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Title: Death Comes to Pemberly
Author: P.D. James
Genre: Historical mystery
Thingummies: 1.5
Synopsis: Renowned British mystery writer takes on Pride and Prejudice. Much ambition, not much payout.
Thoughts: There have been a number of modern riffs on Elizabeth and Darcy. Some of them have been fun, others less impressive. I happen to love P.D. James' mysteries, so I figured if anyone could competently handle the pastiche, she could.
Unfortunately, it doesn't really work that way.
One of the big problems with cozy mysteries is explaining why normal people would chose to play detective. That goes double for borrowed characters--one must explain why characters who have never shown a particular inclination to solve mysteries will suddenly start investigating. James neatly solves this dilemma...by having no one investigate. A guy gets murdered. People are angsty. Then after the trial is resolved by a deus ex machina, a series of denouements occur in which several people spill their secrets to Darcy, pretty much unprompted.
Just Darcy, though. Elizabeth is appropriately ladylike and thus basically doesn't appear in this book.
So...no one actually takes any actions. Stuff just kind of happens. Everyone behaves relatively in-character, but there's a reason Jane Austen didn't write a mystery--because these are not the right characters to be in a mystery in the first place.
Author: P.D. James
Genre: Historical mystery
Thingummies: 1.5
Synopsis: Renowned British mystery writer takes on Pride and Prejudice. Much ambition, not much payout.
Thoughts: There have been a number of modern riffs on Elizabeth and Darcy. Some of them have been fun, others less impressive. I happen to love P.D. James' mysteries, so I figured if anyone could competently handle the pastiche, she could.
Unfortunately, it doesn't really work that way.
One of the big problems with cozy mysteries is explaining why normal people would chose to play detective. That goes double for borrowed characters--one must explain why characters who have never shown a particular inclination to solve mysteries will suddenly start investigating. James neatly solves this dilemma...by having no one investigate. A guy gets murdered. People are angsty. Then after the trial is resolved by a deus ex machina, a series of denouements occur in which several people spill their secrets to Darcy, pretty much unprompted.
Just Darcy, though. Elizabeth is appropriately ladylike and thus basically doesn't appear in this book.
So...no one actually takes any actions. Stuff just kind of happens. Everyone behaves relatively in-character, but there's a reason Jane Austen didn't write a mystery--because these are not the right characters to be in a mystery in the first place.
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Date: 2015-07-20 02:21 am (UTC)From: