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Aug. 12th, 2021 11:02 pmSo far on this trip I'm averaging about one yellowed paperback a day; I've knocked out three to date, although as I am now reluctantly abandoning the cottage bookshelf to instead attack some of the things I brought with me I don't expect the streak to continue.
Anyway, the second book was Christie's The Man in the Brown Suit, an entertaining and funny but deeply racist thriller-romance from 1926 about a Plucky Young Adventuress who accidentally stumbles onto a Clue in the middle of a murder case and then decides to blow the last of her very limited cash on a ticket to South Africa to attempt to pursue the murderer because a.) she has no better prospects and b.) sounds like fun and also, c.), why the fuck not!
Anne "sounds like fun and why the fuck not" Beddingfield continues to be an extremely vibrant if occasionally alarming protagonist to follow. (In a mid-century thriller thematic twist, she also is the daughter of an archaeologist who has no wish to follow in his foosteps but whose specialized knowledge about brachiocephalic heads occasionally comes in useful.) Midway through she gains an additional motivation for Adventure when a gravely wounded murder suspect rolls through her door, reluctantly allows her to patch him up, is extremely rude to her, and disappears again.
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: Anne, darling, you've met the murderer! If you catch him could make your fortune selling your story to the papers, which would be really helpful for you, because you have literally no money, and also very convenient since you've already scammed your way into getting hired as a fake newspaper correspondent!
ANNE: ABSOLUTELY not
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: why not??
ANNE: because we have exchanged three words and I am now madly in love with him! sorry!!
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: but he is a murderer???
ANNE: I mean I'm pretty sure he didn't do it. It's not that I don't think he's capable of murder, because I think he absolutely is and I think that is very sexy of him, it's just that the victim was strangled with a rope and I personally think he would have done it with his bare hands if he did it at all, which is also very sexy of him
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: .... well, far be it from me to kinkshame?? I guess???
And, to be fair, the next time Anne and the murder suspect meet he does place his hands around her neck and threaten to strangle her and she does continue to find it very fun and sexy, so while one may question the wisdom of this romance overall one cannot deny that Anne is a woman who Knows Herself.
Anne's passion for ADVENTURE and also for THIS RUDE POSSIBLY-MURDERER leads her into various perils along the lines of kidnapping, and being framed for crimes and getting trapped on remote desert islands being shot at by evil minions, which, to her credit, she usually gets herself promptly right out of again without losing any of her good spirits and zest for life.
Anne's POV chapters, meanwhile, are interspersed with entries from the diary of her occasional traveling companion Sir Eustace Pedlar, a jovially lazy middle-aged lord overwhelmingly beleaguered with secretaries who is unfortunate enough to own the house in which the strangled murder victim was found. Pedlar's chapters are very funny as a counterpoint to Anne's, especially when Anne is inclined to consider various characters Extremely Sinister and Pedlar is determined to present them as stressed-out minor characters in a workplace comedy.
Unfortunately this all happens in various African countries under colonial rule, which, again, gives Agatha Christie all-too-plentiful opportunities to be racist! Not to mention using what appears to be a full revolution against colonial rule in Rhodesia as a charmingly misguided and inconsequential backdrop against which our British protagonists can have exciting adventures with no real long-term consequences! So, you know.
( end of book spoilers )
Anyway, the second book was Christie's The Man in the Brown Suit, an entertaining and funny but deeply racist thriller-romance from 1926 about a Plucky Young Adventuress who accidentally stumbles onto a Clue in the middle of a murder case and then decides to blow the last of her very limited cash on a ticket to South Africa to attempt to pursue the murderer because a.) she has no better prospects and b.) sounds like fun and also, c.), why the fuck not!
Anne "sounds like fun and why the fuck not" Beddingfield continues to be an extremely vibrant if occasionally alarming protagonist to follow. (In a mid-century thriller thematic twist, she also is the daughter of an archaeologist who has no wish to follow in his foosteps but whose specialized knowledge about brachiocephalic heads occasionally comes in useful.) Midway through she gains an additional motivation for Adventure when a gravely wounded murder suspect rolls through her door, reluctantly allows her to patch him up, is extremely rude to her, and disappears again.
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: Anne, darling, you've met the murderer! If you catch him could make your fortune selling your story to the papers, which would be really helpful for you, because you have literally no money, and also very convenient since you've already scammed your way into getting hired as a fake newspaper correspondent!
ANNE: ABSOLUTELY not
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: why not??
ANNE: because we have exchanged three words and I am now madly in love with him! sorry!!
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: but he is a murderer???
ANNE: I mean I'm pretty sure he didn't do it. It's not that I don't think he's capable of murder, because I think he absolutely is and I think that is very sexy of him, it's just that the victim was strangled with a rope and I personally think he would have done it with his bare hands if he did it at all, which is also very sexy of him
ANNE'S SOPHISTICATED SHIPBOARD BFF: .... well, far be it from me to kinkshame?? I guess???
And, to be fair, the next time Anne and the murder suspect meet he does place his hands around her neck and threaten to strangle her and she does continue to find it very fun and sexy, so while one may question the wisdom of this romance overall one cannot deny that Anne is a woman who Knows Herself.
Anne's passion for ADVENTURE and also for THIS RUDE POSSIBLY-MURDERER leads her into various perils along the lines of kidnapping, and being framed for crimes and getting trapped on remote desert islands being shot at by evil minions, which, to her credit, she usually gets herself promptly right out of again without losing any of her good spirits and zest for life.
Anne's POV chapters, meanwhile, are interspersed with entries from the diary of her occasional traveling companion Sir Eustace Pedlar, a jovially lazy middle-aged lord overwhelmingly beleaguered with secretaries who is unfortunate enough to own the house in which the strangled murder victim was found. Pedlar's chapters are very funny as a counterpoint to Anne's, especially when Anne is inclined to consider various characters Extremely Sinister and Pedlar is determined to present them as stressed-out minor characters in a workplace comedy.
Unfortunately this all happens in various African countries under colonial rule, which, again, gives Agatha Christie all-too-plentiful opportunities to be racist! Not to mention using what appears to be a full revolution against colonial rule in Rhodesia as a charmingly misguided and inconsequential backdrop against which our British protagonists can have exciting adventures with no real long-term consequences! So, you know.
( end of book spoilers )
