Pagina principaleGruppiConversazioniAltroStatistiche
Cerca nel Sito
Questo sito utilizza i cookies per fornire i nostri servizi, per migliorare le prestazioni, per analisi, e (per gli utenti che accedono senza fare login) per la pubblicità. Usando LibraryThing confermi di aver letto e capito le nostre condizioni di servizio e la politica sulla privacy. Il tuo uso del sito e dei servizi è soggetto a tali politiche e condizioni.

Risultati da Google Ricerca Libri

Fai clic su di un'immagine per andare a Google Ricerca Libri.

Sto caricando le informazioni...

The Longer Bodies (1930)

di Gladys Mitchell

UtentiRecensioniPopolaritàMedia votiCitazioni
813328,939 (3.22)9
A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERYRediscover Gladys Mitchell - one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.Great Aunt Puddequet was reputed to be enormously wealthy. It was also a tradition in the family that she was extraordinarily mean. So when the malicious old bird summons her grand-nephews to perform in a games tournament in order to secure their inheritances, they gloomily oblige. Before long, the country house games are interrupted by murder. The police are baffled, but fortunately Mrs Bradley, an unusual psychoanalyst with a flair for sleuthing, has begun to take an keen interest in the Puddequet Olympics.Opinionated, unconventional, unafraid... If you like Poirot and Miss Marple, you'll love Mrs Bradley.… (altro)
Sto caricando le informazioni...

Iscriviti per consentire a LibraryThing di scoprire se ti piacerà questo libro.

Attualmente non vi sono conversazioni su questo libro.

» Vedi le 9 citazioni

Mostra 3 di 3
Gladys Mitchell books are both classic detective fiction and unusual examples of the same.*

The Longer Bodies was a satisfying read, one of the most overtly funny and with some absolutely unforgetable characters, noticeably the mad Great Aunt whose eccentricity leads her grand nieces and nephews to vie for their inheritance. A very enjoyable read. Would have been 5 stars except for the rather jarring notes, where highly unlikely explanations are given for clues.


*It takes a while to adjust to the style of the Mrs. Bradley series; certainly I find them unlike most of the other golden era offerings. The writing is superb, the settings range from melodramatic to classic (country house, quiet village etc.) but there are elements of gothic fiction not just in the plotting but in the characters. Mrs. Bradley is a grotesque if likeable figure. Her infuriating habit of explaining the crime away one way, only to renounce that explanation and explain it another way, coupled with her rather ungenerous habit of holding the cards too close to her chest for even the reader to see, can be irritating but the compensation of the witty, and atmospheric writing helps. ( )
  Germoorkensbyrne | Jan 4, 2022 |
As far as I can see, the only good reason for reading "The Longer Bodies", other than forgivable ignorance of what you're letting yourself in for, is the kind of curiosity that leads you to read "The Life & Opinions of Tristam Shandy, Gentleman". Just as Tristam Shandy shows you what a novel looked like before people really figured out how to write one, "The Longer Bodies" shows you how early crime fiction flopped about like a recently landed fish on a dock before the modern genre emerged.

The first half of the book, a long, long, oh-God-am-I-not-yet-through-this, 150 pages or so is a complete mess: scrappy exposition, cardboard characterisation more suited to a farce, an investigative method that was explained at length and yet was both ineffective and implausible.

When Mrs Bradley finally flies in on her broomstick, the novel flares brightly for a while, like a cheap candle with a bad wick and then starts, all too slowly, to gutter and die. The denouement is protracted, clumsy, implausible and would, in any book less dull than this one, have been anticlimactic but here simply sustained a level of when-will-this-end tedium.

There were some stray shafts of sunlight in this cloudy waste of a day novel. Mrs Bradley weaponises eccentricity by bringing to bear high levels of insight with very low levels of empathy and absolutely no need or desire to be liked by anyone. The improbably named Great Aunt Puddequet turns tyranny into an amusement in the way only a very old person, who has been wicked by the standards of her day but now wishes she'd been a great deal more so, can. The "children" in their late teens and twenties are a curious mix privileged prig and abuse survivor.

The depictions of the German trainer and the Scottish cook are so patronising and xenophobic that they could be the stuff of a Brexit campaigners' fantasy except for the hint of self-mockery.

This is a book that I endured rather than enjoyed. I assume that some of the sixty-six Mrs Bradley books must be worth a read. I went to this tribute site for guidance and was disappointed to see that "The Longer Bodies" is consistently listed in the top third. I think I'll restrict myself to trying one of the top three before I decide that Gladys Mitchell just isn't my thing
( )
  MikeFinnFiction | May 16, 2020 |
An eccentric aunt decides to gather her family to take part in a athletic competition in the grounds of her house. Events will include 'putting the shot',long and high jumps and throwing the javelin. The winner will receive a large amount of the aunt's money.
Very soon things begin to go awry,including the discovery of two bodies. The police,headed by Inspector Bloxham are soon on the scene and interviewing members of the family and various servants and others. Things are getting more and more obscure instead of clearer,when Mrs Beatrice Lestrange Bradley arrives to cut through the fog and eventually all is made clear.
This is the third in the Mrs Bradley mysteries and it has to be said,it shows. She doesn't appear until page 102 and to say the plot is complicated is putting it mildly.On the other hand many of the characters are among her best, in particular Great-aunt Puddequet,who sets the whole thing in motion. ( )
  devenish | Dec 30, 2010 |
Mostra 3 di 3
nessuna recensione | aggiungi una recensione

Appartiene alle Serie

Devi effettuare l'accesso per contribuire alle Informazioni generali.
Per maggiori spiegazioni, vedi la pagina di aiuto delle informazioni generali.
Titolo canonico
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
Titolo originale
Titoli alternativi
Data della prima edizione
Personaggi
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
Luoghi significativi
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
Eventi significativi
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
Film correlati
Epigrafe
Dedica
Incipit
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
GREAT-AUNT PUDDEQUET was reputed to be enormously wealthy. It was also a tradition in the family that she was extraordinarily mean.
Citazioni
Ultime parole
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi. Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
(Click per vedere. Attenzione: può contenere anticipazioni.)
Nota di disambiguazione
Redattore editoriale
Elogi
Lingua originale
DDC/MDS Canonico
LCC canonico

Risorse esterne che parlano di questo libro

Wikipedia in inglese

Nessuno

A VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERYRediscover Gladys Mitchell - one of the 'Big Three' female crime fiction writers alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.Great Aunt Puddequet was reputed to be enormously wealthy. It was also a tradition in the family that she was extraordinarily mean. So when the malicious old bird summons her grand-nephews to perform in a games tournament in order to secure their inheritances, they gloomily oblige. Before long, the country house games are interrupted by murder. The police are baffled, but fortunately Mrs Bradley, an unusual psychoanalyst with a flair for sleuthing, has begun to take an keen interest in the Puddequet Olympics.Opinionated, unconventional, unafraid... If you like Poirot and Miss Marple, you'll love Mrs Bradley.

Non sono state trovate descrizioni di biblioteche

Descrizione del libro
Riassunto haiku

Discussioni correnti

Nessuno

Copertine popolari

Link rapidi

Voto

Media: (3.22)
0.5
1 1
1.5
2 1
2.5 1
3 8
3.5 1
4 5
4.5
5 1

Sei tu?

Diventa un autore di LibraryThing.

 

A proposito di | Contatto | LibraryThing.com | Privacy/Condizioni d'uso | Guida/FAQ | Blog | Negozio | APIs | TinyCat | Biblioteche di personaggi celebri | Recensori in anteprima | Informazioni generali | 203,186,859 libri! | Barra superiore: Sempre visibile