The Shape of Snakes

Rating:
Summary: The best of its kind.
Review: This is the best mystery novel I have ever read to date. However, I am not here to go details about how good is this book, but just like to say some words over some reviews I just happened to read here.
I find those reviews quite disturbing in which people usually complain about animal cruelity written in this book. To say so, I am most devoted animal lover (cats included of course) but I believe one cannot mix up the reality with fiction. And also I do not think the book's description of cruelity to cats either surpass or worth remembering than the cruelity, wickedness and dark psychos of human characters played in this book. And above all, real and pure cruelities directed to both human and animals alike are being taking place in the real world out there with every passing second of our lives.
So my suggestion is try to recognize and rejoice in a good book when you have the privilege and be disturbed and offended by the real world cruelities.

Rating:
Summary: Harrowing mystery for non-mystery readers
Review: This book was a book-club read for me, and I would not have found it otherwise. While I very much enjoy the PBS series "Mystery" I've never been much of a mystery reader-- my little experience with it has been that I grow impatient with the prose and am not engaged enough by the literary pleasures of the book, just waiting for the secrets to be revealed.

Well this book is a great mystery for people who thought like me. The prose is wonderful-- it's not so much a whodunnit, although that is part of it, as it is a portrait of a whole town full of cruelty, misunderstanding and pain-- including the guilt of the main character.

The first-person narration is wonderful although we do come to learn that the narrator is holding back. But this seems less a ploy of the genre than a function of the character's psychological makeup-- in short, a fine literary device. The book also, unusually for an adult novel, though it's common in YA novels, includes examples of email and photographs. This adds greatly to the uncomfortable feeling of being implicated in the sadness of the past.

Warning: some of the episodes we learn about are hard to take. There's cruelty to animals, rape, and cruelty to the disabled. But none of it seems gratuitous, and I found this a very satisfying, harrowing read. Sneaky, scary and sad. As with the best mysteries I have read-- I immediately reread it, this time reading the incidents with the benefit of my new knowledge.

Rating:
Summary: Definitely her worst book yet
Review: I've kind of enjoyed Ms Walter's other books but I gave up on this one after a couple of chapters. I'm grateful I bought it from the library and didn't waste any money on it.

The plot is quite unbelievable and boring - I found it impossible to believe that the heroine would be so obsessed with the death of a woman who is essentially the local baglady 20 years or so after it happens. I also found her liberal white condension towards Annie, the lady who dies, quite offensive. The major reason though was that after the first few pages I knew that a lot of cats would probably be killed quite horribly and I never read books where there is gratituous cruelty to animals. I simply put the book down and don't read any further - and in this case the story was so uninvolving it was easy to do.

Rating:
Summary: Disturbing and senseless
Review: I found this to be of no literary value. The dialogue was so presumptuous and strait out of a bad soap opera.
The plot was silly and I really did not feel any sympathy for any of the characters. The animal cruelty was ramptant through out the book and most of it was very unnecessary to the plot, but the author seems to have the need to go on and on with the subject of torturing cats and uses this as shock value but it only makes her as a writer and a person appear to be mentally disturbed. I can not recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: A brilliantly written book but rather dark
Review: As a catlover, I found it difficult to read parts of this book, and yet the plotting and characters are so well done that I couldn't stop reading. I was reminded of Elizabeth George in the quality of writing and literary complexity of this work. The plot involves a woman trying to solve a murder -- ruled by the police an accidental death -- from 20 years previously, despite efforts by a number of people to get her to let it go. She has lived abroad for many years and returns to England to find the evidence necessary for the police to re-open the case. The book makes novel use of letters, emails, and even photographs as you share the hunt for the truth with the protagonist. Altogether, a great read, but difficult in parts for squeamish catlovers. Fortunately, those sections only involve perhaps 5% of the book. One wonders why the author felt it necessary to include them as they really could be deleted without affecting the plot very much (or at least drastically toned down) and certainly do not add to the book. This is not a book that can be read in one sitting, but you'll have trouble putting it down.

Rating:
Summary: Intelligent and Gripping--but a WARNING!
Review: Walters is an unusually good writer in the genre, she creates beleivable characters who stay with you, and her plotting is simply excellent. That said, a serious warning for cat lovers--there are pages and pages of grotesque, gratuitous cat torture in this book. It's essential to the plot, but the author's semi-pathological relish in detailing all the torture over and over makes this book impossible reading for anyone who truly cares about cats. (The author also unintentionally reveals her rather warped moral sensibilities by having the heroine happily put her teen age children in harm's way, and has both heroine and hero- husband use physical violence as evidence of their upstanding character. Very odd woman, this Walters. I would much rather read her than meet her.)

Rating:
Summary: Dark and Disturbing
Review: An amazing Rubik's Cube of a novel, with the reader twisting and turning the clues to come up with a solution to the puzzle.

On a rainy night twenty years ago, Annie Butts, a black woman suffering from Tourette's Syndrome was found dead in the gutter in front of M. Ranelagh's house. 'Mad' Annie was hated by her neighbors on Graham Court because of her race and her disability.

... it's been a long time since I picked up a book this hard to put down. Walters is a fine writer of psychological mysteries. Her characters are finely drawn and disturbingly real. I can heartily recommend this novel.

Rating:
Summary: Different than previous books; good, but not great.
Review: I think Walters is a wonderful writer, but this book strays from her classic mysteries and is probably more akin to her previous novel, "The Breakers." If you didn't like "The Breakers," you'll probably hate "The Shape of Snakes." I wasn't put off by the animal abuse, the psychological abuse and manipulation of women and children, or the violence. I was more intrigued by the structure and execution of the plot. Information is uncovered layer by layer and then I realized that the story is a remembrance and was not happening in real-time. Technically, it's a good book. And as usual, she has excellent character development. Whether or not you'll like them (the protagonist included) is another story. In the final analysis, was it really about revenge, justice, or a way to assuage guilt? Hmmm... :-)

Rating:
Summary: Very gripping but deeply disturbing.
Review: I have to echo the comments of other reviewers about the animal abuse and child abuse in this book. I found the animal abuse especially disturbing. I found myself almost in tears in several sections.

If you can make it through the descriptions then the book is worth reading.

Rating:
Summary: The Shape of Snakes
Review: If there was a poster book for a need to warn away people from torture of animals and children, this is it. I have no idea why such a good writer as Walters feels the need not only to describe the horrible things done to cats but to go back again and again to add more. This does nothing for mystery, which I presume is what she is trying to write. I am sorry I bought it and I certainly won't give it to my library. I will throw it in the trash, which is where it belongs.

Ann James Freelander
Conroe, Texas