La Pietra di Luna si presenta già dal titolo come una storia intrigante.
Cos'è e che poteri ha questa pietra? Effettivamente nelle prime pagine è lei ad essere la protagonista. Il narratore torna indietro di qualche decade raccontando un episodio apparentemente disconnesso dalla storia centrale ma in realtà decisamente rilevante per comprenderne alcuni aspetti.
Da qui parte la narrazione.

Così come in La Donna in Bianco, ancora una volta Collins si dimostra un gran maestro nel sapersi muovere tra una moltitudine di narratori, sono almeno quattro o cinque in questo caso, se non sbaglio.
Si passa dal primo narratore, il maggiordomo Mr Betteredge che come gli altri personaggi della storia avrà il compito di fornire una sua versione dei fatti, a Drusilla Clack - altra testimone e 'amica di famiglia' - alla quale segue la narrazione dell'avvocato Mr Bruff fino a chiudere il cerchio con la testimonianza conclusiva apportata sempre dal maggiordomo.

Sono diverse le tematiche affrontate da Collins in quello che è uno dei romanzi più rappresentativi del genere sensation noveloltre che un precursore delle detective stories.
Una di esse è indubbiamente il rapporto tra la Gran Bretagna e il suo grande impero e come esso influenzi i rapporti interpersonali tra i diversi personaggi. A questo proposito, ho notato come spesso Collins tenda a rappresentare alcuni personaggi quasi come delle caricature con diversi aspetti ironici, sembra quasi prendersi gioco di coloro che nella storia mostrano un atteggiamento spiccatamente pro imperialista come Mr Betteredge, ad esempio. Sfumature di ironia si ritrovano anche nella raffigurazione di Drusilla Clack, cugina di Rachel, apparentemente pia devota ma in realtà rappresentativa di un falso perbenismo e una filantropia di facciata.

Oltre a ciò vengono affrontate, e non è una novità in Collins, anche tematiche di genere. La storia infatti sembra chiedersi quale sia il ruolo della donna nel rapporto uomo-donna e nella società, pensiamo in primo luogo alla relazione tra Rachel Verinder e Franklin Blake e il furto della pietra.

Da un punto di vista formale è interessante la figura del narratore o meglio dei narratori e del loro grado di affidabilità. Fino a che punto la testimonianza da loro fornita è riconducibile alla verità? Quali opinioni si costruisce il lettore? E soprattutto riesce quest’ultimo a farsi un quadro chiaro della situazione prima che essa venga svelata? Man mano che la storia prosegue sembra ci sia sempre più difficoltà a dipanare quella matassa che si è venuta a creare se non grazie all'aiuto dei personaggi stessi che con il concludersi della narrazione andranno ad aggiungere i pezzi mancanti di un grande e complesso puzzle.

Intrigante ed avvincente ma al tempo stesso leggero e con dei tratti ironici. Forse il libro da cui partire se ci si approccia per la prima volta a questo grande autore.

I loved this. The writing style is brilliant. While it’s a long classic everything adds up at the end, and I liked how it all came together and the outcome of the mystery. Despite its length, I couldn’t see anything unnecessary in the story. I loved that Collins once again used different perspectives for weaving the mystery. I especially loved the voices of Mr Betterage and Mr Franklin. I was also impressed with how much I cared for every one of the characters – secondary characters included! It was incredibly suspenseful. I craved the answers to the mystery and had to keep turning pages. Ultimately, I found the ending incredibly satisfying which is exactly what you want at the end of a mystery book. I liked how it had themes of the foreign vs the nation, honesty, love, betrayal, and money all tied up in the storyline. I will definitely read more Collins in future.

Original review: https://oliviascatastrophe.com/2021/0...

Mr Betteridge would be very disappointed in me as I have never read Robinson Crusoe and I should have read this book long since.

It was wonderfully crafted and put together with delicious twists and turns. So many characters and situations, yet you care for the characters. They are delightful and even the villains are not truly villainous. I loved this book.

THE MOONSTONE is one of those books that I put off reading for a long, long time. Yes, it is a very famous mystery story, but for someone who has grown up loving the detection tales of Sherlock Holmes, the cozy mysteries of Agatha Christie and modern writers who have turned the regaling of criminal exploits into thrillers, the idea of settling down with a mystery of such length seemed extremely daunting. Besides, having read so much of Charles Dickens and his masterful character creation, could protégée Wilke Collins hope to compare?

Yes, indeed.

