Et in Arcadia Murder Monday

[evelyn_b]

What I've Finished Reading

Behold, Here's Poison by Georgette Heyer. The twist here (which is not really a spoiler) was that it looks like the case is going to be solved by a bland professional, but then an Obnoxious Amateur swoops in and steals the show. Here it's one of the Mitchell family's ultra-arch young cousins, Randall. Competition for

Comments

[lost_spook]

If you've read more Heyer, Randall suddenly being the hero is a lot less surprising, I can tell you. (And he may be awful, but he is still the only reason for reading that one. As to randomly reasserting hetersexuality, that one has nothing to the one with Neville in; they even stand around saying, "Hey, we thought he was gay!" if I remember rightly).

However, despite everything else here, I am mostly distracted by the fact that the US seems to have renamed Stella (the cousin who marries Randall) as Sophie. I wonder why on earth they did that? Randall marrying Stella is one thing, but clearly he should never marry a Sophie at all. *baffled*

(As I said, I much, much prefer Heyer's historicals! But The Unfinished Clue has gratuitous detective romance and name books, while there are two others I like. I just can never remember which ones they are. It's v inconvenient. But not Penhallow. One day I might work up the courage to re-read it, but I suspect life's too short. She wrote it at the same time as Cousin Kate, which is

[evelyn_b]

That's what I get for reading things out of order! I am also pretty sure it was Stella and my mind just lazily auto-replaced it with Sophie for uninteresting reasons, so I'll correct that. Behold, Here's Poison was interesting in that I know I enjoyed it perfectly well while I was reading it, but twenty minutes after I'd finished it, it had almost completely evaporated. Which is good for keeping the mind attic tidy, I guess.

Penhallow seems to have a widespread reputation as The One You Should Never Read.

Hand in Glove in the TV version - though I dislike it - does manage to have John Gielgud as Mr Pike Percival (or whatever his name is)

Percival Pyke Period! If that is his real name. I can imagine Gielgud had a lot of fun with it. I definintely spent most of Hand in Glove wondering if there was a romance-torpedoing TV version (with Nazis?) because I liked those well-meaning young people

[lost_spook]

Ha, well I can't say anything, because while I do remember Stella, I really have trouble remembering which Heyer murder is which (apart from the one with the detective romance, the one with Randall, and the one that's really a 30s spy romp, which is sweeter than most of the rest).

And, as to the TV version, oh my goodness, they didn't half torpedo that romance. I don't think they were quite so harsh to any of the others. That one got shot down in flames. I don't know what the writer/producer had against them, but clearly they'd been nursing a grudge for years.

If Marsh's American publishers didn't want people to be disappointed in the actual content of the book, they should never have named it KILLER DOLPHIN. An important lesson for all!

THis is true. *nods wisely*

[liadtbunny]

Maybe Heyer doesn't like gay men so she can't have the amateur detective hero being one??? The only Heyer crime novel I know has a gay or not very coded gay character and he doesn't come out well. It's the one with a murder at a bridge party, can't recall the title.

Still Killer Dolphin:)

[evelyn_b]

Maybe! I don't know if worries about gay coding were actually an issue in Heyer's mind; that's just how it read to me. Randall's extremely arch and snipes endlessly at everyone like That One Gay Guy in Marsh's books (and other 20th century media), plus I totally neglected to read his constant insults as playful flirting, so the decision to marry whatshername seemed to come out of nowhere. It may just be that the end of the book was coming up, so Heyer felt it was time to uncork some Detective Romance before the final quip.

Still Killer Dolphin:)

The worst kind of dolphin, really. :(

I'm going to be a little sad when I've finally actually read Killer Dolphin and can't anticipate it anymore. But you know what they say about all good things.

[silverflight8]

I love Bathgate. The part in Artists in Crime where he makes up the little poems on Fox and Alleyn always make me laugh.

"I thought," he continued, "I saw Gargantua in fancy worsted socks.
I looked again and saw it was a mammoth picking locks.
'Good God,' I said, 'it might have been my friend Inspector Fox.' "

[evelyn_b]

Nigel is the best. <3 Both Alleyn and Marsh seem to have tired of him pretty quickly, but I keep hoping he'll turn up again one of these days.