Week of ay 18, 2001 - Review of "The Complete Father Brown Stories"

By Joan Whetzel

"The Complete Father Brown Stories" by G.K Chesterton is a series of short stories and novelettes featuring a decidedly non-traditional British sleuth. Father Brown, a Catholic Priest, successfully solves murders for the police, thanks in no small part to his innocent demeanor and his congenial nature. He's someone that everyone trusts - especially the perpetrator.

 
The stories are  written in chapter form and narrated by one of the main characters, usually a police officer. They take place around the turn of the 20th century, which means the technology for solving the crimes is minimal, so Father Brown has to use his brains, his wits, and his innocent nature to help the police.

The BBC produced a "Father Brown" series for public broadcast. The series can be seen from time to time on most local PBS stations. I recently ran across the series playing an Saturday evenings around 6PM. They run about an hour, making them short enough for the "Mystery Theater" show. I believe the series can also be purchased on DVD.

If you haven't seen the shows or read the stories, they are well worth your time, especially if you love shorter stories from time to time, like I do. The TV shows are also nice because, while they make a nice series based on the Father Brown character, each episode is unique. The stories create a series of short, made-for-TV filmettes. And if you're not ready to commit to buying any "Father Brown" books without knowing whether you'd like the genre, then check out the local library. Most major Libraries are likely to carry at least 1 or 2 of the books.

Week of May11, 2014 - Happy Mother's Day.

Sorry, no blog this week. I'm celebrating my status as a mom and grandma.

Week of May 4, 2014 - Review of "The Stargazey" by Martha Grimes

By Joan Whetzel

I read the Richard Jury series of books by Martha Grimes quite a few years back and loved them. Richard Jury is a Detective for the New Scotland Yard who is frequently called in by local police to help solve crimes.

"The Stargazey" - named for a London pub by the same name - begins with Mr. Jury being intrigued by a woman. The woman is well dressed and wearing a sable fur coat. She gets on the same bus as Jury, gets off a few blocks later, gets back on the bus, then finally gets off near an Abbey. Jury, intrigued, follows her to the gates of the Abbey grounds. She enters the grounds, but Jury holds back. The next morning he hears of a woman who was found dead on the Abbey grounds, wearing a sable fur coat. He has no choice but to engage himself in the investigation. Imagine his surprise when he finds out that the woman wearing the sable coat is not the same woman he saw wearing it the evening before.

Like all of Martha Grimes's mystery novels,  "The Stargazey" is a great British whodunit, following the detective/mystery plot progression set forth by other British authors .Like I said, I loved these books when I first read them. However, I think my tastes must be changing, because I found the book moved too slowly for me now. Yeah it started out catching the reader - me - right off the bat. But then it took her several chapters (seemed like the whole first half of the book) to get the investigation going. I had a really hard time staying focused. It may just be my changing taste in reading material, though. So don't take this negative from my pen to your ears as gospel truth. Give it a read and decide for yourself.