The Dog Collar Murders (Paperback)

by Barbara Wilson (Author) "WHEN PENNY AND I were eight years old she went through a wedding phase..." (more)
Key Phrases: Loie Marsh, Nicky Kay, Gracie London (more...)

Product Details

• Paperback: 203 pages
• Publisher: Seal Press; 1st edition (May 3, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0931188695
• ISBN-13: 978-0931188695
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 1.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,902,839 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Detective story or feminist pamphlet?, September 3, 2001

By	Anselm de Beauville (Paris (France)) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Dog Collar Murders (Paperback)

Barbara Wilson: The Dog Collar Murders

The book takes you back to those days of clear distinction between goodies and baddies, the Nicaragua solidarity movement and the ideological self-conscious feminist anti-porn activists of the 1980s. This side of the book is utterly amusing if you still remember how it then was. This feminist worlds atmosphere of prudishness, sexual inhibition translated into anti-porn activity, the bigotry and fear of sex, the McCarthyish, almost fascist readiness to oppress other opinions by all means. It is amusing because this ideology never gained much power in society  if it had, the book would be guilty of making things look more harmless than they were.

However the book is meant to be a detective story. And as such it is utterly boring because one third of it are theoretical discussions that make the book look like a rather shallow essay on feminism and sexual exploitation and pornography etc. It is possible to mix detective stories with political messages. But it has to be very well done to be convincing. Read the books by Sjöwall/Waalhöö and T. Mankell (both are Swedish but widely translated) if you want to see what I mean.

Wilsons story line is unrefined, the language unimaginative and schematic. Although the murderer is only predictable from about the beginning of the last third of the book, the final revelation does not satisfy  because the personalities are so poorly drawn that they give no feeling for them as persons. And so unmasking on of them as murderer does not mean much even at this stage the person, i.e. after over 200 pp is not much more than a name on paper. Wilson in this book compares herself to Agatha Christie  a bit presumptuous. A huge bit, actually.