...because God knows you need some satisfaction in life besides shagging Captain Cardboard! And I never really liked you anyway. And you have stupid hair!

Spike ,'Selfless'


Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.

There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."


-t - May 27, 2021 1:46:20 pm PDT #26707 of 27912
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

Thanks for the spreadsheet, megan, having your extra information is going to be super helpful. I am already going to have to add The Man in the Brown Suit to my list (it was recommended to me somewhere else, although I can't remember where (and when I say it was recommended to me I think I mean I saw some mention of it that made me think "oh, I should read that, I don't remember that at all") and the others you have marked especially will get due consideration!


megan walker - May 27, 2021 10:30:22 pm PDT #26708 of 27912
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

Thanks for the spreadsheet, megan, having your extra information is going to be super helpful. I am already going to have to add The Man in the Brown Suit to my list (it was recommended to me somewhere else, although I can't remember where (and when I say it was recommended to me I think I mean I saw some mention of it that made me think "oh, I should read that, I don't remember that at all") and the others you have marked especially will get due consideration!

You're welcome!

The Man in the Brown Suit has always been one of my faves. It's more like a spy novel than anything else. If you are still using Goodreads, everything that is marked as re-read on there is logged with a short review, except for last four or five. (I could have sworn I had done those but I've been bad about writing things up this past year.)


Toddson - May 28, 2021 7:59:02 am PDT #26709 of 27912
Friends don't let friends read "Atlas Shrugged"

It occurred to me - if you're going through "golden age" mysteries, have you tried John Dickson Carr (who also wrote as Carter Dickson and Carr Dickson)? American, but he moved to England in the ... 1920s? 1930s? ... and set most of his stories there. He was known as "the master of the locked-room mystery" ... just thought of him because I'm re-reading one of his books now.


Sophia Brooks - May 28, 2021 8:05:25 am PDT #26710 of 27912
Cats to become a rabbit should gather immediately now here

I read so many John Dickson Carr as a kid/teen!


-t - May 28, 2021 11:00:19 am PDT #26711 of 27912
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

I have not read John Dickson Carr - I put him on my list because I do like locked room mysteries and I have no idea why I haven't read him but he wrote a lot of books and has 4 detectives, apparently, and that's a little daunting. But he's currently scheduled in between Josephine Tey (reread) and Dashiell Hammett (I feel like I have to read The Thin Man for "gentleman detective" purposes and probably should read The Maltese Falcon on general principals)

Confession - the making of the spreadsheet portion of any project feels more rewarding than it probably deserves


-t - May 28, 2021 11:11:57 am PDT #26712 of 27912
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

I've also added Mary Roberts Rinehart who apparently wrote a book called The Bat that was made into a movie called The Bat Whispers that inspired Bob Kane so I have to read that and she also wrote a gazillion other mysteries that I will need to read at least some of...she actually started publishing in 1908 so she'll be a good pre-Golden Age datapoint at the very least


Toddson - May 28, 2021 11:37:06 am PDT #26713 of 27912
Friends don't let friends read "Atlas Shrugged"

John Dickson Carr's detective, Dr. Fell, was supposedly based on G.K. Chesterton. And he had several that had others as the detectives (if I remember correctly).

I don't know if it was based on the Rinehart book, but I've seen a movie called "The Bat" with Vincent Price and Agnes Moorhead. It's better than you'd think. Murders - both serial and one-off, innocent person accused of embezzlement, secret rooms.


-t - May 28, 2021 12:14:57 pm PDT #26714 of 27912
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

That's one of the 3 movies based on it. Apparently it was originally a play based on MRR's first book The Circular Staircase, the play was then novelized, and filmed in 1926, 1930, and 1959


megan walker - May 28, 2021 1:25:02 pm PDT #26715 of 27912
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

I've read The Circular Staircase (mostly because I thought it was the inspiration for Siodmak's The Spiral Staircase, another Old Dark House mystery that was actually based on Ethel Lina White's Some Must Watch. She also wrote The Wheel Spins, on which Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes was based and which I have read as well. The movie is better.)

Regardless, The Circular Staircase contains one of my favorite lines anywhere: "I stirred my tea angrily."

I haven't seen any of the versions of The Bat though I'd like to at some point.


Laura - Jun 01, 2021 6:22:12 am PDT #26716 of 27912
Our wings are not tired.

Goodreads reminded me that I could read The Ship of Stolen Words so that is now on my Nook. Yay!