2 days and I found all the intertwined stories to be so, so delightfully well planned and clever!
(1) The first story is about a young housewife obsessed with posting videos of accidents and death on her blog so she could get a lot of attention from netizens who like this kind of things, could her worried husband help her getting out of this hobby!?
I like watching crime and mystery videos on Youtube and for a few times I encountered videos that actually have (blurred out) images of dead bodies in them, so I can understand the morbid interest well, it's a very cleverly planned story but there is one thing: wouldn't the wife's blog be taken down entirely after she kept posting video and footage about violence and death repeatedly!?
(2) The second story is a more typical one with the typical infight among girls in a high school ballet club thingy, the story is.......okayish and the outcome is understandable.
(3) A woman knocked on her neighbor's door, begging for help while claiming a strange man had broken into her house, shortly afterward a man came up, claiming to be the woman's husband but the woman completely denied it and acting like she had never seen this man before. What is going on?
That's a good mystery! The explanation of the strange happening would really keep you guessing!
(4) A man is trapped in a snowy mountain and he stumbled upon a little cottage to ask for help, an old man answered the door but there were three young women and a little girl inside the household, was the old man a kidnapper and the women his captives?
Well, well, that one would really keep you guessing.
(5) The last story......everything is fine until.....OMG the cliffhanger, the fucking evil cliffhanger!!!...more
Pre-review: I'm very late to the party but I'm watching the tv adaptation on Netflix! I'd like to see how the novel would turn out to be!
Okay, I finisPre-review: I'm very late to the party but I'm watching the tv adaptation on Netflix! I'd like to see how the novel would turn out to be!
Okay, I finished watching season 1 of the TV adaptation, the opening is strong, the production is of high quality, the murder mystery intriguing, the actors/actresses are pretty solid and charming, but when it reaches the 2/3 mark, but I found it difficult to keep focused. Honestly, I really don't like the MC, perhaps the author originally wanted to present a ' talented alienist who is a bit weird and insensitive to the feeling of others', hell, the history of crime and mystery literature is pretty much full of MCs like this, yet so far I can't relate with this guy and I'll try to pinpoint what'd gone wrong later.
Plus the explanation for the murder mystery is a bit underwhelming.
When the library is reopened, I will find this book and read.
Rating: 5 'I really, really couldn't see it coming', mind=fucked stars.
Review:
*major plot spoilers hidden under tTitle: Medium Detective Jozuka Hisui
Rating: 5 'I really, really couldn't see it coming', mind=fucked stars.
Review:
*major plot spoilers hidden under the 'spoiler' buttons!*
The first three short murder mystery stories are a bit on the 'so-and-so' side and they are only 3 to 3.5 stars worthy at most, the characters seem to be pretty flat and to be honest from time to time they look like a bunch from some second ranked girl-manga; but then things literally turn upside-down when the final plot twist arrives and it is really amazing! Five stars!!!! No...if 10 stars rating is allowed, I'd have gladly give this book that.
Medium Detective Jozuka Hisui, a murder mystery novel which won 5 awards in Japan, is the perfect example of author playing mind game with the readers and playing games with the audience's expectation. But how masterfully the author plays this game. So I gladly accept defeat.
Though in the reading progress the thought about (view spoiler)[the hero actually being the serial killer who killed a lot of women (hide spoiler)] did cross my mind, but I had never suspected that (view spoiler)[the so-called medium heroine, Jozuka Hisui, never has the ability to see ghosts, instead she is a magician, a trickster and of course, a detective who used her skill of observation and logic to solve the murder mysteries (hide spoiler)].
Will look forward to read more books by this author....more
Premise: In the Taisho Era, a famed painter went out to look for beautiful women to be his models...but what he looked for wasn't just mere beauties, Premise: In the Taisho Era, a famed painter went out to look for beautiful women to be his models...but what he looked for wasn't just mere beauties, but beautiful women with deadly secrets to hide...
