Customer Reviews

The Moonstone (Penguin Readers, Level 6)

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As many reviewers have noted, T.S. Eliot called `The Moonstone' "the first and greatest English detective novel." Is the novel worthy of such praise? We shall see...

The story begins with a brief prologue describing how the famous yellow diamond was captured during a military campaign in India by a British officer in 1799. The action moves quickly to 1848 England, where, according to the British officer's will, the diamond has been given to one of the soldier's young relatives, Rachel Verinder. Yet only hours after the diamond arrives at the Verinder estate, it disappears. Was it stolen by a relative? A servant? And who are these three Indian men who keep hanging around the estate?

`The Moonstone' is told from the point of view of several characters. The first portion of the tale is told by Gabriel Betteredge, house steward of the Verinder estate, who has been working for the family practically his entire life. Although over 200 pages, Betteredge's account holds the reader's interest as he introduces the main players and the crime itself. The next account, by distant Verinder relative Miss Clack, is humorous and somewhat important, but far too long (nearly 100 pages) for its relevance to the story. But after Miss Clack's account, things really take off at breakneck speed.

Readers who latch onto the T.S. Eliot quote expecting a modern detective tale will be sorely disappointed. You aren't going to see anything resembling Jeffrey Deaver, James Patterson, Sue Grafton, or even Mary Higgins Clark. You also won't see Mickey Spillane, Dashiel Hammett, or Raymond Chandler. Nor will you see Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, or Martha Grimes. You won't even see Arthur Conan Doyle. But you WILL see the novel that influenced them all.

You'll also see something else. Something that modern mystery/detective writers have for the most part lost. Characters. Oh sure, modern writers have characters, but for the most part, the reader only learns enough about the character to forward the plot. In our time, plot is King. When `The Moonstone' was published (1868), one of the novel's attractions was its characters. Collins has painted each of these characters so well that the reader feels that they know not only how they look, but their mannerisms, their movements, how they think, and their view of the world they live in. That type of character development is seriously lacking today, not from all writers, but from far too many.

Of course, the down side is that Colllins also took over 500 pages to develop those characters. Is the book too long? For most modern readers, the answer is yes. I believe it all has to do with your expectation. Put modern mystery/detective stories out of your head. Then read `The Moonstone' as you would any other novel. Get lost in the atmosphere and the characters. Immerse yourself. Most of all, enjoy. Reading `The Moonstone' is like eating at a fine restaurant after months of fast food. When it's over, you just want to sit back in your favorite chair and say, "It's nice to know that the finer things are still available." Yes they are. Treat yourself to this gourmet book.

522 pages

I have become a recent convert to Victorian literature. Educated as an electrical engineer, I did not appreciate literature until I reached my 70's. This book is to the modern detective novel as Maxwell's equations are to the wireless engineer of today. All the modern detective novels follow the basics exhibited in Moonstone, but usually fall far short because they leave out one or more of the "equations". A thoroughly gripping and inventive novel by a master.

THE MOONSTONE was the first mystery story, and it in many ways remains one of the most remarkable. Working in the shadow of the Gothic and Romantic literary traditions, Wilkie Collins managed to create something new and unique. Instead of the endless evocation of atmosphere and focusing on sinister villains, Collins focuses instead on a simple mystery and its solution: who stole the diamond known as the Moonstone, and where did it go? But any reader of the novel knows that the mystery is secondary to the exposition and the marvelous parade of characters. It isn't the getting to the resolution of the mystery that is the main thing, but the process of getting there.