THE MOONSTONE was a delight from beginning to end. (Well, there was that sojourn with Miss Clack who was quite tedious. However, all of the other characters in the book found her to be so, too!) In fact, when I finished the novel today, I was quite surprised that I'd reached the end already.

So far, the only works of Wilkie Collins that I've read have been his theatrical productions written in association with Charles Dickens. Truth to tell, I found only one of those worth reading. While I had initially assigned the fault to Mr. Collins, I've since come to the opinion that the writing of plays wasn't Mr. Dickens' forte. And, even though THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD wasn't finished, it quickly became apparent that Collins was more adept at mystery stories, too.

When I read Bram Stoker's DRACULA, I found that the relating of the story through various narratives of different diaries and other source material was often a bit of a slog. So, noting from the chapter headings that Collins used something of the same technique for THE MOONSTONE (although it was written decades before the famous vampire novel), I approached the book with some trepidation.

That was unfounded.

Like Dickens, Collins was adept at creating characters for which I had immediate empathy. They were endowed with traits so readily their own that I felt I would be able to easily identify them should I encounter them at a gathering. I also appreciated how Collins turned one of Dickens' techniques on its head, taking a character whose name and appearance clearly indicated someone who shouldn't be trusted, and then making that character very empathetic.

Although I had accurately guessed how the book would end, that didn't diminish the joy of "getting there" at all. I was especially pleased when I was completely wrong about a technique that was used to come up with the solution to the crime. My initial thought was, "Oh, no! He's not going to use that tiresome ploy, is he?" Well, no, he was not. I very much appreciated the inventiveness.

This was a most worthwhile reading experience. I will be exploring more of the works of Wilkie Collins.

The original English mystery novel.

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This review is from: The Moonstone (Kindle Edition)

From skimming other reviews, it appears to me that some readers do not understand this novel. It was written, if I remember correctly, in the 1860's. The style, the language, the grammar, even the vocabulary are not the same as today's. Many consider THE MOONSTONE to be the precursor of the modern detective novel, but it is unreasonable to expect a completely modern style mystery when reading it. It is told through narratives and journals of different witnesses. Some of these people are interesting while, at least one in my opinion, is tedious and trying. Much the same as my real-life experience as an investigator. I rated it at 5 stars on it's own merits, but to me it can stand with many of the current mysteries.

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins enthralled me.After that,I had to read more of his work.But I think the rest won't compare.

The Moonstone is supposed to be among the earliest English detective novels.It is the story of the theft of a priceless Indian diamond.

Couldn't finish it the first time.The way the Indians are described is rather racist and off-putting,but I suppose that is expected from authors of the Victorian era.

Going to try and finish it this time,because the author is Wilkie Collins and even if it is half as good as The Woman in White,that will be time well spent.

This is thought of as the first long novel mystery and one of Collins most notable works. I did enjoy it very much but also thought it was a tad bit too long in the telling. Opium users seemed to occur quite a bit within the literary writers and their stories during this time period, I remember being shocked that Sherlock Holmes was just such character. I wonder if this had an effect on the general population that were the readers. In this work we have a stolen diamond and looking for the culprit of the theft. In the telling of the tale the narrators change and the narration reminds me of depositions and rely on the memory of the character. Are they reliable as it is a personal opinion of how they review the series of events and the people involved? I must admit it was written as such I was not able to reach a conclusion before the end of who did it.

Questo è un ‘romanzo d’altri tempi’, definizione che per me ha connotati non negativi.
Non che io sia un’inguaribile nostalgica.
Ammetto solo, anche con un po’ di vergogna, che all’inizio ho dovuto ri-abituare la mia lettura a certi tempi, spazi, la dilatazione e il passo da maratoneta di una narrazione sontuosa. Cose che in un ‘poliziesco’ contemporaneo raramente trovano spazio.
Alla fine, però, stavo lì, famelica, a girar le pagine. Chi sarà stato? Chi sarà stato?
Ho vissuto questo romanzo come fosse un mega serial della Bbc - ne esiste più di uno tratto dal romanzo. Mi ci sentivo troppo dentro.
Un piacere immenso. Un grande classico.
Finisco qui, che già tutto è stato detto. Imperdibile.
(E comunque la zitella moralista Miss Drusilla Clack è un personaggio di cui ci sarebbe bisogno in ogni romanzo. Idolo).

The flyleaf says I bought this book in September 2003, and I’ve finally read it in the same month of 2020. The good thing about classics is that it doesn’t much matter when you get around to them, although I do wonder why I let this one languish for so long.