The author chose a very creative topic for their novel. I'm glad to find all of the short stories in this story-within-stories novel are nice! I also like how the fate of those women-with-secrets are connected with flowers and fruits, I also like the crime mystery parts of the story! Highly recommend!
Plus there are many unexpected plot twists and I like it very much! For example, in the third story we are led to believe that (view spoiler)[the young heroine was raped by her abusive father and that's why she planned to kill her old man, but in the end we learned that the young woman had a romantic relationship with her own brother and she chose to kill her father after he discovered this affair (hide spoiler)]....more
The Trap of Nine Holes (it's my own translation and it's no good, sorry!) is the 7th novel of Shinzo Mitsuda's Detective of the Omens of Death series.The Trap of Nine Holes (it's my own translation and it's no good, sorry!) is the 7th novel of Shinzo Mitsuda's Detective of the Omens of Death series.
Premise: The Detective of the Omens of Death (it's my own translation, maybe there will be an official English translation later on), is a 20 years old young man who has a rare ability to see the Omens of Death from other people and foretell their death. During his childhood his ability made him a freak in the eyes of almost everyone around him, but the Detective did his best to deal with this gloomy psychic ability, and living as normal a life as he could.
This time his client is a young woman who has an ability to predict future events, when she comes to the Detective of the Omens of Death, the latter sees a gruesome death awaiting the young woman, with blood everywhere.
This time, I only had a vague feeling about how the story will end, so in the end((view spoiler)[the first two murdered victims were faking their own death with the help of their own psychic powers in order to trick the killer into believing his curse is working well. I would have been tricked if the Detective's client isn't the first one to 'die' (hide spoiler)]) but I have no idea how he/she/they had managed all these. So again I accept defeat, although in the 3/4 of the story, some of the MCs start acting really inorganically to a point I can totally sense something is up, so, 4.2 stars only....more
Premise: a married woman and a married man decided to run off to Europe, abandoning their own spouses, then the pair decided to commit suicide in the Premise: a married woman and a married man decided to run off to Europe, abandoning their own spouses, then the pair decided to commit suicide in the Middle East. But the woman's husband was hot on their heels, with love and betrayal entangled together, is death and misfortune soon to follow?
My thoughts on Salt of the Desert:
I'm a bit stunned that the main couple decided so early and easily (almost readily) that they would escape from Japan to Europe/Middle East and kill themselves together, instead of escaping to Europe or somewhere else and starting over together.
I know, committing double suicides is pretty much a cultural thing in Japan (so many plays, dramas, movies, stories etc glorifying couples killing themselves together) and I can understand going through a divorce was a really big deal in the 1970s Japanese society and a lot of couples might want to avoid losing face in front of their relatives and coworkers by separating with their spouses and remarrying with someone else, but I'm still surprised that the couple in the story would put on so much effort, planning beforehand for such a long time to get to Europe/Middle East just in order to kill themselves over there instead of finding a way to live.
Since it is a story about a couple running away and planning to commit suicide for love, so the relationships between two men and one woman takes the central stage of the story, but I found out the romantic plot line is where the story becomes lacking: we are told the woman passively married her husband because the man asked for her hand first and her mother talked her into it despite her feeling toward her other suitor, but this relationship is presented in a 'Tell, Not Show' way in where we are told this couple loved each other enough to die together but we are hardly showed this; even when the woman was seeing her suitor behind her husband's back still I barely saw the woman being passionate with her lover (I mean, as passionate as you can expect from a restrained Japanese woman of her time), plus the woman's husband, did he really love his wife so much to a point that once he realized his wife had escaped from him, he would go into such great length, going all the way to the Middle East to chase her down? I really couldn't see it, perhaps those characters are too restrained about their emotion in today's standard.
The author, Seichō Matsumoto, had done so much better when romance is concerned in his other novel, Zero Focus.
