Superb
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This is an extremely good example of what I'd call 'a thinking man's crime novel' (mind you, I can immensely enjoy 'easy' novels too). This is no easy reading, and at times you'll wonder who the criminals or even the crimes really are, but in return what you get is an astounding story with an incredibly atmospheric description of London in the 1880s, mixing historical and fictional characters. I loved it from the first page to the last!
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Well, here we are again
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I won't waste words; it doesn't get much better then this. However, as one reviewer above has noted, please don't expect a mystery in the traditional format. Not to be condescending, but I rather suspect that the intended mystery is (as in all Ackroyd's fiction) the mystery of London itself. Endlessly interlocking patterns of history and personality...cheap revelations aren't really what this is all about!
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Well, here we are again
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I won't waste words; it doesn't get much better then this. However, as one reviewer above has noted, please don't expect a mystery in the traditional format. Not to be condescending, but I rather suspect that the intended mystery is (as in all Ackroyd's fiction) the mystery of London itself. Endlessly interlocking patterns of history and personality...cheap revelations aren't really what this is all about!
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Limehouse Golem or Limehouse Sham?
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I bought this book on the recommendation of a book review programme on Radio 4 ("A Good Read"), as I have previously found the panel's suggestions spot on. However, having read this novel over the past weekend, I am left feeling somewhat cheated. If this is a psychological thriller, where exactly was the psychology or indeed, the thrills? The plot was anything but thrilling - a reasonably intelligent child could have seen the denouement coming almost from page one - and the clumsy 'psychological' insights into the minds of the major protagonists left much to be desired. Add to this a series of seemingly pointless appearances of several famous nineteenth century personalities in 'bit parts'. Exactly how was the plot enhanced by the sentence on page 138 which stated that Karl Marx, Oscar Wilde, [George] Bernard Shaw and George Gissing were all to be found in the Reading Room of the British Museum on a particular morning, with no further explanation? I did enjoy the descriptions of life in the Victorian Music Halls, but I could have got this information from any competent history book covering that era, and many more details besides. I'm left with the impression that the author had a jolly good time writing this novel and in showing the world what a clever chap he is, bringing together various (unconnected?) strands of nineteenth century London. What a pity I didn't have a jolly good time reading it.
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The most interesting -mystery book i've ever read
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It all starts with the trial of a young woman accused of murder,everybody thinks she has killed her husband.The story goes on and we are brought back in time in order to discover the past of this woman.Her life has been a difficult one,she was a very poor woman with a sick mother to take care of.While a narrator is telling the story of her life we are in front of terrible and brutal killings,all of them commited by night.This novel is a very interesting one the thing that made me love this book is that arriving at the end you realize that all you had read until then has been different...............
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