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16+ opere 110 membri 3 recensioni

Opere di David Ruffle

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Etichette

Informazioni generali

Data di nascita
1956
Sesso
male
Nazionalità
UK
Luogo di nascita
Northamptonshire, England, UK

Utenti

Recensioni

I'm sorry, but, to me, this was plain boring. All dialogue, long diatribes that might be interesting for the author, but not for the reader, and although it's obvious that the author knows well the canon, the only use he does of it is... showing it.

It failed to engage me.
 
Segnalato
Claudia_M | Oct 27, 2018 |
It wasn't a bad read. Took a while to get through though. The majority of this novella was a just a conversation between Sherlock and Holmes. If you were going to watch the film of Mr. Holmes (starring Sir Ian McKellan) this would be a good one to read since it's like a prequel to that storyline. I probably could have finished this sooner but I kept getting distracted with my job assignment.
 
Segnalato
jovemako | Sep 3, 2016 |
Speculative Fiction for the Ripperology Set

(Full disclosure: I received a free copy of this book for review through Goodreads's First Reads program.)

A quirky little novella, The Abyss: A Journey with Jack the Ripper imagines the birth and development of infamous serial killer Jack the Ripper. Born into a staunchly religious household, only child James is routinely abused by his traveling lay-preacher father and arguably sadistic mother. When mum dies in her sleep (supposedly of natural circumstances - but what of her bloodshot eyes?), James is sent to live with his Uncle George and Aunt Katherine in Surrey. After several peaceful years in this household, a now sixteen-year-old James discovers that Katherine is cheating on her husband. His reaction? He blackmails her into buying his silence with sex, and then arranges for his uncle to accidentally walk in on one of her trysts anyhow. An enraged George murders Katherine, and James is unleashed on the world.

The man who would eventually come to be known variously as "Jack the Ripper," "the Whitechapel Murderer," and "Leather Apron" finds his way to the East End of London, where he takes on a series of menial jobs, many of them involving the slaughter and butchering of animals. Unhappy, poor, and a perpetual underachiever, he begins to take out his aggression and low self-esteem (to say nothing of his misogyny) on the local population of sex workers.

Told in the third person, James's story is interspersed with chapters written from the viewpoints of his "canon" victims: Polly Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Kelly. I appreciate this approach, since it helps to humanize and give voice to women who are so often overlooked (or worse, objectified and demonized). This is somewhat undercut, though, but the chapter titles, which refer to the women by number: one through five, corresponding to her sequence in Jack the Ripper's killing spree.

Readers should be aware that the text is filled with the sexism and anti-Semitism of the day; I lost count of how many times the slur "whore" was employed.

The Abyss is likely to appeal to hardcore Ripperologists, who might enjoy it as a intellectual exercise. If you don't know much about the Whitechapel murders, I suspect that your attention may wander a bit. There are a few editing errors here and there - missing punctuation, mostly - but overall the book is professional and polished. Maaaaybe 3.5 stars, rounded down to 3 on Amazon.

http://www.easyvegan.info/2014/03/14/the-abyss-a-journey-with-jack-the-ripper-by...
… (altro)
½
 
Segnalato
smiteme | Mar 5, 2014 |

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Statistiche

Opere
16
Opere correlate
1
Utenti
110
Popolarità
#176,729
Voto
3.2
Recensioni
3
ISBN
36

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