Beside the 'double suicides for love' theme, it is interesting to see the 1970s Europe and Middle East (and in small part, Hong Kong) landscapes and the people's way of life was like at that time....more
Premise: three girls disappeared in an elite summer camp and were never seen again, now 15 years later, the heroine--the last and only person to see the girls alive at the night of their disappearance, was invited by the camp's wealthy owner to stay in the camp site for the summer.
Rating: originally I thought I'd give this book 4 stars but in the end it is 5 stars. I really couldn't see the last plot twist coming.
This book does have its flaws but I do like the description of the landscapes and the great atmosphere! I also like the ending so much!! The final plot twist is very nice! (view spoiler)[So Vivian, in order to take revenge on Allison and Natalie who left her older sister for death, plotted and tricked the two girls to a distant spot and killed them and then faked her own death. (hide spoiler)] I should have known that no one would risk their lives to just expose the decades old past crime of a family at random.
I think the characters are doing okay, not great, but not dysfunctional nor Too Stupid To Live, I like how the heroine Emma holds her own through years of guilt, doubts and regret, although her IQ does drop considerably by the end of the story. The other characters are okay too, especially Vivian, she is one of the most impressively written characters in the story.
In the present timeline the MC's friendship with these three young girls under her care is not developed enough. So I don’t feel the girls’ action by the end of the story makes a lot of sense to me. Plus I do think it has made things way too easy for the author to have (view spoiler)[two people committing the crimes in two different time periods, with 15 years in between two sets of crime (hide spoiler)]....more
I read the Chinese translation of this book and the titled novella, Dream-Ghost takes place in the 1930s Japan, it is a story of crime and passion aboI read the Chinese translation of this book and the titled novella, Dream-Ghost takes place in the 1930s Japan, it is a story of crime and passion about an ugly looking young orphan who was raised in a circus and his obsession with a beautiful girl performer who had a sadistic taste for someone else's blood and pain. The two were paired up to perform high-risking trapeze shows, and naturally things do not end well.
Dream-Ghostis a story about the darkness in human's heart and impossible dreams, it reminds me of Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham and some of Edogawa Rampo's short stories about twisted love and obsession; but is this story better than Rampo's and Gresham's? I don't think so. I almost wanted to give this story 2 stars because I found it a bit unpleasant to see the protagonist obsessing with the girl in a sick way, but as the story processed the characters and their actions start to make more sense to me and the story as a whole becomes more real as I read on, therefore I boosted the rating to 3 stars.
PS: the author was killed at 33 years old in a plane crush in Taiwan during WWII, another life being cut short by the senseless and wasteful war.
Sleeping Forest of the Underworld is a detective novel with 4 short stories connected together by a manga-editor who must solve one mystery after anotSleeping Forest of the Underworld is a detective novel with 4 short stories connected together by a manga-editor who must solve one mystery after another when one of the manga-ka went missing without explanation, the missing manga-ka only left behind 8 unfinished pages of sketches for his new horror story, and the deadline is looming over the editors.
The first story deals with the mystery of the missing manga-ka, why did he vanish? Was he kidnapped or was he going away on his own account? What's the secret beyond the 8 pages of unfinished sketches he left behind? Was his new horror story hinting at a murder mystery which the manga-ka and his childhood friends once witnessed as children, or was the story something out of his pure fantasy?
All these questions, the readers must try to find out the answers alongside with the MCs.
The second story is about our MC (the editor) being assigned to help a female manga-ka to do research on her new historical/fantasy manga series, this new series is based on the legendary Queen Himiko and her partly mythical Yamatai Kingdom(Yamatai-koku), but with the larger-than-life manga-ka and her attitude problem, the new manga series might simply crush and burn even before leaving the ground.
In this second story no one has ever died and the main mystery is mostly a 'historical mystery', as the editor and the manga-ka overcome their difference and working together to give motivation and reason for the historical figures' actions in history, e.g. they made a bold guess that Himikuko, the king of Yamatai's opponent the Kuna Kingdom, was actually blood-related to Himiko or at least he might be a priest from the same religion shared by Himiko and her people; while Iyo, the future queen was actually Himiko's foster daughter and a student from a school of shamans. I also like what little we know about the historical Yamatai is being introduced to us through the story. I can totally see how these two can cook up a good manga series between this pair of editor and manga-ka.
