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Read Locked Rooms (2006)

Locked Rooms (2006)

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Rating
4.23 of 5 Votes: 3
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ISBN
0553583417 (ISBN13: 9780553583410)
Language
English
Publisher
bantam books

Locked Rooms (2006) - Plot & Excerpts

This episode in the Mary Russell series finds Russell and Holmes in San Francisco, where Russell is to attend to business related to her parents' estate. As Russell gets closer to San Francisco, she becomes increasingly disturbed by nightmares which appear to be linked to childhood events. Once the pair arrive, they naturally become embroiled in a mystery, which is resolved with the assistance of a band of Irregulars, including young crime fiction writer and former Pinkerton's detective, Dashiell Hammett. There's lots to love about the series in general and this book in particular. King writes very fine prose which is a joy to read and her evocation of place and time is superb. In this novel, San Francisco in the mid-1920s and at the time of the 1906 earthquake comes vividly alive. I particularly enjoyed the setting, having visited San Francisco earlier this year. In addition, she continues to develop her central characters. In this episode, Russell shows great vulnerability, which is an interesting change, and plot developments mean that part of the narrative is from Holmes' perspective, which is an added bonus. I really like the way King makes Holmes her own creation by distancing him from Conan Doyle's Holmes within the text, while having him retain enough of the original Holmes' characteristics to be recognisable. Also, Dashiell Hammett is worked into the plot in an interesting an inventive way. References to "the thin man" to describe the tubercular Hammett made me smile. There are some less satisfying elements of the novel. The plot is coincidence layered with implausibility. (view spoiler)[ There is, for example, no convincing reason why the culprit, who killed so many people to cover his tracks, would not have done in Russell much earlier in the piece. (hide spoiler)]

A gripping story concerning the mystery of Mary's past. Questions are answered and pieces of her life are filled in nicely. I'm happy to see her finally forced to confront her past. It was always a little heartbreaking the few times she pondered her family's deaths and accepted responsibility, unfairly, it seemed to me. Even at fourteen, she was still a child and she was acting like any fourteen-year-old, fighting with her brother. To carry such a heavy guilt because of such a normal action is sad. I cried at the part where she finally absolves herself of guilt. Stayed up quite late to finish.We also get a nice, in-depth look at Holmes in this book. However, I don't care for narratives which shift from first to third person. It's disconcerting and distracts away from the story. I understand it's needed in this instance because Russell was not functioning properly throughout and Holmes became a bigger focal point, uncovering evidence the reader needs to see. And once I became comfortable with the shift, the sections with Holmes were interesting, only to shift again to first person and Mary. I don't mind multiple POV, but I hate the shifting from first to third person. I hope this is a one-time deal. The main reason I read this series is because I love Mary's voice.

What do You think about Locked Rooms (2006)?

I greatly enjoyed this, and decided to give this full marks. The series is basically Sherlock Holmes fanfic, with the great detective given a female romantic and professional partner. So many ways it could have gone wrong, but I never have felt King's creation Mary Russell was a Mary Sue--for all her capabilities she has had her vulnerabilities, and I think this installment is among the most personal and introspective of the books, and I loved that aspect. One thing I've enjoyed about the books so far, and this is the eighth of them, is that King keeps changing things up so they're fresh. Even the narrative technique is different in this one, consisting not only of Russell's first person narrative, but third person from other perspectives. And, as usual--and it's infectious--you can tell King has a blast with these, this one perhaps more than usual. The Moor has the Sherlock Holmes novel The Hound of the Baskervilles for its basis. The Game was set in India under the British Raj and was a homage to Kipling's Kim. This one takes place in 1924 San Francisco. King is a California native and resident and she even slips an ancestor who survived the famous 1906 quake into the narrative as a character. She writes San Francisco with evident affection, and even included Dashiell Hammett, the one time Pinkerton Agent and mystery writer, as a character. There's even a playful reference to Conan Doyle, Holmes' creator... er, I mean biographer. This novel isn't quite the favorite some of the other Russell novels have been--The Beekeeper's Apprentice, A Letter of Mary and Justice Hall--but boy was this a pleasure. It was a treat in particular to get more of Holmes from his own perspective.
—Lisa (Harmonybites)

Satisfying sleuthingLuckily for me, Locked Rooms was a book club selection or I might never have discovered this delightful series of novels featuring Sherlock Holmes and his young wife Mary Russell. This book is the eighth book in the series, but it isn't necessary to have read any of the previous books to enjoy this one.Evidently, Mary was a student of Holmes who eventually became his apprentice and then his wife. They have been traveling around the world with mysteries and misadventures finding them at every turn.This book finds them in San Francisco where Mary's family lived part-time during her childhood. There are many interesting details about the 1906 earthquake, early Chinatown, the practice of feng shui, Dashiell Hammett, California Highway 1 and many other points of interest.I thoroughly enjoyed the book and plan to go back to the beginning of the series.
—Peggy Walker

Books 4-8 of that series where young woman meets, studies with, and eventually marries Sherlock Holmes. I'm . . . ambivalent.Good things" Pretty writing. Good research. Not infrequent veins of emotional or intellectual or historical richness. Commercial derivative fiction that's actually interesting!The bad: not always succeeding in that admittedly hard task of writing about historical people and their views on race and gender while neither alienating modern readers or being anachronistic. (These books fail in both directions, on different occasions).But the greatest sin of all is that, right up to Locked Rooms, Sherlock freaking Holmes was about as dull and sanitized as he could get. I mean, she started by virtually hand waving the drug addiction, but apparently all his quirkiness and baggage went, too. I mean, Sherlock Holmes! You have to try to make him uninteresting. That does get better in the last book
—Lightreads

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