![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
#5 Platform - A Conspiracy of Paper
Sep. 22nd, 2008 11:51 amMore financial thrillery, now from an earlier time and a further off place.
Book #37: A Conspiracy of Paper
Author: David Liss
Provenance: Received from Bookmooch
David Liss definitely enjoys writing this historical financial detective stories. Here, in his first novel, we follow the adventures of Benjamin Weaver, a secular Jewish boxer turned thief-taker, as he tries to work out who killed his estranged father and one of his father's business partners. There's a good number of suspects, lots of potential for things going wrong, but the story has one of those framing devices where the character is writing his memoirs from years off in the future, so you know that it couldn't have gone too badly for him.
The writing style is meant to be fairly contemporary, and pulls it off well without it feeling too stilted; in fact, it can be fairly witty in places. The lead couple of characters are pretty well laid out; Weaver really is conflicted about his status as a Jew, his relations to his family and to society, and for his past conduct. You really get a feel for him. The lead female character, Miriam, is also pretty interesting, although in a similar fashion to his newest novel, the Whiskey Rebels, probably a bit more modern in tone and thought than is historically accurate. The secondary characters were amusing or interesting, but not very complicated, for the most part. For a mystery, that's not that surprising, though.
I enjoyed the mystery part of it well enough, and you do learn a lot about the nature of the markets and such of the time, but it can get to sound a bit like a lecture in some parts. You need the info, but the style fails sometimes that way. At least Liss doesn't hammer home the parallels between the stock market speculation problems of that time and now. The presentation of the time period, the place, and the Jewish community there were well done; I'm pretty happy with it.
This book was quite enjoyable, although not as polished as Liss's more recent work. As a first novel, that's to be expected, though. I look forward to reading more of his work soon.
Next up: After the Long Goodbye. Some friend of mine said this is the best book they'd ever read. Sounds like a reason to give it a try.
Book #37: A Conspiracy of Paper
Author: David Liss
Provenance: Received from Bookmooch
David Liss definitely enjoys writing this historical financial detective stories. Here, in his first novel, we follow the adventures of Benjamin Weaver, a secular Jewish boxer turned thief-taker, as he tries to work out who killed his estranged father and one of his father's business partners. There's a good number of suspects, lots of potential for things going wrong, but the story has one of those framing devices where the character is writing his memoirs from years off in the future, so you know that it couldn't have gone too badly for him.
The writing style is meant to be fairly contemporary, and pulls it off well without it feeling too stilted; in fact, it can be fairly witty in places. The lead couple of characters are pretty well laid out; Weaver really is conflicted about his status as a Jew, his relations to his family and to society, and for his past conduct. You really get a feel for him. The lead female character, Miriam, is also pretty interesting, although in a similar fashion to his newest novel, the Whiskey Rebels, probably a bit more modern in tone and thought than is historically accurate. The secondary characters were amusing or interesting, but not very complicated, for the most part. For a mystery, that's not that surprising, though.
I enjoyed the mystery part of it well enough, and you do learn a lot about the nature of the markets and such of the time, but it can get to sound a bit like a lecture in some parts. You need the info, but the style fails sometimes that way. At least Liss doesn't hammer home the parallels between the stock market speculation problems of that time and now. The presentation of the time period, the place, and the Jewish community there were well done; I'm pretty happy with it.
This book was quite enjoyable, although not as polished as Liss's more recent work. As a first novel, that's to be expected, though. I look forward to reading more of his work soon.
Next up: After the Long Goodbye. Some friend of mine said this is the best book they'd ever read. Sounds like a reason to give it a try.