The main character shows a strong understanding to the history of the Yamayai Kingdom and the way the two main characters take turn shaping their fictional characters based on historical figures is very convincing and reasonable. I actually like the characterization they'd made (e.g. the almost goddess-like Himiko and the more down-to-earth Iyo, and the reason why Himikuko hates Himiko so much, etc).
In the third story. a child from a single family came to the editor for help in the third story, the kid's father, an down-on-his-luck middle age man with a strong passion for movies, was found dead and the cops listed his death as a suicide. The child, unable to believe his father would kill himself like this, enlists the help of the editor (also a movie lover himself) to try to make sense of the man's death. The mystery itself might not be so strong, but the final message is a great one, though.
In the last story, we go back again to the mystery of the missing manga-ka and his childhood experience with meeting with a 'monster who lives in the dark', is this incident a real event or is it just something from the manga-ka's fantasy?
I quite like the explanation for this short story too (view spoiler)[turns out the so-called monster is a boy who was kidnapped and unluckily the boy died in the end (hide spoiler)]....more
I don't always like Keigo Higashino's books but Threads of Hope really is an enjoyable read. Better still, I happens to have visited tRating: 4 stars.
I don't always like Keigo Higashino's books but Threads of Hope really is an enjoyable read. Better still, I happens to have visited those few locations which are mentioned in the story as well.
Outline of the story: a 50-something cafe owner was found stabbed to death in her kitchen, the police investigators learned the victim was well liked by her customers and there was seemingly no suspect who might hate her enough to do murder. Soon, the police noticed the victim's ex-husband and one of her frequent male customers were behaving strangely, were the two men hiding something?
The male customer in question, was also having problem with his teenage daughter since his wife died due to illness, so what was his motive to get close to the café owner?
Meanwhile, one of the police investigators also received a phone call from a hotel owner who he had never heard of before, the older woman had shocking news for him.
Most of the story is doing great, I really like the police investigation part of the story, the final explanation for the murder mystery is logical and well planned as well, I do like how the (view spoiler)[murder is committed mostly out of a very ill fated misunderstanding instead of malice, also as shocking is how the murdered victim is in fact the bio mother of the male customer's teenage daughter, out of a twist of fate (hide spoiler)], but the last 10 or so pages of the story, I don't like it so much, too much lecturing instead of story telling. *sighs*...more
It's a short stories collection of crime-related stories taking place mostly in the post-WWII Japan. I like the author, Seicho Matsumoto, a master novIt's a short stories collection of crime-related stories taking place mostly in the post-WWII Japan. I like the author, Seicho Matsumoto, a master novelist of crime novels, handled the topics of guilt, betrayal, greed, loss, moral struggle etc.
The first story is pretty much the best story, the rest is rather uneventful because many of them are focused on the internal thoughts of the characters and their motives, but those stories are still very good at serving as character's study.
I like the author's keen observation on human nature and their greed, but Mr. Matsumoto clearly had better stories to offer, so 3 stars only....more
This one is somewhere between 2.6 to 3 stars. The story is solid and entertaining enough but I am not very interested with the characters and the threThis one is somewhere between 2.6 to 3 stars. The story is solid and entertaining enough but I am not very interested with the characters and the three stories are decent enough but there is simply nothing exciting about them.
If you don't mind the detective and crime mystery elements are rather thin in the stories, you might give it a try. The last story about the urban legend of a 'deadly script and play that killed its audience' is the best story. ...more
So we get to see how the Corleone family has been doing after their bloody victory from The Godfather? It doesn't sound bad at all, let's see how thisSo we get to see how the Corleone family has been doing after their bloody victory from The Godfather? It doesn't sound bad at all, let's see how this will go.