The so-called “earliest and best detective story” doesn’t present a huge riddle to the modern reader, but it’s still a very enjoyable book to curl up with, due to Collins’ host of unreliable or semi-reliable narrators and the unmistakable glamour of a narrative with a yellow diamond, a country house, and an Indian curse at its core.

Beautiful Rachel Verinder is given the moonstone as a barbed birthday present: a trio high-caste Indian hit men follow the diamond to her Yorkshire estate, and the very night she receives it, it disappears from her bedroom. Witnesses tell their tales and family try to piece together what happened that night, while the family slides into dysfunction. There is a housemaid who is a reformed thief, a butler (spoiler: he didn’t do it) who takes spiritual guidance from Robinson Crusoe, the newfangled concept of the police detective. There are laudanum addicts, fences, mistresses. There is quicksand.

The structure is both the book’s strength and its weakness, with different sections narrated by different witnesses. In the beginning, this is a definite virtue, as the two witnesses with the longest sections are true eccentrics and enjoyable heads to inhabit: faithful family retainer and Crusoe afficionado Gabriel Betteredge and self-righteous Drusilla Clack, who has an improving religious tract for every occasion. Later sections are narrated by a range of respectable men, and are accordingly less entertaining (although at this point the mystery swings into high gear, so there’s more fun to be had from the plot); they are the kind of characters who know, intrinsically, if a new acquaintance is “a gentleman” or not.

I feel like The Moonstone has aged very well. Although many of the hallmarks of Victorian melodrama are there, they are also subtly subverted: has the Moonstone really been stolen from Miss Verinder, if it was itself stolen from the head of the statue of an Indian god, and before that stolen from others? A housemaid declares, rather scandalously, that the adored heiress at the centre of the mystery wouldn’t be thought half so pretty if she wasn’t dressed up in beautiful clothes. Religion is never far from hypocrisy.

All in all, a wondeful book for the end of the holidays.

3.5 stars for this overly long classic/mystery novel by Collins. The second half of the novel picked up in pace but the foreshadowing left little doubt about the outcome. The writing is good, it saves the book really. I have previously read "The Woman in White"' which I liked more, but this book has secured it's position in the canon of English Literature.

Trigger warnings: colonialism, drug use/addiction, death, suicide, racism, racial slurs, murder.

14/6/2022
On this reread, I'm bumping this up to a full 5 stars because it's just. so. much. fun. The characters are great. The mystery is fun. It's actually surprisingly sympathetic to the three Indians who come looking for the Moonstone. All in all? I'm really glad I reread this. And I also watched the BBC miniseries I wanted four years ago and it was pretty stinking great.

21/7/2018
4 stars.

Okay so apparently don't mark rereads as finished on the new Android app because IT WILL WIPE YOUR ENTIRE REVIEW. Seriously, I had reviews here from 2017 and 2013 and now they're gone forever. Thanks a lot, Goodreads.

Anyway.

I first read this book back in the early 2000s. After reading and loving The Woman in White for an English class in first year uni, I basically went through every Wilkie Collins book that my university library had because I'm trash. And I continue to love this story and the way that it's told to this day. Thanks to the narratives of Betteredge and Miss Clack, it's full of sly humour and just plain ridiculous moments. It's also full of mystery, romance, and tragedy and it does a great job at representing what life was like for both the rich and their servants in the middle of the nineteenth century.

Is the overall whodunnit beyond ridiculous? Uh, yes. It's called Sensation Fiction for a reason. But is it an absolute joy from start to finish? Also yes.

In summary: read it. Also if the BBC would like to produce a glorious multi-episode miniseries of it, that would be delightful.

What a fine fine book this is. I am so surprised that it has taken me so long to get to it given how much I love Victorian Era British Novels. I think perhaps that is because of how slow a book I found the Woman in White to be. I finally picked up the Moonstone three days ago, and have read through it virtually nonstop.

This is often described as the first real detective novel in the English language, and as such you might expect it to be completely plot driven. That is not the case at all. Collins uses seven different voices (detectives) in the telling of the tale. Some are endearing (Betheredge), some annoying (Miss Clack), and some totally heartbreaking (Ezra Jennings); but each is individually believable, and each adds to the unravelling of the mystery. It is these characters who are the heart and strength of the novel, as much as the mystery at its center.

Surprisingly, Collins never breaks faith with the reader in the development and resolution of the mystery. The solution is a surprise, but on that fits within the parameters of what the reader knows, and within the characters of the individuals who are central to the story.

I have heard it described as too long and too slow, but personally I didn't find either to be the case. Its status as a classic is totally justified in my mind.