One of the great attractions of the novel is the extraordinary style of the writing. Although the first English mystery story, it had not yet devolved into a genre, and Collins was not aware that a mystery story could not also be great literature. As a result, he imbued his characters with enormous charm and give them each a vivid manner in expressing themselves. The multiple narratives by this remarkable characters was a strategy to deal with the problem of authorial point of view. On the one hand, Collins wanted to avoid the omniscient narrator who would know the truth both about each character and about the myster of the fate of the diamond. Collins therefore cast the novel in the form of a succession of narratives by the various participants in the novel. He thereby limits the knowledge of each narrator, but he also is able thereby to provide considerable variation in the style of each narrative. The two most remarkable segments are those by Gabriel Betteridge, House-Steward in the service of Lady Verinder and her cousin Miss Clack, a prim and fervid evangelical Christian whose missionary zeal and prudish moralizing provide many of the funniest moments of the novel. The style of these two could not be more distinct, both from the rest of the narratives and from each other. Miss Clack has constantly to fight a tendency to sermonize. She is apt to turn out passages such as: "A thundering knock at the street door startled us all. I looked through the window, and saw the World the Flesh, and the Devil waiting before the house--as typified in a carriage and horses, a powdered footman, and three of the most audaciously dressed women I ever beheld in my life." Betteridge, on the other hand, is solid, practical, a tad parochial, but ferociously loyal to his employer. For him the good life consists of a good pipe and a copy of ROBINSON CRUSOE at hand. If one laughs a bit at Miss Clack, the reader comes to thoroughly like Betteredge. Between the two of them, their narrative occupy more than half the novel. The others are also quite enjoyable, but not to the degree that these two are.

THE MOONSTONE is a page turner, which is to say that it is a delight to read. One wants to read quickly both because each page is such a joy and because one wants to discover what happens next. The characters are mainly enjoyable, but like so many authors his eccentric characters are far more memorable and enjoyable than his central characters. Betteredge, Miss Clack, and Sgt. Cuff far outstrip the "hero" of the book, who while a good citizen, is from a literary point of view a tad boring.

I can agree with those readers who consider THE WOMAN IN WHITE a better book, but this is another of those comparisons that are odious. The book is so enjoyable, fun, and memorable that I can't imagine any reader lamenting during the course of its pages that they weren't reading the other book instead.

Almost everyone has heard of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Sherlock Holmes, whereas his predecessor Wilkie Collins has been relegated to footnote status. However writers in the "golden age" of detective mysteries, especially Dorothy Sayers, were very aware of Collins and his influence.

The Moonstone uses a clever device whereby the narrative is passed from hand to hand to tell the story of the massive yellow diamond called the Moonstone. Ill-gotten spoils from colonial India, the Moonstone vanished for a generation until it was bequeathed as an 18th-birthday gift to Rachel Verinder. The engaging characters who tell the story of the mysterious disappearance of the Moonstone on Miss Verinder's birthday, each with his or her unique background and perspective, kept me following the story until the end. Collins also depicts the setting in rural England of Rachel Verinder's home town very effectively and without romanticizing. Unexpectedly, the famous detective plays a minor and reluctant role. In the end, I found the actual method of commiting the crime to be a bit unbelievable, but because I enjoyed the storytelling so much this was a minor quibble.

I purchased this novel based on other Amazon reviews and I just loved it!! It's clever, engaging, and definitely a page turner. Get it!

The Moonstone is a cleverly contrived tale of a stolen Indian dimond which becomes the dangerous inheritance of Rachel Vendier. When the incredible dimond is stolen, for the second time, the seemimly simple case becomes a masterpiece of mystery and suspense. The novel entangles us in every page. We become lost in the emotions of the 19th century characters. When the mystery begins to unfold, we delieghtedly press on, only to find that Collins has outwitted us again. Collins has an amazing talent for assuming a variety of narrative voices, which keep the reader envolved with the individual characters. Each new clue elicits thousands of questions, arousing in the reader, a desire to read on and on. The Moonstone is the most outstanding cassic detective mystery novel ever written.

T.S. Eliot was not exaggerating when he dubbed Collins' masterpiece "the first, the longest, and the best of modern English detective novels". The Moonstone, first published in 1868, is the magnum opus of suspense and intrigue that will surely please the avid mystery and/or classics buff.

The adventure begins when the priceless yellow diamond from India, known as the 'Moonstone', is brought to English as spoils of war and is bestowed upon the spirited Rachel Verrinder on her 18th birthday. Chaos soon commences. The valuable jewel is stolen that very night and the entire household falls under suspicion - including a hunchbacked maid, an assemblage of enigmatic Indian jugglers, and Miss Verrinder's cousin Mr. Franklin Blake. Suspicion of thievery does not even escape Miss Verrinder herself. The famed Sergeant Cuff is summoned to the house to try and make sense of the baffling mystery of the diamond's disappearance and the strange events that ensue.

