2 out of 4 stars
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According to Webster's Dictionary, a myriad is "a countless or extremely great number". It can also refer to an amount of ten-thousand in particular. Well, there aren't quite that many tales in Ernest Barrett's compilation, Myriad, A Collection of Stories and Poems, which has a total of eight stories and thirteen poems included in the tome. Covering a number of story-lines, this book delves into the highest of highs and lowest of lows.
The first four stories in the book feature Detective Inspector Robert Laxton as he investigates a number of murders. My favorite of these mysteries was Justice Deferred, which finds the inspector seeking a serial arsonist. The mix of action and suspense was perfectly blended in this tale, as well as in the other three, but I never found myself on the edge of my seat or breathlessly anticipating what would happen next. Where the story – and all of the others in the compendium – falls short is in drawing the characters involved. While I liked the D.I. well enough, he was not written with enough depth for me to get fully invested in him as a person as well as detective. The same is true of all of the other characters in the book, including all of the antagonists. I also had trouble getting fully immersed in the tales because Mr. Barrett spent a lot more time telling rather than showing. I've never seen as many adverbs in one book as I have in this one. "Smilingly", for instance, was one word that grated on my nerves every time I saw it. I also wearied of the "surprised expressions" and "thoughtful looks" that everyone wore on occasion. Along those same lines, even though all of the characters spent ample time furrowing their brows, plucking their bottom lips, and stroking their chins, I never felt the tension that these actions were supposed to convey. Another pet peeve that I had with this section of stories was that every time D.I. Laxton went to leave his superior's office, he either remembered something or was stopped at the last moment. I fear that the author was taking tips from the television show Columbo and overdoing it. The one thing I did like about these tales was that the criminals all met with grisly ends, thereby appealing to my love of gore.
After the D.I. Laxton murder mysteries were a quartet of stories, all of which suffered from the same writing flaws as noted above. Of these four tales, my favorite was Catch of the Day, a story about a fisherman who catches something that he was certainly not expecting. This section of stories also included two lovely tales of love and a story about the travails that befall a couple as they take a journey on the husband's newly-renovated boat.
Following the eight stories were a baker's dozen of poems covering various topics, ranging from the author's love of Lincolnshire to thoughts about life to the celebration of holidays. Most of the poems rhymed and flowed well, thereby making them one of the best parts of the book. The poem I was most able to commiserate with was Lost Words, wherein the author bemoans the loss of inspiration obtained during the night due to his failure to write it down. The Pledge, which speaks to the sanctity of marriage, spoke to my emotions as well.
As much as I wanted to love this collection of stories, I just couldn't. In addition to the writing defects noted above, the tome was full of grammatical errors, including incorrect punctuation, missing words, extra words, and terrible syntax. As a reviewer, I'm required to note the first ten mechanical errors in particular, and I had all ten of them before the second page was done. I honestly think that the author just wrote the book and never proofread it. If he had, simple errors like "Thankfully they didn’t have an27y children" would have been caught with even the most cursory of once-overs. Other blatant missteps included sentences that seem to have been corrected or rewritten in midstream, such as "Laxton gave smiled and nodded his head as he opened his newspaper that he had bought whilst on the station platform". Similarly, there were many instances of "was sat at" and other similar phrases used in sentences. Another issue that made reading difficult was the mistyping of a character's name. For instance, in the story Troubled Waters, Betty's name was mistyped as "Beryl" at least twice. The book also included a few inconsistencies. In the tale Justice Deferred, one couple was noted as having lived in their former residence for four months, fourteen months, and eighteen months. The most egregious error, though, was found in the sentence, "Her resemblance to her mother Nancy was always a reminder to him. (See Blind Stab)" in the story Red Triangle, where the author takes us out of the story in order to indicate a different book he's written. Lastly, while the stories were all split into chapters, none of them noted Chapter One, but they all included the subsequent chapter headings. In addition, the story Catch of the Day was not listed in the Table of Contents, so it was a surprise when I got to it.
I had a really hard time settling on a rating for Myriad. While I noted many errors above, I do try to reserve one-star ratings for books that have zero redeeming qualities. Since I did feel that the stories were somewhat engaging, I'm giving this tome a rating of 2 out of 4 stars.
Despite the myriad of errors in this book, I am willing to recommend it to those who enjoy compilations, moderately suspenseful murder mysteries, and poetry, as long as you can overlook the missteps I noted. If you're squeamish, this is not the book for you, as there are many violent and gory scenes, including some involving rape.
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Myriad
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