Didn't get to the end of this one.

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I wouldn't recommend this book as I got bored with it.

What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?

I like the period ,1st world war,characters weren't interesting to me

Would you listen to another book narrated by Samuel Giles?

Probably not but that might depend on the subject matter.

Was A Test of Wills worth the listening time?

No

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

A Test of my patience

This is the first time I have ever given up on an audible book but I found the narrator's voice so irritating that I gave up.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

A good old gentle "Who done it"

Despite a pretentious previous review, the author and narator have pitched this story perfectly and accurately for the time periods and characters described.
It is nice to have a slower paced, less aggresive Detective Story to listen to for an evening or to go to sleep with.
Looking forward to the rest of the series.
(Crush as in 'to fancy someone' comes from the 1800s).

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

Excellent first in series.

I really enjoyed this story. The mystery unfolds slowly. The plot twists are developed in a believable way. The ending seemed a little abrupt, but this is a good start to a great series. The main character, Ian Rutledge, is an appealing, believable character, with an interesting back story. I look forward to more books in this series.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

6 people found this helpful

Interesting set up let down by dull narration

I did enjoy this but I hope my review doesn’t sound like damnation by faint praise.

The story was twisty turny and while the ending may have been a bit of a cheat, there were some good characters and a meaty puzzle.

The reason it doesn’t get a higher rating (3 is my baseline for perfectly ok) is that the narrator just didn’t do it for me. I felt that a younger narrator would have better suited the age of the main character who would have been much more engaging with a livelier narrator.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

niggles

I enjoy the Rutledge stories and have heard many of them, but I am not keen of the narrator of the early books. He does not seems to have understood the importance of an RP (received pronunciation) accent which was so important until the 1960s in Britain. How could Rutledge have even the slightest provincial twang? I am sure his sister would not have one - they move in the wrong social environment for that (see "A Fine Summer's Day). If he sounded provincial as this narrator suggests then he puts Rutledge lower down social ladder than I have placed him in a very class-conscious Britain. It is also one of the things Bowles, his superior, dislikes about Rutledge.

The other thing that annoy me is the use of US words like "drapes" and "gotten". UK English may now be scattered with US English terms and pronunciation, but either "Charles Todd" is catering for an American-speaking audience of they are from the other side of the pond! It is annoying to think that "curtains" are not acceptable or valid English for a story firmly set in early 20th Century Britain.

This story is the first case for Rutledge post war when he, and the rest of the country, have to cope with their losses and nightmares or ghosts.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

7 people found this helpful

Brilliant start to the series

Having listened to all the books over the years, I decided to revisit them and have not been disappointed. Love the twists that all the books have that keep you on your toes the whole time. Very entertaining

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

Not very well written

To be honest this book is not in the first rank modern detective fiction. It is not so much the story itself, but the fact that the author just does not have the writing skills of authors such as Robert Goddard, Philip Kerr, Nicola Upson, David Downing and others, and I found that as I listened to it, it's style quickly became irritating and after a while I decided I didn't want to listen any more. If you consecutively read (or listen to) a Charles Todd book and one by one of the other authors I have mentioned, you will see the difference.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

Dull as ditchwater

Devoid of pace, this plodding detective story sees the policemen at the centre of the story wandering around talking to people and eventually getting given the solution to the mystery. Excellent narration, though.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

Americanisms. And character voice changes

I figured out what the big wedding destroying argument was about only a few chapters in and was frankly at a loss why it was made such a big secret and deemed too horrible for anyone to mention. The real motive for the killing was also obvious only a few chapters in, despite the author withholding key information until the end. The many other amateur elements of the plot suggested to me this was a possibility and frankly the detective's key suspect both psychologically and motive wise seemed the least likely person to have actually committed the crime.
The premise of the bitter boss lining up the protagonist for a fall was interesting but did not make up for a boring plodding and very unprofessional investigation where the detective is highly unlikely to have been working on such a key case without more support from Scotland Yard. He's a professional policeman yet operates more like an amateur who does not follow due process. Also, different character's accents keep changing, leaving the listener with only context to guess who is talking. Words like honey are used as endearments and the word crush, meaning infatuated, is also used. In rural Britain shortly after the WW1! I don't think so! I carried on listening despite the inaccuracies like the summary firing squad execution that the protagonist ordered and which contributed to his shellshock. That's not how such things were done. The description of the firing squad is entirely inaccurate. There would have been a court martial, more than one officer would have been involved in the final decision and not all of the men ordered to shoot would have live rounds. And often it would not be the accused's own squad that would shoot him.
It's true that in reality such court martial and firing squad victims were often unfairly punished. However, there was nevertheless a due process and it would not have happened as described in this book.
Unrealistically all the posh females are gorgeous and the working class ones don't even exist beyond being cardboard cutout ciphers and all the working class people (except a very unrealistic Bolshevik type character) adore their lot in life and think their posh employers and neighbours are worthy of their adoration.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!