The whole not believing women because they may be mistaken, hysterical, not understanding, dozy, etc. is a scary repeating theme. If I remember correctly, it also forms an important plot point in 4:50 from Paddington and is essentially the catalyst for Marple getting involved in the mystery.
Yes. It's not quite as blatant there (Mrs. McGillicuddy only saw the murder for a second, or a few seconds at best, and the police actually do perform a search along the tracks; they just don't find anything). But eventually, Miss Marple is told off and accused of wasting police time. Which, in the screen adaptation starring Joan Hickson (though not also in Christie's book), makes her throw down the gauntlet to Inspector Slack:
"I can see how irritating this must be for you, Inspector -- so I'll ignore what you just said. After all, we may both be involved in this business at a later date. When *one* of us is clever enough to find the body."
That is a good scene.
In the book the police do weigh up whether Mrs McGillicuddy is hysterical or suffering from a vivid imagination as soon as she tells her story and the way it comes across it is because of Maple accompanying and basically vouching for her that they do take her seriously.
But the whole doubting her word started with the ticket collector, who even cast doubt over McGillicuddy's own mind.
I've always disliked that.
Oh yes, true, I forgot about the ticket collector! And of course they only investigate because Miss Marple is accompanying her friend -- but *she* at least is taken seriously (up to a point) ... Well, they've learned the hard way that that's the safer course!
1) What is this women writer's bingo? Can I do that?
2) You've maybe solved a life-long question I've had. I love mysteries, but I've had a REALLY hard time getting into the "classic" ones. My family was not a reading family, so I saw all of those Hitchcock movies long before reading the books. I don't do that anymore. If there is a book, I hold off on the movie until I've read the book. This can be a mistake too - see The Circle by Dave Eggers, or anything by Eggers come to think of it. I'll never get those hours back. Anyway, I'm going to think on this a bit.
It's not my own idea; there's a bit of an explanation how it originated in the card reveal post and the posts linked there. Basically, the idea is to read more women writers -- regardless who they are, where they're from, and whether they are contemporary or classic / historic / long-dead authors.
It came about after a few of us had read the surveys of the genre recently published by Martin Edwards (current president and first-ever archivist of the "real life" Detection Club founded by, inter alia, G.K. Chesterton, Agatha Christie, and Dorothy L. Sayers; and also currently president of the Crime Writers' Association -- the folks who hand out the Daggers Awards) -- "The Story of Classic Crime in 100 Books" and "The Golden Age of Murder". Reading those books made us aware just how many Golden Age writers there are that we haven't read yet (to the extent we'd ever heard of them to begin with), so some of us resolved to remedy that situation, and Moonlight Reader (http://moonlightreader.booklikes.com/) created that discussion group.
And since Moonlight Reader is also one half of the amazing duo that has come to host all sorts of book-related games here on Booklikes (advance warning: expect your dashboard to be flooded with game-related posts as soon as the next game comes around; they're tremendous fun and wildly popular), she has even come up with a bingo card for us to track our reading progress there, too.
(All of which is just to say: If you're not following her and her game hosting partner, Obsidian Blue (http://oblue.booklikes.com/), yet, you absolutely should -- they are both amazing bloggers, and anybody not following them is missing out on a lot of good stuff, not only games-related.)
Anyway, maybe exploring Golden Age mysteries together with the rest of us in the Detection Club may make them more approachable -- just in case it's not just the movie vs. book situation that just may be at play here? -- FWIW, I love Golden Age mysteries and have read plenty of them, so for me to say about any mystery from that era that I like the movie better is somewhat unusual ... and it's really more the subject matter of these two specific books that didn't speak to me, not the writing as such or the period; much to the contrary, in fact.
You're amazingly helpful and generous -- thank you! I've grabbed a copy of the bingo card. I'm also trying to keep up my #readDiverseBooks challenge that I've been doing for about 4 years now, so I don't want to overcommit, but maybe in a few months, I'll creep over and join the classic mystery group. Sounds like a good way to get started, especially to have people to bounce what I'm reading off of. And yay -- some very exciting new follows. This place is really wonderful. I've been at GR for a very long time, and I'm not even friend with my actual friends there. I'm so pleased I picked booklikes from all the "alternatives to GR" lists I had lined up earlier this month. Thanks again!
"I can see how irritating this must be for you, Inspector -- so I'll ignore what you just said. After all, we may both be involved in this business at a later date. When *one* of us is clever enough to find the body."
I love that scene ...
In the book the police do weigh up whether Mrs McGillicuddy is hysterical or suffering from a vivid imagination as soon as she tells her story and the way it comes across it is because of Maple accompanying and basically vouching for her that they do take her seriously.
But the whole doubting her word started with the ticket collector, who even cast doubt over McGillicuddy's own mind.
I've always disliked that.
2) You've maybe solved a life-long question I've had. I love mysteries, but I've had a REALLY hard time getting into the "classic" ones. My family was not a reading family, so I saw all of those Hitchcock movies long before reading the books. I don't do that anymore. If there is a book, I hold off on the movie until I've read the book. This can be a mistake too - see The Circle by Dave Eggers, or anything by Eggers come to think of it. I'll never get those hours back. Anyway, I'm going to think on this a bit.
It's not my own idea; there's a bit of an explanation how it originated in the card reveal post and the posts linked there. Basically, the idea is to read more women writers -- regardless who they are, where they're from, and whether they are contemporary or classic / historic / long-dead authors.
And btw, if you like mysteries, you may also want to join the Detection Club discussion group: http://booklikes.com/groups/show/1012/the-detection-club
It came about after a few of us had read the surveys of the genre recently published by Martin Edwards (current president and first-ever archivist of the "real life" Detection Club founded by, inter alia, G.K. Chesterton, Agatha Christie, and Dorothy L. Sayers; and also currently president of the Crime Writers' Association -- the folks who hand out the Daggers Awards) -- "The Story of Classic Crime in 100 Books" and "The Golden Age of Murder". Reading those books made us aware just how many Golden Age writers there are that we haven't read yet (to the extent we'd ever heard of them to begin with), so some of us resolved to remedy that situation, and Moonlight Reader (http://moonlightreader.booklikes.com/) created that discussion group.
And since Moonlight Reader is also one half of the amazing duo that has come to host all sorts of book-related games here on Booklikes (advance warning: expect your dashboard to be flooded with game-related posts as soon as the next game comes around; they're tremendous fun and wildly popular), she has even come up with a bingo card for us to track our reading progress there, too.
(All of which is just to say: If you're not following her and her game hosting partner, Obsidian Blue (http://oblue.booklikes.com/), yet, you absolutely should -- they are both amazing bloggers, and anybody not following them is missing out on a lot of good stuff, not only games-related.)
Anyway, maybe exploring Golden Age mysteries together with the rest of us in the Detection Club may make them more approachable -- just in case it's not just the movie vs. book situation that just may be at play here? -- FWIW, I love Golden Age mysteries and have read plenty of them, so for me to say about any mystery from that era that I like the movie better is somewhat unusual ... and it's really more the subject matter of these two specific books that didn't speak to me, not the writing as such or the period; much to the contrary, in fact.