Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Packed full of dastardly adventures, hilarious characters and a mystery with a diamond at its heart, 28 Dec 2007
T S Eliot called The Moonstone "the first, the longest and the best of modern English detective novels". It's hard not to agree. The Moonstone, an enormous diamond of religious significance, is vilely plundered by a British soldier during the taking of Seringapatam in 1799. The Moonstone is brought back to England and, eventually, given to the prim, beautiful and wilful heiress, Rachel Verinder, on her birthday in 1848. And it goes missing the very same night. Rachel's family and friends are keen to recover the lost stone and to identify the thief and thus call upon the services of Sergeant Cuff, the most celebrated and successful detective that Scotland Yard can offer. Yet Rachel is strangely reluctant to assist in the investigation, and the professional sleuth is not the only one searching for the stone and for answers. Three juggling Indians accompanied by a clairvoyant young boy, a ruthless London money lender and an amiable philanthropist all seem to have their own interests in recovering the stone, while others including Rachel and a reformed thief turned servant girl, seem at least as anxious to conceal certain facts surrounding its disappearance. The stage is thus set for a gripping detective story full of twists and turns and unexpected developments, all centred on the Verinder's country house in Yorkshire.
Written in a semi- epistolary style, with several of the major characters telling the parts of the story with which they were most concerned from their own perspective, Collins' novel has strong gothic overtones and much in common with the `big-house' novels written earlier in the century and serves as a bridge with the swelter of English detective fiction which was to follow. It is long, but you hardly notice as Collins whisks his mystery from India to Yorkshire, to London, to Brighton and back to Yorkshire. Elegant prose reminiscent of yet lighter than Dickens encapsulates an enchanting mystery with magical, even fantastical overtones, and presents a series of warm, engaging, if somewhat stereotypical characters: who can forgot the admirable Gabriel Betteredge, with his mystic faith in the powers of Robinson Crusoe to provide answers to daily difficulties, or the misunderstood Erza Jennings, with his face so much older than his body and his two-tone hair?
A sheer delight to read, like some much detective fiction, it does not demand to be taken seriously, yet for the careful reader, there are on offer deeper strains of tension over class, over Empire, and over religious differences and good and evil, which one might more readily associate with the post-war literature of a cosmopolitan diaspora.
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7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Collins' second best, 22 Jun 2005
Not as good as the Woman in White, the Moonstone is still a very good book. Told from various first person viewpoints, the Moonstone is a stolen diamond. What is original in this book is that the focus is not on the recovery of the diamond, but on resolving the mystery of the theft. The novel takes several completely unexpected twists, although the reader will be able to guess whodunnit after about 250 pages, how Wilkie Collins gets us to the conclusion is excellent, and he sows seeds of doubt into the reader's mind in every chapter.The only slight criticism of this book is that it can start to drag at times, but once the book gets to the halfway point you won't want to put it down.
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7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A fantastic detective story to while away the hours, 5 April 2003
By A Customer
This was my favourite book in a English module at university entitled "Dickens, Collins and Detection". It is written from the point of view of different narrators, including an old House-Steward who finds the answer to all of life's questions in his trusty copy of Robinson Crusoe, which gives the reader a break from one narrative voice throughout. Collins' novel traces the theft of an Indian yellow Diamond known as The Moonstone. Follow the exploits of characters such as Rosanna, Franklin Blake, Ezra Jennings, Limping Lucy, Sergeant Cuff and his obsession with roses and comical Miss Clack and her well meant readings in this entertaining novel. Definately a good read and a perfect way to get into Collins' works.
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