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Rating: 
Summary: Close, But No Cigar...
Review: George Baxt has carved out an interesting niche in the mystery world, from the gay-themed Pharaoh Love series to the Celebrity series, which takes names like Dorothy Parker, Humphrey Bogart, Bette Davis and, of course, Alfred Hitchcock, and weaves them into mystery plots as amateur detectives. Because I like fictional versions of real people in my books, I was bound to come across Baxt at some point. For the most part, I can say I'm glad I did. His mysteries are usually entertaining and very funny, which works with an original character, like Pharaoh Love, or even with a character like Dorothy Parker, who you expect to be funny. But here we have Alfred Hitchcock, who had a wicked on-set sense of humor. But Baxt's portrayal here seems false somehow - Hitch and his wife Alma become embroiled in a plot that seems to come directly from one of Hitchcock's movies. It's complex and wry and gives one the impression that everyone knows what's going on but the hero (a staple of several of Hitch's spy movies). Many people die throughout the story and Alma & Hitch giggle through it all as though they were Nick and Nora Charles. But that isn't the problem. I'm okay with humorous mysteries. I'm okay with detectives who laugh in the face of death. But I'm afraid I wasn't prepared for Alfred Hitchcock laughing in the face of death. I suspect this is a failing of my own, but I didn't get the feeling that the characters were well-researched or portrayed effectively. One thing I did like was the "Dain Curse"-like plotting that stretched the story over several years.
Rating:
Summary: A Bit Too Confusing, this one.
Review: I found this book a little confusing, and it did not ring true in a lot of areas. For example, picturing Alfred Hitchcock as a devil-may-care spy for England. The relish that he displayed when faced with murder and kidnapping is certainly not the picture that I have of him in my mind. This book is quite different than The Dorothy Parker Murder Case which is the only other book of Baxt's that I've read so far. This was a spy story set just before the beginning of the Second World War. Maybe my assessment of the book has been tainted by the fact that I just finished reading Eric Ambler's "A Coffin for Dimitrios" - a spy story set about the same time as this one was. "Coffin" was a masterpiece, and this one just seemed a little inane. It is still quite funny in spots, and Hitch had a great sense of humour, and that shows up over and over in the book. Not bad for a romp.
Rating:
Summary: A Bit Too Confusing, this one.
Review: I found this book a little confusing, and it did not ring true in a lot of areas. For example, picturing Alfred Hitchcock as a devil-may-care spy for England. The relish that he displayed when faced with murder and kidnapping is certainly not the picture that I have of him in my mind. This book is quite different than The Dorothy Parker Murder Case which is the only other book of Baxt's that I've read so far. This was a spy story set just before the beginning of the Second World War. Maybe my assessment of the book has been tainted by the fact that I just finished reading Eric Ambler's "A Coffin for Dimitrios" - a spy story set about the same time as this one was. "Coffin" was a masterpiece, and this one just seemed a little inane. It is still quite funny in spots, and Hitch had a great sense of humour, and that shows up over and over in the book. Not bad for a romp.
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