Rating: 2.5 stars. It is a hard book to rate, I almost want to give it 3 stars because the story is actually enjoyable to a degree, but in the later half of the story, the plot holes and the OOC characters are just too much to handle.
Sighs, I know I can hardly expect Mark Winegardner to measure up to Mario Puzo, still The Godfather Returns is quite a disappointment.
The plot is okay-ish, but from time to time I don't feel like I can recognize these characters anymore. I mean, Michael confesses (view spoiler)[to Kay the crime he and his family had committed? What the actual fuck? From what I know about Michael, he would never do that, for hell's sake. (hide spoiler)]
Then Fredo went on to become a radio talk show host? In which alternative universe would THIS happen? I guess the author wants to use this to partly justify Michael (view spoiler)[doing away with his own brother (hide spoiler)], but story-wise it's just so ill-planned.
On one hand, there are some good writing in the text and I'm glad to read anything with the Corleone family in it, but on the other hand as the characters act increasingly OOC in the later part of the novel, I just have to call BS....more
Outline of the story: An unemployed young woman was hired to be the sitter of a luxurious apartment building in New York, on the surface it seems to bOutline of the story: An unemployed young woman was hired to be the sitter of a luxurious apartment building in New York, on the surface it seems to be a dream-job, she got to live in a nice apartment suite (overlooking the Central Park!) for three months free of charge and she would also get paid handsomely for doing easy maintenance tasks, what else can an orphaned 25 years old girl trying to find her footing in New York ever hope for?
But there is a catch: strange rumors had always surrounded this apartment building and soon, a fellow female sitter disappeared in the middle of the night. Plus the young woman's bad memories of her parents' death and the disappearance of her older sister were coming back to haunt her.
So far I do like how the MC's tragic personal history is woven into the story itself, the rest of the story is yet to be investigated.
It's my second book by this author and it doesn't disappoint! I like how the MC formed friendship/companionship among the people around her, especially the two other sitters. The final plot twist is nice, although it isn't something groundbreaking but the explanation of the mystery is still a logical: one (view spoiler)[the young, orphaned sitters are lured into the building in order to become unwilling organs donors for the wealthy, aged residents (hide spoiler)], I like it!
I also like that the heroine (view spoiler)[ still doesn't get any closure for the disappearance of her sister. Hell, as sad as it sounds, missing person case doesn't always get solved, (hide spoiler)] right?
Riley Sager's stories are the ones that I'd want to write, the pacing is nice, the story is well constructed and it also touched upon a few social issues (missing person cases, the unstable life of the young people, inequality, etc) the author respects you by not bothering you with long-winded nonsense and moral lectures. I look forward to more of his books.
I first read I Married a Dead Man by Cornell Woolrich some ten years ago in Chinese, then later read it again in English, then this year I re-read it I first read I Married a Dead Man by Cornell Woolrich some ten years ago in Chinese, then later read it again in English, then this year I re-read it in Chinese and it's still a fine tale of suspense and romance, with a nice plot twist at the very end. No wonder people call Mr. Woolrich the master of romance-noir, alongside James M. Cain!
Plus, you know it must be true love when a guy is (view spoiler)[covering up murder for you. Lol (hide spoiler)]
The Red Cape: It's a 'game of wit' story mixed with urban legend, the explanation for the mystery is nice. 3.8 stars.
Baptism: the auRating: 3.4 stars.
The Red Cape: It's a 'game of wit' story mixed with urban legend, the explanation for the mystery is nice. 3.8 stars.
Baptism: the author dished out endless references on Dario Argento (an Italian director of horror movies) and other 1970s to 1980s horror movie stuff please me a great deal, the setting of the murder mystery (an indie band performing in a school festival, then their female manager got killed) is very interesting but the ending is........sadly anti-climactic. 3 stars.
Inhuman: This story is short but chilling and effective, 4.7 stars.
To sum up, it's an entertaining enough short stories collection, but the author really has far, far better works than these.
There also are a few unremarkable stories, I won't mention them here....more
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