British Mystery

THE CANARY TRAINER, by Nicholas Meyer.: Genre: British Mystery; Availability: IP, in the stores now.; Rating:; Review: The Canary Trainer is a bad first draft that inadvertently made its way to the printers. The author achieves absolutely no resolution of the plot problems; the Erik here is an unknown quantity, sometimes described as a ghost, sometimes as a ladies' man seeking revenge for god-knows-what. Whatever he is, the qualities of the Phantom's character which we do see are repugnant and inconsistent. Likewise, in Meyer's hands Sherlock Holmes becomes a wimpy, stupid character obsessed with his own monkish existence. Buy the paperback, if you buy this book-the hardback certainly isn't worth wasting the extra money over.

ANGEL OF THE OPERA, by Sam Siciliano: Genre: British Mystery; Availability: IP, in the stores now.; Rating:; Review: Angel of the Opera is an affectionate return to Leroux's text. The cartoonish quality of Christine and Raoul is here again, with Christine actually growing a character of her own, if you can believe it. The Erik is sympathetic but still quite from the model of Leroux's Phantom; the Sherlock here is appropriately brilliant in his deductions. (And charismatic, to boot.) Although I've been told some anachronisms exist in the text, I didn't find them distracting during my readings of the book. I disliked the ending as being somewhat insulting to Erik's character, but otherwise, Angel is a happy read.