Inspector French and Freeman Wills Crofts

[cimorene]

I've been feeling a bit bored lately, but I started reading some more 1920s detective novels that I haven't read before (the works of Freeman Wills Crofts) and am having a lot of fun.

His plots are elaborate, not to say convoluted, and there are lots of details about the investigations as well as usually a bit of international travel and some colorful descriptions of scenery, but at the same time his narrative voice is rather dry and quite formal, sort of like a Data or Spock character was given a lively passage in another language and translated it as directly as possible into their own typical voice.

Also sometimes his character names are very funny: Pierce Whymper (The Starvel Hollow Tragedy), William Service (The Sea Mystery), Cosgrove Ponson (The Ponson Case).

Comments

[oracne]

Those do sound fun!

[cimorene]

Yes, it is hitting a sweet spot where I recognize flaws (from the pov of my own taste anyway) but they don't irritate me enough to drive me away, just enough to be humorous pretty much, while other facets of the writing are still interesting and admirable.

[haphazardmethod]

I love that description of his narrative voice!

[cimorene]

It's a very funny contrast at times between the colorful scenes and sometimes extended metaphors being denoted and the ponderous formality of the diction! I know those guys aren't really the only source of that sort of diction either, but it's what I'm always reminded of.