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Sleeping Murder, Part 2: How to ruin a Miss Marple story
In my read through of Sleeping Murder, I noted that my initial impression of this story was not a great one. I also noted my surprise at this fact on re-read, as Sleeping Murder is, in so many ways, Peak Marple. But, having watched through the adaptations, I think I can confidently blame it on…
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Nemesis, Part 2: A mess of Marple mistakes
I’m so sorry I’ve been so late to post – the holiday season got a bit away from me… But I am determined to get through this series this year – so expect some catch-up posts! As we get towards the end of our review of Miss Marple adaptations, I feel comfortable listing some of…
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At Bertram’s Hotel, Pt. 2: a failure of peak TV coziness
I mentioned last week that At Bertram’s Hotel is one of my favorite Miss Marple stories, period. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for either of the adaptations of the book. Neither sufficiently capture that cozy (yet slightly unsettling) feeling of reading about Bertram’s hotel. Instead of unsettling perfection, we get either unsettling claustrophobia or…
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A Caribbean Mystery, Part 2: Social capital and social awareness
Summer in the Bay Area is cold and foggy – I literally walk to work in a puffer jacket. And so I’ve been looking forward to escaping into the BBC (1989) and iTV (2013) adaptations of A Caribbean Mystery. Who could fault hours and hours of palm trees and ocean vistas? Well… maybe me, as…
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The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side, Part 2: balancing texture, theme, and plot
And so we come to the adaptation of The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side. Having watched two in quick succession, I now understand why I had underestimated the value of the novel. Neither the BBC nor iTV was able to capture the magic of the original well. Both focus almost exclusively on the plot,…
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4:50 from Paddington, Part 2: Battle of the Lucys
We’re back with 4:50 from Paddington, and this week I want to take a look at how the BBC and iTV chose to adapt Lucy Eyelesbarrow. As a quick recap: Lucy Eyelesbarrow is one of my favorite Christie characters – a smart, independent woman who knows her strength in the domestic sphere and has the…
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A Pocket Full of Rye, Part 2: Motivation matters
Welcome back to our deep-dive on Agatha Christie’s sixth entry in the Miss Marple series, A Pocket Full of Rye. When we left off last week, we discussed features that make this novel unique: Miss Marple’s social engineering, and an increased emphasis on her drive for Justice. Where we’ve previously been treated to Miss Marple’s…
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They Do It With Mirrors, Part 2: creating a character ecosystem
It’s time to take a closer look at the two TV adaptations of They Do It With Mirrors. This is a bit of a tricky one, because the novel has distinct strengths and weaknesses. Specifically, the novel features quite strong character portraits but a questionably consistent theme. Last week, we discussed that the overall effect…
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A Murder is Announced, Pt. 2: The risks of sensationalism
I have a confession to make. After the last three adaptation posts in this series, I was getting ready to quit. It had started to feel like every post came back to the same points: BBC adapted the plot, iTV adapted the themes, and iTV came out on top. And while I like to think…
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A Murder is Announced, Pt. 1: Perfecting the pattern
I have to say, when I started this series, I was not anticipating having this many thoughts on the evolution of the Miss Marple books themselves. I genuinely expected that I would write brief overview for each story before jumping in to the adaptations. But here we are, book 4, and I still have Thoughts…