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Books : The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher
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The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by: Kate Summerscale List Price: £11.99 CD-Charts Price: £7.91 You Save: £4.08 (34%)Prices subject to change. |
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Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
Binding: Paperback EAN: 9780747599227 ISBN: 074759922X Label: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Manufacturer: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Number Of Pages: 384 Publication Date: July 26, 2008 Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Studio: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Sales Rank: 77 Related Items:
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Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
 Rating:  - I couldn't put it down...I just finished this book last night and I have to say it is one of those books that you mourn finishing - What will I read now? I love social history but am not so much a historian that I can read straight-up history books although I keep trying. What I loved so much about this book is that the author clearly did painstaking research, not only around the story itself but in researching the social history of that time as it connected to the story being told. It brought Victorian England to life for me and all the characters in the story also. Add to that the extra flavour of describing the challenges posed to a fledgling role of a detective. I am a huge fan of CSI and was intrigued at the initial stumblings of the science of detection as described ... Read More: Rating: - murder as social and cultural history This excellent, readable book explores a number of fascinating strands of mid-Victorian social and cultural history through the story of a real-life child murder. In 1860 a four year old boy, Saville Kent, disappears from his nursery at his father's country house in Road, Wiltshire (now Rode, Somerset) and after a search is found murdered in an outside privy. It didn't need Sherlock Holmes or Fabian of the Yard to work out that the killer was a member of the household. And, as Kate Summerscale so ably demonstrates, Mr Kent's household was not the conventional Victorian happy home and there were any number of emotional and psychological undercurrents. The local police having proved themselves spectacularly incompetant, a detective was sent for from ... Read More: Rating: - The Suspicions of Mr WhicherSimply, this is a superb book. It is a great detective story (and it is - quite literally - the original detective story) ; it is also a great historical novel; but more than anything it is a great read. When I picked this book up I simply couldnt put it down and finished it 12 hours or so later. I was entangled in the mystery, I first doubted and then believed in Mr Whicher, and then doubted him again when he failed. The resolution to the story hit me like a classic sucker punch, and then, right at the end another twist that stuck like a punch in the guts. I cant recomend this book enough. It works as a whodunnit, but its much more. The author charts the history of the detective and provides somehing of a social history ... Read More: Rating: - Intriguing and informativeA good combination of whodunit and history of the period (1860). The author includes maps, room plans and photographs which ensure that the reader can't forget the reality of the murder. Yet at the beginning of the book there is a family tree and a 'List of Characters' which almost suggests it's a work of detective fiction, popular at the time. I found it really fascinating, from the gruesome murder of a young child to the personal and professional lives of Scotland Yard detectives. Summerscale has researched her material and the facts of the case very well and the result is a book that satisfies lovers of both facts and fiction. Rating: - One of the best non-fiction titles of the yearI bought this after listening to parts of it on BBCR4. In another writer's hand this could have been one of those dreary `true crime' books, but the author broadens out the story to investigate the society of the time, and draw parallels with our own, not least the impact the case has on the public and press of the time, which is all too familiar today. This is one of those books that could have quite easily disappeared without trace, published with a whimper rather than a bang, but thankly it hasn't and had received the plaudits and awards that it richly deserves. A very good and original book. |
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