Marilyn's Mystery Reads

About Marilyn

Have you ever thought much about sidekicks? I hadn’t, until recently.

In films and television, sidekicks are the ones who usually aren’t as good-looking as the hero, never or almost never get the girl or guy, and never get the glory.  Think about it.  There’s the Lone Ranger and Tonto, Roy Rogers and Gabby Hayes, Lucy and Ethel.  Am I right?

In mystery novels, things were pretty much the same.  There’s Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, C. Auguste Dupin and Poe’s nameless narrator, Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin.  In the last case there’s a bit more equality, but even though Archie is younger, better-looking, and as narrator could emphasize his importance in the case, he’s always a step behind Wolfe.  Yes, in these novels Archie has the girl, but Lily Rowan is more like arm candy than a true love interest, always available to go dancing or have dinner at Rusterman’s, but that’s all.

In earlier books the sidekicks usually were subordinate in every way to the detective, as I mentioned above, especially when it came to who was the toughest guy in the room.  But, interestingly, the sidekick’s role has changed over the years.  I think this began with Spenser and Hawk.  Spenser certainly is tough and knows his way around criminals and low-lifes, but he has a moral center.  Enter Hawk.  When we first meet him, he’s a killer for hire.  And although he’s mellowed in the course of the novels, he still behaves in ways that Spenser can’t or won’t.  Spenser can do breaking and entering, but Hawk can do breaking bones.  That’s why Spenser needs him.

And here’s another facet of the new breed of sidekick.  There was a similarity between the roles of Spenser and Hawk and Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.  Pike’s conscience, like his eyes behind dark sunglasses, is hidden.  There are, or were, things that Cole didn’t do, but Pike did.  Now, however, that Pike has moved on to his own series, he, like Hawk, has gotten softer and isn’t so quick on the trigger.  If Pike is going to be the new hero, he can’t behave like the old sidekick.

We know that certain things, unpleasant and illegal things, may have to be done in order to solve a crime. But we don’t seem to want our hero, and it’s always a hero, not a heroine, to do them.  We don’t want his hands to be so dirty that they can’t be cleaned.  That’s apparently what his sidekick is for.

So what does this say about us as readers of detective novels?

Marilyn

If something is perfect, why change it?

My husband and I were on Cape Cod on July 11, and I read in The Boston Globe that Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express would be shown on PBS that night.  Now, as far as I’m concerned, Ms. Christie was/is The Queen of Mysteries.  I know, I know, the Golden Age style is no longer in vogue.  Now we need serial killers (see my July 7 post), sexual perversions, and child abuse to make a best seller.  But no one, past or present, could toss those red herrings around like Dame Agatha.

Very excited to see a new version of this classic novel, I sat through an hour-long promo of David Suchet going for a ride on the Orient Express.  I’m guessing he’s a Method Actor and needed to experience the train before he “became” Hercule Poirot.  I must admit that I’ve never been the biggest Suchet fan, but then I’ve never seen a Poirot I thought was authentic.

Anyhow, at 9 p.m. I was ready to view this mystery classic.  And was I disappointed! I thought that Suchet was acting as if he had a hyperactivity problem.  His facial expressions, his gestures, were so unlike the refined, mannered Belgian detective as to be almost (almost) humorous.  I keep waiting for him to calm down, to remember the character he was playing, but no such luck.

Of course, I don’t know if this (mis)characterization of the great detective was the author’s fault or the director’s.  But either way it was wrong, wrong, wrong.  There wasn’t a bit of Christie’s character in this production.

My feeling is, if you’re going to change the character or plot of a novel when you bring it to film or television, perhaps you should simply invent a new character.  Leave the old one alone and come up with your own idea.

And that way you won’t even have to pay royalties!

Marilyn

True to my promise in the April 22^nd post, I’m still refusing to post reviews of books I’ve read but haven’t enjoyed or thought worth recommending. That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t think about those books and why I didn’t like them.  So now I’m going to vent a bit.  Okay, a lot.

I read three books in the last couple of weeks, all of which featured serial killers.  Honestly, I am really tired of serial killers. It’s so easy for an author to make a S.K. the villain.  You don’t need any motive, or at least any realistic motive, if your killer just keeps killing seemingly random people—sort of like the Energizer Bunny on steroids.

The author can blame everything on the killer’s childhood, which is what these three authors seemed to do, without actually explaining what it was in their childhoods that caused the man (the S.K. is almost always a man, almost always white, almost always in his 30s or 40s).  Actually, after I read these three books, I thought I could quit my day job and become a profiler for the FBI. Once the authorities have decided a S.K. is on the loose, they turn to S.K. 101 in their textbooks and come up with the above description, a one size fits all label.

So your parents made you eat all your veggies before you got dessert?  So you couldn’t have your own television/computer/car and all the other kids did?  So you got punished for coming home ten minutes past curfew?  That explains your compulsion to slice and dice women who are runners, men with beards, women over 50 with bleached hair the color of your late mother’s.  It’s easy, simplistic, and not at all convincing, at least to me.

I want a motive that’s realistic—love, hate, greed—all the old standbyes that make a person commit the unforgivable crime.

Do you feel the same?

