Rating: 
Summary: Cunning, and smooth
Review: The Club Dumas rings like an Eco novel, but plays very much in the unique style of Perez-Reverte. "Shadowing" various plot elements from Alexandre Dumas's novel The Three Musketeers, it craftily weaves them together with medieval Devil lore and book antiquariation. Its surreal atmosphere and colorful locations (Southeastern Europe) are well employed by Perez-Reverte's skill at the mystery thriller.The ending is particularly good, but I daresay that Perez-Reverte's main characters seem to be remarkably similar. Which, much like this habits of Martin Cruz Smith, can be rather annoying. Alas.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Vague
Review: This book was impressively complex -- with the author's obvious deep research into old books and writers. Of course, it helps if you've read "The Three Musketeers." I wish I had. I probably would have appreciated this book more. The build up was exciting, but the ending was a little too watered down. What happened? Who was the girl? Who had sent her? Was I missing something?
Rating: 
Summary: The Club Dumas
Review: An amazing book. It is one of few books I have read that successfully combines action and high art. It is very entertaining but not disposable. Given all of the information on manuscrict forgery etc. the book moves along quickly, is always entertaining, is written with wit and grace and never degenerates into purposely esoteric dry intellectualism.
Rating:
Summary: Fun Page-Turner Spoiled By Trick Ending
Review: Like The Flanders Panel, this falls into the category of "literary mystery," although it'll most likely show up on the fiction shelves in stores and libraries. The hero is Corso, a loner mercenary who makes his living hunting down rare books for dealers and collectors. Corso has little else going on in his life (he lives in some torment, having been left by a true love years ago) and ready crisscrosses Europe searching out duty old tomes for a 30% comission. The plot weaves together his attempt to authenticate a handwritten chapter of a Dumas (French author best known for "The Three Muskateers") manuscript for a friend, and his comission by a wealthy collector to investigate a book of witchcraft called De Umbrarum Regni Novem Portis (The Book of the Nine Doors to the Kingdom of Darkness). The tone is dark all the way through, as Corso is shadowed, attacked and evenutally confronts his foes. It's a page-turner, but suffers from a trick ending that wouldn't be as irksome if it weren't a touch too ambiguous.
Rating:
Summary: An intelligent tease but no real climax
Review: The Club Dumas is an interesting exercise in the craft of fiction. It tries, ultimately unsuccessfully I think, to blend a complex, deliberately artificial mystery plot with a number of elements of more serious fiction that are simply diminished by the artifice. An interesting cast of characters (especially Lucas Corso, the book hunter) is set in motion with multiple, seemingly unrelated, objectives which, over the course of the novel, come together in unexpected ways. There are multiple mysteries to solve and nothing is really as it seems. The reader is titillated constantly and kept expectant and in the dark. It isn't until the last few pages of the book that the mystery(s) are resolved - one after another in a cascading sequence of not very satisfactory revelations. That being said, it is important to note that I enjoyed almost every page of this book. From the inside information on antiquarian book dealers and forgers to the details of Alexander Dumas's working habits to all the esoteric details of Satanic manuscripts from the Middle Ages, the story is packed with detail that few book lovers can avoid finding interesting. But the story itself is ultimately unconvincing and the reader is left with very little emotional investment in the fate of the characters. If one doesn't mind an artful tease, knowing that the book won't go all the way, then this is still an interesting, if not satisfying, reading experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Horrible.
Review: I expected more. A lot more. This book was vastly irritating. Here's the short version of my grievances: 1/3 of this book is taken up with grating, failed Raymond Chandler-type descriptions of the various facial expressions the main character makes, and how they resemble various woodland creatures such as rabbits and wolves. All of this nonsense perplexed me until I looked at the author's picture on the dust jacket. He looks kind of like a bunny. 1/3 of it is taken up with him being menaced by a shadowy group of sinister RENAISSANCE FAIR TYPES who act out "The Three Musketeers". ooo, spooky. I realized about halfway through that this book was little more than a fancy Nancy Drew mystery. 1/3 of it deals with someone finding a book that summons satan. Not bad, if done right. Not done right. None of these goofy plot threads have much to do with each other, and the whole thing comes across as an attempt at an Umberto Eco book written by a college student.
Rating:
Summary: You are cordially invited to join The Club Dumas.
