Mysteries that put the eye in private eye
Dec. 12th, 2012 02:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kestrell_The Case of the Counterfeit Eye_ by Erle Stanley Gardener (1938)
I wasn't very interested in reading any of the Perry Mason books--I grew up with the TV show in perpetual syndication, and I didn't think it was very interesting, aside from the fact that it featured another disabled investigator.
However, this title features a client who comes to Perry Mason with a pretty unusual story: someone stole his prosthetic eye and replaced it with a cheaper version, and he's pretty sure he's going to be set up.
This is probably my favorite WTF? plot for a mystery, and it even includes some very good information about prosthetic eyes, and that the better ones are a work of art, made to suit the individual user, as opposed to the cheaper out-of-the-box variety. I kept checking the copyright date. I was also surprised that the original Perry Mason of the book series was a lot less of a rule-abiding conservative in a suit than the TV series created. The original character (who is not disabled) plays pretty fast and loose with the letter of the law, and half of the fun is watching him pull another fast one.
My least favorite WTF? mystery was _Star Island_ by Carl Hiaasen. IT doesn't really matter what the blurb says a Carl Hiaasen mystery is about, as it always turns into a crazy free-for-all. Sadly, this mystery featured a crazy kidnapper eco-terrorist with a poorly-made prosthetic eye. If I had a dollar for every time I read a book with a crazy and/or evil guy with a badly made prosthetic eye. (My favorite is a Christopher Fowler Bryant and May book in which the antagonist is the Anti-Christ himself and, despite being the richest man in the world *and* the Anti-Christ, he still couldn't get a decent prosthetic ey; I kept thinking, If *I* was the Anti-Christ I would get a nice glow-in-the-dark yellow eye with the slitted pupil, and I'd get my enslaved mad scientists in Hell to make a vaporizing ray come out of it.).
Anyway, to get back to the book, the fact that the eco-terrorist was both crazy and had a funny fake eye just annoyed me too much to finish the book.
_It's All Fun and Games Until Someone Loses an Eye_ by Christopher Brookmyre
A kickass suburban granny turns international spy, so more of a spy thriller than a mystery. Also, no one actually loses an eye. It's pretty much all fun and thrills, and incredibly more interesting than _The Ex-Pats_, which got a lot of hype as a regular mom-is-secretly-an-international spy thriller. I was on something around page seventy when I realized nothing of any interest had happened yet. I bet the NY Times book reviewers put this on their "Best of 2012" list, as the NYTimes seems to really love serious writers trying to write genre books in which nothing interesting happens.
I wasn't very interested in reading any of the Perry Mason books--I grew up with the TV show in perpetual syndication, and I didn't think it was very interesting, aside from the fact that it featured another disabled investigator.
However, this title features a client who comes to Perry Mason with a pretty unusual story: someone stole his prosthetic eye and replaced it with a cheaper version, and he's pretty sure he's going to be set up.
This is probably my favorite WTF? plot for a mystery, and it even includes some very good information about prosthetic eyes, and that the better ones are a work of art, made to suit the individual user, as opposed to the cheaper out-of-the-box variety. I kept checking the copyright date. I was also surprised that the original Perry Mason of the book series was a lot less of a rule-abiding conservative in a suit than the TV series created. The original character (who is not disabled) plays pretty fast and loose with the letter of the law, and half of the fun is watching him pull another fast one.
My least favorite WTF? mystery was _Star Island_ by Carl Hiaasen. IT doesn't really matter what the blurb says a Carl Hiaasen mystery is about, as it always turns into a crazy free-for-all. Sadly, this mystery featured a crazy kidnapper eco-terrorist with a poorly-made prosthetic eye. If I had a dollar for every time I read a book with a crazy and/or evil guy with a badly made prosthetic eye. (My favorite is a Christopher Fowler Bryant and May book in which the antagonist is the Anti-Christ himself and, despite being the richest man in the world *and* the Anti-Christ, he still couldn't get a decent prosthetic ey; I kept thinking, If *I* was the Anti-Christ I would get a nice glow-in-the-dark yellow eye with the slitted pupil, and I'd get my enslaved mad scientists in Hell to make a vaporizing ray come out of it.).
Anyway, to get back to the book, the fact that the eco-terrorist was both crazy and had a funny fake eye just annoyed me too much to finish the book.
_It's All Fun and Games Until Someone Loses an Eye_ by Christopher Brookmyre
A kickass suburban granny turns international spy, so more of a spy thriller than a mystery. Also, no one actually loses an eye. It's pretty much all fun and thrills, and incredibly more interesting than _The Ex-Pats_, which got a lot of hype as a regular mom-is-secretly-an-international spy thriller. I was on something around page seventy when I realized nothing of any interest had happened yet. I bet the NY Times book reviewers put this on their "Best of 2012" list, as the NYTimes seems to really love serious writers trying to write genre books in which nothing interesting happens.