Marilyn

Perhaps some readers of this blog have noticed that all my reviews are positive.  Are you asking yourself, “Is Marilyn so fortunate in the books she chooses to review that all of them are winners?” or “Does the woman like everything she reads?”

Well, the answer to both questions  is negative.  I’ve read plenty of mysteries that I don’t enjoy.  But I decided to write reviews only of books that I believe are worth reading. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m exasperated when I read a review and at the very end I find that the reviewer tells me not to bother reading the book.  I don’t want to find out what not to read–there are too many novels in the world that aren’t worth the time it takes to turn the pages.  I want to find out what I should read, or at least what someone whose opinion I respect suggests that I read.

This past week I read two mysteries that were so poorly written and so completely unconvincing that I was amazed that they were published.  I’m sure that this has happened to everyone at one time or another.  But I don’t want to waste valuable internet space and your time by reviewing them.  I’ll just chalk it up to a waste of time (my time, not yours) and pick up another book and hope for the best.

I used to have a sweat shirt with the logo, “So many books, so little time.” So let’s not waste time reading about mysteries that aren’t worth reading.  Our time is more valuable than that.

Marilyn

In my March 9th post I talked about wanting to know as much as possible about the lives of the protagonists in the mysteries I read. I said I felt most strongly about knowing about female protagonists, but really it applies to males also.

In the April 5th issue of TIME magazine (magazines always are dated a week ahead of the actual date of issue) there’s a Q & A column interview of Walter Mosley, creator of the Easy Rawlins and Leonid McGill series.  Two of Mosley’s comments seem to me to support what I wrote.

The interviewer asked if Mosley tries to focus on character over plot.  Mosley’s partial response:  “With the original hard-boiled detectives, there was no connection to the world.  No mother, no father, no friends, no dog.  With a person like that, there can’t be character development.” My sentiments exactly.  If I know nothing about the back story of a detective (such as Sam Spade or the Continental Op, to name two classic dicks), my personal involvement is limited.  I don’t know why they behave the way they do, what propels them, why they keep involving themselves in such dangerous situations (assuming it’s not just because it’s their job), so I somehow don’t fully relate to them.  But when I know more about the detective (V. I. Warshawski, Kinsey Milhone), I feel personally connected and more able to understand their motivations.  I know these books are works of fiction but a good author draws you in, and for the time you are reading, these heroes or heroines are as real to you as your family and friends.  That’s the mark of a true novelist.

The other comment that Mosley made that resonated with me was when he was asked how much of a character’s life was apparent to him when he first started to write about him.  Mosley said, “I just finished the first chapter of the third Leonid McGill book.  And I’m still learning about him.  And I will be learning about him until I come to the last book.” To me that means that McGill is as real to Mosley as if he were an actual person, not merely a character in a mystery novel.

My hat is off to Walter Mosley for so eloquently expressing what I feel, that regardless of the genre the novelist’s duty is to make his character believable and ever-changing works in progress.  Just the way “real people” are.

You can learn more about Walter Mosley at his web site.

Marilyn

I was talking to my sister tonight about my strong feeling regarding character development in mysteries.  One of the reasons I enjoy series mysteries rather than stand alone books is that I like to follow the heroine/hero from the beginning of the series to the latest book. When I pick up a book that has had several before it in a series, I feel as if I’m coming into a movie in the middle and there’s lots of back story I should know but don’t.

For some reason this is more important to me in books with female protagonists.  Not knowing the histories of Elvis Cole, Travis McGee, or Spenser is mildly annoying but doesn’t impact on my admiration for the authors’ works.  But I feel differently about female characters.  I want to know everything about them–where they were born, who their family is, why they’ve remained single or have been married four times.  Is this because I’m a woman and identify more with female characters?  Is it that women (warning:  big generalization follows) are more open about their lives than men?

I don’t know the answer, but in starting this blog I realize that my favorite women characters are those I know the most about–V. I. Warshawski, Kinsey Milhone, Deborah Knott, among others, which I something I’d never thought about before.  But with male detectives, this doesn’t seem to matter much.

Does the back story matter to you?  Or am I the only one who cares?

Marilyn

Based on my son Rich’s urgings, I’ve decided to start a blog reviewing mystery novels.  According to my mother, I’ve been reading since the age of two, but you know how mothers are.  In truth, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t read, and mysteries have always been my favorite genre. Like most girls, I started with Nancy Drew, Cherry Ames, Vicki Barr, the usual pre-teen mystery novels.  Then I moved to adult mysteries.

I started a book club in 1970 that was featured in an article in The Boston Globe about clubs that were started way before Amazon.com’s reviews and Oprah’s recommendation became must-reads.  Although the Birch Street Book Club has never achieved that level of fame, we’re still ten members strong nearly forty years later.

We read novels, biographies, and non-fiction, but very few mysteries.  This blog will be my attempt to spread the word about my favorite mysteries, mostly new but some classics as well.

My son, who blogs on his web site www.flyteblog.com, as well as connecting on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, tells me that one of the best parts of blogging comes from feedback from readers.

So I hope that people who find my blog, as you have, will respond to my reviews and give me your opinions on what I’ve written, make suggestions for future reviews, or direct me to your blog.  Hope to hear from you soon.

I’ve started off with a number of reviews to arouse your interest; my goal is to review a novel a week.  So here goes….

Marilyn