Review: I have to both thank and curse Roman Polanski for adapting Perez-Reverte's novel to the screen (as The Ninth Gate). I thank him because I went out and procurred "The Club Dumas" soon after seeing the film. I curse him for basically demolishing the novel in his adaptation (I know, it's not an atypical thing in movie adapations; nonetheless, it is disappointing) The novel captivated me from start to finish. The plot contains two major threads which intertwine in unforseen ways as the protagonist, Corso, an unscrupulous rare book dealer, takes on two apparently unrelated assignments: For a friend--the authentication of a manuscript fragment of Dumas' "The Three Musketeers"; the other,for a wealthy collector of demonology--to compare and authenticate three copies of a rare book, "The Nine Gates..." containing engravings whose author, legend has it, is the devil. Corso soon has more than old books on his hands as dead bodies start turning up and he finds himself being pursued by a strange man with a scar. To his amazement, the people in his life seem to be taking on the character and behavior of those in Dumas' 3 Musketeers. What role does Corso play in this game? The two threads, Dumas' "Three musketeers" and "The Nine Gates...", get an equal and fascinating treatment. The business of rare book collecting and authentication methods becomes, in Perez-Reverte's hands, fascinating. The author weaves all into an eminently readable mystery containing a good deal of verbal repartee and comedy a la "The Three Musketeers" combined with what I would say is a very subtle supernatural edge and at times a great depth of feeling. For those willing to read between the lines to get to the heart of of the matter, this book is much more than a mystery story. Unfortunately, while Polanski's "Ninth Gate" generally gets the tone right, Polanski tosses out the Dumas thread entirely, changes the motivation and reason d'etre of major characters, and exaggerates the supernatural elements (To go on further about the film would turn this into a film review). Reading Club Dumas inspired me to read Dumas' "Three Musketeers" and now I recommend reading it before "Club Dumas." Doing so will just give the reader a lot more context for what happens in the Reverte. Either way, "Club Dumas" is a great read.
Rating:
Summary: Not his best, but...
Review: Great expectations I had with this book because I loved "La Piel del Tambor" and "El Maestro de Esgrima", they weren't fullfiled; I found rather boring and tedious all the parts about the devil and longed for more about Dumas and the musketeers. Maybe is because I have read a lot about ocultism and I used to enjoy reading the tarot that I wasn't particullary interested in such a superficial view of it. "The Club Dumas" is not my favorite Perez Reverte, but he is always a good read and in his works you will find enjoyable antiheroes and more than a good laugh.
Rating:
Summary: Reading, we read ourselves
Review: After watching the film "The Ninth Gate," I began The Club Dumas with the expectation that I would become immersed in the world of rare books. I wasn't disappointed. Perez-Reverte conveys the tactile pleasures of fragile pages, leather bindings, and the printer's art with the adoration of an antiquarian. But the author goes beyond the physical nature of books to explore how a story unfolds within a reader's mind. I was surprised that the plot, unlike in the movie, revolves around Alexandre Dumas' body of work rather than a tome on the occult--or does it? We the readers become as confounded as Corso once we agree to follow him through what seems to be his scripted fate. As we lose ourselves in the story (any story), we choose our assumptions about what is happening in the text. Besides the wonderfully subtle exploration of reader as audience/actor, I also recommend the book because of the humor and Perez-Reverte's beautiful language. I wish I could have read this in the original Spanish! Maybe the literal gloom of the movie is a projection of the mental confusion we feel when we read a story and try to understand every aspect of it. Can we stand apart from a book in order to analyze it when, by involving ourselves in it, we become part of it? This is a great "Hmmm, I wonder" book.
Rating:
Summary: forget ninth gate, think "the devil in love"
Review: The Dumas Club is a throughly enjoyable read. but be warned, it's full of (explained) literary references, so if you just want the explosions and daemons you felt jipped out of in The Ninth Gate, look elsewhere. also, this is not the book version of the ninth gate. Mr. Pereze-reverte, i'm assuming, read and incredible book that was out of print and saugt to share it: for all intents and purposed, it's a remake of Jaques Cazotte's 18th century novella "the devil in love". don't believe me? read it. the story lines of the dumas manuscript and the ninth gate are secondary stories. Lucas needed the distractions Alvaro had to keep him from overly second guessing his companion. It reads much better when you realize it's about Lucas and Irene, and the writer has the freedom to romaticise and frankly look at their relationship. i'm pretty sure no one would have appreaciated it if Cazotte had permitted Alvaro and Biondetta. and we may never of heard the story if he hadn't brought it back.
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