Customer Reviews

Sweet Death, Kind Death (A Kate Fansler Novel)

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THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST IN READING THE REMARKABLE AMANDA CROSS MYSTERIES Run, don't walk to the Amazon Store, and COLLECT the Amanda Cross Series. They should be read in chronological order. And what will one find in this combination fun/learning experience? · Cerebral Puzzles and Urbanity · Witty, Intelligent Writing · Good Humor and Great Fun · A Story Beautifully Told And always, the joys of literature, the dynamics of feminism, the dastardly brutality of academic life, the pleasure of "gorgeous" writing, the challenge of brilliant plots - and a very likeable, sophisticated, human heroine. IN THE LAST ANALYSIS (1964) Psychiatry, psychologists, Freud, process, theory. "I didn't say I objected to Freud, " Kate said. "I said I objected to what Joyce called freudful errors - all those nonsensical conclusions leaped to by people with no reticence and less mind." THE JAMES JOYCE MURDER (1967) Joyce and Ulysses, Dublin, dedicated to "the first reader of this - and other things." POETIC JUSTICE (1970) Mystery and a passion for W.H. Auden. "Though one cannot always Remember exactly why one has been happy, There is no forgetting that one was." "Looking up at the stars, I know quite well That, for all they care, I can go to hell, But on earth indifference is the least We have to dread from man or beast." THE THEBIAN MYSTERIES (1971) A seminar on Antigone. "An ancient tragedy, a modern demise and a mystery to baffle the gods!" and as read in Antigone, "No, though a man be wise, 'tis no shame for him to learn many things, and to bend in season." THE QUESTION OF MAX (1976) "A bit of homicide, much wit, and lashings." Scholars, famous writers, literary circles. A taste of Walt Whitman, Wilde, Eliot, Oxford. Dissertations, literary executors, biographical writings. DEATH IN A TENURED POSITION (1981) The death of the first woman professor in Harvard's English Department Academic politics, endowed chairs, Gertrude Stein: You are so afraid of losing your moral sense that you are not willing to take it through anything more dangerous than a mud-puddle." SWEET DEATH, KIND DEATH (1984) Women in academe, the politics of gender studies. Iris Murdoch: "Only in our virtues are we original, because virtue is difficult . . . .Vices are general, virtues are particular." And George Eliot: "Few women, I fear, have had such reason as I have to think the long, sad years of youth were worth living for the sake of middle age." NO WORD FROM WINIFRED (1986) Journals, novels, intrigue, literature, academic meetings, papers, women talking with each other, faculty politics. A TRAP FOR FOOLS (1989) Women faculty and lethal politics and the wonder of Kipling: "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise; . . . . If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!" THE PLAYERS COME AGAIN (1990) Writing a biography, manuscripts, journals, literary detecting, and Virginia Woolf: "Wander no more, I say; this is the end. The oblong has been set upon square; the spiral is on top. We have been hauled over the shingle, down to the sea. The players come again." AN IMPERFECT SPY (1995) The challenge of white male power in a Law School. Citations from John LeCarre. And A. N. Wilson's words: "Where mediocrity is the norm, it is not long before mediocrity becomes the ideal." And John Le Carre: "I invested my life in institutions - he thought without rancor - and all I am left with is myself." AMANDA CROSS: THE COLLECTED STORIES (1997) What a remarkable collection of Kate Fansler short stories.

This is the first Amanda Cross mystery I've read. I did enjoy it, but I must agree with the previous reviewer, who said that it was a good book but not much of a whodunit. The mystery really takes a back seat to literary discussions and character analyses. (And the ending, while fun, emerges out of the blue.) I also found that, especially towards the middle and end of the book, the characters all tended to speak in a mannered way that I found slightly improbable-- as though they're all declaiming instead of just talking.

I picked the book up because it dealt with a women's college; as a student at a women's college, I'm always curious to see how they're treated in literature. I found Cross' view interesting, although nothing like my own.

Kate Fansler attended the memorial service for Patrice Umphelby, a professor at Clare College. At the time she did not think that she knew Patrice but later she learned from Patrices's biographers Herbert and Archer that she had met her once in Scotland.

Kate is someone who evades memories. Her husband Reed works in the office of the DA notwithstanding the fact that most people over forty pursue other legal careers. By the end of the book it is learned that Reed plans to begin teaching at Columbia Law School.

Kate is asked by the president of Clare College to serve on a board of advisors for an institute being set up by her friend Madeline, a psychoanalyst, and to investigate the death of Patrice. Patrice wrote in a journal that the human mind has trouble taking in aging.

Madeline is of the opinion that Patrice was appreciated insufficiently at Clare College. She was eccentric but sane. Clare College it is charged was not receptive to the unorthodox. Indeed, foul play is uncovered by Kate Fansler evidencing professional jealousy and a different view of middle age. The book is a nearly perfect mystery story. The views of the issues and the personalities are expressed in interesting and cogent language.

I have mixed response to this mystery novel set in academe. The sentence structure and writing style is academic, almost Dickensonian in elaboration and convolution. This made it more difficult to read. However, its use of literary references and intelligent protagonists provided an element of fun..

I might read some more of her work in the future, but it's not on the top of my list. I rate this book somewhere between a '3' and a '4'.

This fascinating book presents Kate Fansler with the task of understanding the life of Clare College's exceptional and unusual Professor Patrice Umphelby who is found dead in the lake on campus. The question is whether it was suicide or murder, and Kate is asked to investigate. However, this novel appears less a murder mystery than a paean for justifying suicide. In this context, it is a sad book.

Cross weaves opinions of suicide by a number of well know literary figures into this novel. In retrospect, this novel seems to state the thinking behind her decision, although healthy, to commit suicide in 2003. Thus, the story, may affect the current reader, who knows of Cross' suicide, in sadly unexpected ways. As usual Cross displays an exceptional understanding of human motivations, and her writing is pithy and well structured. I rated this four rather than five only because her discussion of death, in this otherwise well designed work, was somewhat depressing when considered in light of her own death. However, in predicting the motivation for her 2003 death it provides some exceptional insights.

If you read this book as a series of witty conversations about age, women's colleges, lit crit, etc, it's a lot of fun. As a mystery, however, it is a complete failure. The MO of the murderer rivals the worst of the silliness of Agatha Christie, and the revelation of whodunit made no sense.

I have read most of the series. This was interesting but not her best.