June 2022 Main Read: Perfect Prey, by Helen Sarah Fields

[Chris]

To Pat, who felt the murders in Ash Lake were gruesome...

These are FAR, FAR worse. What sort of mind comes up with this stuff and doesn't vomit all over their keyboard when typing it up is way beyond me.
I'm just glad I have a useless 'mind's eye' so I don't form much of a mental image from the words on the page...

[Pat]

I began reading British mysteries with the golden-oldies authors. They were less descriptive of the murders themselves, concentrating on the mystery of "who done it." Now little difference exists in this area between British and American mysteries, IMO.

Sometimes I have to skim a few sentences or paragraphs to avoid nightmares. My mental video of what I'm reading is far too detailed. Wish it weren't so. Now I'm concerned about moving on to Perfect Prey!

[Jeanne]

Yes I have recently bought these two and wonder how I will go.One of Graham Mastertons books was too much for me with its description of torture.I actually through the book in the bin which to me is a sin normally but thats what I thought of it,and I read his "Solitaire" which I found to be to my liking.

[Pat]

Jeanne, Good for you for trashing the book that offended you. We have too much violence on the news these days to need it to be too blatant in entertainment. Though I would have picked the offensive book out of the bin later and traded it for another at Half-Price Books or a similar store.

On my Kindle reader, I get the satisfaction of DELETING books that I wish I had never bought. This doesn't happen often for me; I will usually give authors wide latitude before giving up on them.

I wonder if some of us, myself included, are especially sensitive to violence in entertainment reading at present because of news coverage of the Putin-Ukraine war and the mass-shootings in the US.

[Icewineanne]

I’ve always disliked extreme gruesome & unnecessary violence. Graphic, horrific violence isn’t entertaining to me.

[Pat]

I've often wished authors would consider that some of us read while we eat....

[Chris]

Ended up giving 2 stars. Would have been more if it hadn’t been so gory.

[Pat]

I'd rather give this book a warning label than even one star. I've never read as many inhuman, beyond-belief ways to kill people in one book. Helen Fields knows how to plot and write well, though characterization was one-dimensional. From this book, I have to wonder about her state of mental health.

[Jeanne]

Still havent read this book so thanks for the warning.I dont really need to read about this type of violence so will be prepared to bin the book without finishing

[Beth]

Interesting that Agatha Christie sold
Millions of books with blood and gore …..

[Pat]

Agatha Christie didn't write in minute detail about every aspect of the murders in her books. The murders were standard variety, not devised to push the limits of imagination by psychopaths trying to outdo each other in outrageous ways to kill. With Christie, the puzzle of Who Did the Deed was the focus, not the killing itself.

Every murder mystery involves the killing of one or more victims. IMO, lingering on the most inhumane details of causing slow death doesn't make the story a better read.

[Jeanne]

Yes so true.

[Lorraine]

I really enjoyed this, i much preferred it to the other BOTM. Gore doesn't bother me, but i thought it was quite mild.

[Pat]

Tastes differ, Lorraine, and it's good that gore doesn't bother you, as modern mysteries present it more graphically than The Golden Age mysteries did. I liked this book better than the other one, too, though both were well written.