Sandra T. (silverwife) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 16 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 4
This is an excellent opener to a series and has made me a pretty devoted fan. It's 1856 and William Monk has awakened in a hospital without a memory. He doesn't even know his name until someone tells him. He's surprised and puzzled to find out that he's a 'peeler', a member of the British police. As soon as he's released he starts trying to piece together his past while still working on the cases he's assigned. He meets (and winds up allying himself with) a nurse recently back from the fields of the Crimean War. Despite the antipathy between them, information from their two pretty disparate realms actually work well together and keeps the story moving along at a clipping pace. Anne Perry does an excellent job of evoking the mores, the concerns, the constraints, the flavor of the period. Her plotting and pacing are very good. If you like murder mysteries you'll like it. If you like mysteries woven in an historical setting, you'll like it a lot.
Helpful Score: 2
Excellent introduction of Inspector Monk ... can't wait to read the next one! Anne Perry is one of my new favorite authors!
Carol L. (LittleRhody) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 14 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 2
In the two series that Anne Perry authored, William Monk and Thomas Pitt, she builds the characters and their lives as she delves into their latest mystery which enhances her stories with an added dimension. If you wish to get the most out of her series, here are the Monk books in the order in which they were written: 1990-Face of a Stranger, 1992-A Dangerous Morning, 1994-A Sudden Fearful Death, 1995-The Sins of the Wolf, 1996-Cain His Brother, 1997-Weighed in the Balance, 1998 The Silent Cry, 1998-A Breach of Promise, 2000-The Twisted Root, 2000-Slaves of Obsession, 2001-Funeral in Blue, 2002-Defend & Betray, 2003-Shifting Tide. For historical (Victorian Age) fiction mystery lovers, she is the greatest for a delightful pageturner.
Helpful Score: 2
1st in the "Monk" series. Great story.
Helpful Score: 1
William Monk has lost his memory. Apparently he is a London police detective and he must solve the murder of a prominent citizen, while trying to recover just who he is.
Good story. Good writing.
Good story. Good writing.
Helpful Score: 1
Fascinating, unique protagonist in wonderful mystery that keeps the reader riveted until the end.
Helpful Score: 1
I started off by enjoying this book, but towards the middle, I lost interest. It became a bit long winded. Not one of her best.
Carolyn F. (GracefulFire) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 65 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
The first book in the William Monk series of Victorian detective novels by Anne Perry. FANTASTIC. Be sure to read this one first and read them in ORDER.
Helpful Score: 1
The first book of the William Monk series. Monk's memory returns a little as the series progresses. I very much enjoy Anne Perry because she writes about the reality of the "good olde days".
Linda S. (dragonlady) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 94 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
Anne Perry is tops. This is the first William Monk mystery.
If you want to know how Monk lost his memory and found Hester you need to read this book. I found it a great read.
This is an excellent Victorian mystery. Can't wait to read the whole Inspector Monk series.
Lorelie L. (artgal36) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 471 more book reviews
Branching out from her popular Victorian London sleuthing team, Inspector Thomas Pitt and his wife Charlotte, Perry ( Cardington Crescent ) introduces another exemplary "Peeler" (as in Bobby Peele, the first "bobby"), detective William Monk, in this period mystery with a pronounced and satisfying psychological dimension. After an accident in his carriage, Monk wakes up with no memory; ashamed to admit it, he bluffs his way through recovery and returns to work, where he is assigned a particularly tricky investigation of a young nobleman's brutal murder. While tracking the last affairs of Joscelinsp ok? yes Grey, Monk traces his own history and dislikes what he turns up on both fronts. Uncovering unpleasant secrets within Grey's aristocratic family, he also finds his gradually revealed former self to have been ambitious, cold and perhaps cruel. Integral to Perry's rich, unpredictable plot is the Crimean War, graphically described by Hester Latterly, a forthright young woman of the middle class who nursed there with Florence Nightingale. While Monk's unwillingness to face directly the questions of his past is often a stumbling block, forbearing readers will be amply rewarded by Perry's resolutions of both mysteries.
Allison W. (sealady) reviewed The Face of a Stranger (William Monk, Bk 1) on + 657 more book reviews
From School Library Journal - First of the series. YA-- Readers are immediately immersed into the Victorian world of William Monk as he awakens from a coma in a squalid London hospital. Leaving in a semi-amnesic state, he finds his flat through a receipt in his pocket. Gradually, as he begins to solve a much-publicized murder case, Monk's established abilities as an investigator are renewed. As he unravels the case, he also comes to know his own past. Perry leads readers to the solutions of the two mysteries with a fine, comfortable style and descriptions of turn-of-the-century London that are vivid and accurate.
Set in London after the Crimea war. I loved the fact that one of the main characters was one of Florence Nightingale's nurses. Main character is detective William Monk, a London police detective. The catch? He had an accident that has left him bereft of his memory. He hides the fact as he continues his detective work.
If you are an Anne Perry fan, then you will want to read this one. William Monk returns to work after the accident that leaves him without a huge gap in his memory. He is assigned to the murder case of a Crimean war hero. This book has been well read therefore is not like new. Not torn or dirty just well used.
His name, they tell him, is William Monk, and he is a London police detective. But the accident that felled him has left him with only half a life; his memory and his entire past have vanished. As he tries to hide the truth, Monk returns to work and is assigned to investigate the brutal murder of a Crimean War hero and man about town. Which makes Monk's efforts doubly difficult, since he's forgotten his professional skills along with everything else....
Tedious, repetitious and boring. The idea of a main character being a police office with amnesia I found intriguing, but what I got was a snooze fest. I got through 90 pages of a 345-page book and could not get through the rest.