The Moonstone is comprised of three novelettes and a handful of sub-sections, each narrated by three individuals (and a handful of other characters writing shorter supporting memoirs), with their own whimsical writing styles and detailed anecdotes about their adventures surrounding the jewel's disappearance and the aftermath. Their varying perspectives on incidents throw interesting light on the events unraveling around the reader. Introducing the novel is the household's elderly and garrulous manservant, Mr. Gabriel Betteredge, with his witty maxims and proverbial quotes from his personal bible, "Robinson Crusoe". The pious and almost-fanatical Miss Clack's cold recital of events, is followed soon after by Mr. Franklin Blake's narrative of events, and the mystery's final and most ingenious outcome. It will not disappoint.

I leave you with a bit of insight bestowed upon us by the lovable and amusing Mr. Betteredge:

"When my spirits are bad -- Robinson Crusoe. When I want advice -- Robinson Crusoe. In past times when my wife plagued me; in present times when I have had a drop too much -- Robinson Crusoe. I have worn out six stout Robinson Crusoes with hard work in my service. On my lady's last birthday she gave me a seventh. I took a drop too much on the strength of it; and Robinson Crusoe put me right again. Price four shillings and sixpence, bound in blue, with a picture into the bargain. Still, this don't look much like starting the story of the Diamond -- does it? I seem to be wandering off in search of Lord knows what, Lord knows where. We will take a new sheet of paper, if you please, and begin over again, with my best respects to you."

Wilkie Collins is considered by many to be the "Inventor" of the modern mystery. I state this not as an absolute, rather as a commonly held literary opinion. Other reviewers often refer to Mr. Collins in a review of a Charles Palliser Novel, or many others who are at the top of the Mystery Genre today. Mr. Collins was also a contemporary, literary collaborator, and business partner of another rather well known writer, Charles Dickens.

This book later would influence the novel that Charles Dickens was never to complete "The Mystery Of Edwin Drood" due to his death in the midst of writing what was his final novel. There was a common denominator in these novels and it related to a drug, Laudanum. Mr. Collins was a user of the substance however I have never read of Mr. Dickens also having used the drug. When preparing for the book he was never to finish, Collins took Dickens to the opium dens of London, whether or not Dickens participated is a mystery along with the ending of his final work.

Laudanum is a key factor in the mystery of the "Moonstone" that the book revolves around. Collins wanted to write a story that would be directly impacted by the use of the drug on a person or persons, with or without their knowledge, and how their behavior would be affected during a dramatic event while under the influence.

Mr. Collins as mentioned was a consumer of this drug, when he set out to write the book he stated, "he would write the story as it would have happened, not how it may have happened". He was referring to his own experiences with the opiate, which takes an already complicated plot and adds the altered behavior Laudanum can have. The book is as complex as Palliser's "Quincunx", but I find it easier to follow "Moonstone".

To the extent you feel a familiarity with the Author it may be because so much of what is written today is derivative. The "Diamond" that plays center stage in this work during the England of Queen Victoria was astonishingly "new" when published. I believe were it published again today under a new title and Author, it would be found again on the Bestseller Lists, as it was over a century ago,

Mr. Collins writes with an elegant hand, which immerses the reader and binds him or her to the characters and the roles they play. The book is not brief as this was a time when Authors wrote as much as was needed, not what was allowed or could potentially be shown at the local multiplex.

From the moment the diamond is found, and the story unfolds, clearly for some, less clearly for those who may have been influenced by something other than the dinner wine, the book will delight any reader of Mysteries. If Mr. Collins was not the absolute first to write a modern mystery, he certainly has yet to be surpassed by any other's pen.

The Moonstone and The Woman in White are considered to be the best works of Wilkie Collins. Maybe so, but the novels differ tremendously. The Woman in White is a page-turning thriller of frantic proportions ... to the extent it almost feels like a slapstick comedy. The Moonstone is a straightforward crime story, complete with well-developed characters and interesting dialogue, culminating in solving the mystery: who stole the Moonstone (..a collosal diamond)?. The story is never dull, but compared to The Woman in White it is hopelessly conventional.

So I recommend The Woman in White over The Moonstone for most people. However if you prefer a more leisurely, conventional (ie, less complicated) read then The Moonstone might be more enjoyable for you. You really can't go wrong either way.

This is an excellent mystery. I read it after reading "The Woman in White." I like the Woman in White better, but both are incredible. Once I got used to the style (1800's British), it is a great read. He is one of my favorite authors.