Customer Reviews

Murder at Gettysburg (Mysteries in Time Series)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Don't let the title mislead you, this book is a poor excuse for a mystery. I was surprised to find that I had actually guessed the murderer and motive before I was even a third of the way into the book. Perhaps for someone who isn't a hardcore mystery fan it would take a little longer to figure it out, but still there's no genius to the murder mystery part. The plot was fast-paced, perhaps a bit too fast paced for my taste, but by being fast-paced it always has a interesting change of scenery. The romance in it was okay, at times it dragged unlike the story. Jim Walker certainly makes use of his knowledge of civil war history. (as far as that's concerned I'm impressed with the book) Anyone who enjoys reading Gilbert Morris's work will enjoy this book.

While I do agree with the others reviewers that this isn't a very complicated mystery novel, I still really enjoyed it. The story is very interesting and even if you've already figured out the murder part it's worth finishing. Jim Walker has written some of my favorite mysterys, the best being Murder on the Titanic and Voices from the Titanic.

Murder at Gettysburg works on none of the levels it attempts. As a murder mystery it is
dull and predictable-anyone could guess the murderer and murder weapon the instant the crime is discovered. The love story is completely unbelievable-a supposedly smart woman falls madly in love with a jerk in a day; and thinks someone her sister after having known her for an hour. But it is typical of all of the personal relationships in the book which are contrived and weak. None of the characters do anything believable, but only because the writer commanded them to. And the book fails as a historical novel. Walker's research seems to have consisted solely of reading "The Killer Angels"-from which he plagiarizes freely. He calls the Confederate battle flag the "Stars and Bars" has people from Gettysburg refer to their town as being in Western Pennsylvania. Walker may not have looked at a map, but if his characters acted like real people they would certainly know where they live. The forced inner dialogue and conversations written like a 5th grade lesson on the Civil War are repeated ad nauseam. The biggest surprise in this book is how it got published in the first place.