Rating: 
Summary: The book was great!
Review: This book is the best book that I have read by Agatha Christie. The way all of the characters were made to look guilty made the book even more interesting. I think that the book was well written and that Charles Osborne adapted this novel well. I would love to read more of Agatha and Charles' work.
Rating: 
Summary: Unfortunately disappointing
Review: There was obviously a reason that Dame Agatha didn't release this play in novel format. It's dull, predictable, redundant and boring. I rushed right out to the bookstore the day it was released, and now I wish I had saved the twenty two bucks! Maybe my hopes were just too high.
Rating: 
Summary: What a Disappointment!
Review: I looked forward to reading this and, boy, was I disappointed! I have not read the play from which this "new" Agatha Christie novel was adapted, but I don't feel I ever need to. Charles Osbourne never moves the action out of the drawing room (obviously, the play had a single set!) and the characters' stage business and blocking -- as opposed to their feelings -- is described in tedious detail. Don't waste your money. The only fun I had was trying to guess where Acts 1 and 2 ended.
Rating:
Summary: a disappointment
Review: Osborne didn't even come close to acheiving Christie's style. The dialouge was stilted, and the thought and sentence patterns felt so...wrong. Accordingly, Christie's characters do not ring true here. I have read other works where a living writer has tried to imitate another writer's style, and most of them succeeded on a much higher level than this. I admit, though, that I probably would have enjoyed the book more if I could have stopped myself from subconsciously comparing it to Christie's masterpieces.
Rating:
Summary: If you are a Crhistie fan, don't bother
Review: After the thrill of a new title, I was hoping for a lot more than this novel delivered. The dialogue (except that lifted from oher Christie novels) was flat and uninspired, the action wodden. What a disappointment.
Rating: 
Summary: The novel was Christie all over with Osborne's words
Review: I liked this novel, originally a play by Agatha Christie. It was all of her normal intrigue and suspense. Charles Osborne's words leave much to be desired, we all know Christie's style and he just didn't cut it. I think he accurately translated the book from the play, although it would be a true masterpiece in the hands of Christie herself. I enjoyed the book.
Rating:
Summary: I'm sorry I bought this
Review: I was so looking forward to reading this, and so disappointed when I did. I have read all of the Poirot books and stories, and found many instances in which a hard-core Christie fan would feel that an old friend had just taken leave of himself. How many times did Hastings swear that no gentleman eavesdrops, even in the face of Poirot's stern warnings of murders yet to come? But in this book, Hastings, on his own initiative, deliberately listened in on a conversation in the hopes that it would provide a clue. I have not read the play, though I would still like to. I just think that the author's credentials as one who had performed in the play did not make him the best person to write an Agatha Christie novel.
Rating:
Summary: Not worth the money.
Review: Not working very well is a "new" book by Agatha Christie, who died in 1976. Christie actually left two unpublished novels which were published after her death, but this is not one of them. "Black Coffee" is a play written by Agatha Christie which has been adapted as a novel by Charles Osborne, whomever he may be. Whomever he may be, he should have done something else.While "Black Coffee" might be a good play, it is much too thin to be a novel. I knew the murderer before the murder took place, and there was not enough development of character to make the book real. Agatha Christie has sold more books than anyone except for the Bible and Shakespeare. She had only one daughter, and the number of her descendents is small. They've all got to be either incredibly wealthy or incredibly stupid. I don't think there is much excuse for them to allow this travesty to be published.
Rating:
Summary: A pale imitation of the Queen of the Mystery
Review: I am an avid Agatha Christie fan and was thrilled to think of the appearance of a "lost" work - much as I was about Dorothy Sayers' "Thrones, Dominations". However both books proved that you cannot really recreate another's unique style, but Black Coffee much more so than the other. In the hands of Agatha Christie herself I'm sure this would have been a stylish mystery, but here is is merely a pale imitation, a ghostly image of what might have been. The characters are cardboard and lifeless. The writing does not have the unique verve and humor of Agatha Christie. The plot seems obvious and forced in scenes where you are forced to witness a certain character's actions, which I presume is a result of following the stage directions. It would have been much more subtle if Dame Agatha had written it herself. Instead it is merely serviceable. Agatha Christie is one author whose books I reread again and again just for the sheer pleasure of her writing style, but I have no desire to reread Black Coffee. I'm sorry I wasted the money to buy it in hardback
Rating: 
Summary: Overall a good book but missing something
Review: I feel that the book was well written and adapted smoothly from its original play format. Charles Osborne has tried to keep as closely as possible to Agatha Christie's writing style, and I definitely liked the English country house atmosphere. However, I was a bit disappointed by the plot, which I thought was too simplistic and lacked the drama of some of Christie's other works (I'm a huge Agatha Christie fan and have read every single one of her novels). I realize that since the book was originally a play, it may have required a simpler plot, but I felt that Osborne should have tried to add some complexity to the story in its book form. I also didn't like the fact that it was not written in the style of the other Poirot-Hastings collaborations, where Captain Hastings was always the narrator. His observations were always interesting, even when wrong and made the novels something special. Narrated in the third person, it sounds a bit flat. Still, overall it was a good read and so nice to find one of Dame Christie's "lost works".
|
