“The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side” was published in 1962, but it wasn’t til 1980 that a movie adaptation was released with Angela Lansbury starring as Miss Marple. This novel was most famous for the use of Lord Alfred Tennyson’s poem, “The Lady of Shallot” which was quoted several times throughout the story.

I first read this novel in 2003, and recently started on my Christie mania again. Hence, the title “Marple Revisited”. This novel isn’t one of my favourites, the actions only started in the second half of the book. As usual in any Marple titles, the focus is not really on the murder itself, but rather on the small, gossipy village called St. Mary Mead, and on “human nature”.

The “Lady of Shallot” in this story refers to Marina Gregg, a famous American actress who had recently come to live in St. Mary Mead, when her husband bought over Gossington Hall. Fans of Christie would remember this from an earlier novel, “The Body in the Library”.

The first tragedy happened during a cocktail party at the Hall, when Heather Badcock died after drinking a poisoned cocktail. Everyone assumed the poison was originally intended for Marina, but further developments in the story revealed a dark past of Marina’s; who was the person who wanted her dead? Was Heather’s death really just a mistake on the murderer’s part?

The story picked up some pace in the second half, where another two characters were murdered. First was Ella Zielinsky, the secretary to Marina’s husband. Giuseppe, the butler, was shot after he tried to blackmail the murderer. Several chance words from the witnesses put Miss Marple on the right track; but what was the connection between these facts? Could the solution really be that simple?

“The Mirror Crack’d” closes with the death of Marina herself.

He said, “She has a lovely face;
God in his mercy lend her grace,
The Lady of Shalott.”

**P.S. I hope I didn’t spoil the story too much in writing this review! For those who haven’t read the story, enjoy!

first act, suspicion
this is the opening to the “drama” in crow’s nest, the official residence of a famous and popular actor, sir charles cartwright. thirteen guests were invited to a dinner, among them mr.satterthwaite (whom readers will remember from previous christie titles) and hercule poirot, the famous belgian detective. sir charles was in his usual acting mood without realising it himself (according to mr.satterthwaite, a keen observer of human nature). and before the end of the dinner, the local rector, rev. stephen babbington, dropped dead after drinking a poisoned cocktail.

second act, certainty
act 1 closes with sir charles’ leave to the south of france, apparently the result of his unrequited love for miss lytton gore (another guest at the ill-fated dinner). the second murder took place at roughly this time, when sir bartholomew strange, a highly-respectable nerve specialist was murdered by poison in his own house in yorkshire. coincidentally (apparently) all the guests who were present in crow’s nest were also there when sir bartholomew dies (with the exception of poirot, satterthwaite and sir charles). foul play was immediately suspected among the guests, and the three men started an investigation (with the help of the over-energetic miss lytton gore). sir bartholomew’s butler became the prime suspect after his mysterious dissappearance.

third act, discovery
the suspects were interviewed, one by one. sir charles and miss lytton gore finally make plans to get married (much to mr.satterthwaite’s delight) another victim was discovered, a patient in sir bartholomew’s ward. the story goes fast-pace towards the end, but poirot was convinced that there was something important that he has missed all along the investigations. at his wit’s end, poirot relaxes his mind by building a card-house (with a deck of happy families cards!!!!) when a chance word from miss lytton gore made poirot jump up in agony. “oh, but i have been blind- blind….”

conclusion
the ending is pretty much the same as the other christie titles… with all the suspects gathered in one place and poirot unmasking the murderer. i should have seen the identity of the murderer earlier (since the whole story was told in acts, it gives an impression of a drama being played, so readers should have known who the main actor was), only that it seems impossible at that time. but then again, i have to remind fans of christie that in many of her works, the murderer is often a character in disguise (a hint ot those who haven’t read this book!!)

the drama concluded with poirot’s complaint that he might be the victim by chance (much to his horror!!)

yay! just finished FMP: the second raid (TSR), and short OVA episode 14 bout a month ago!!!!!!! i’ve been a fan of FMP since 2 years back; but couldn’t find TSR anywhere, so i watched it on youtube. and i’m in love with sagara sousuke!!!!! not to mention leonard testarossa, the hot ”whispered” guy who appeared in TSR~ and chidori kaname is cute as usual~

 i watched FMP fumoffu first, followed by the first season, and finally TSR. its been a wonderful and enjoyable journey for me as i follow sagara and chidori’s adventure through the tokyo jindai high school where sagara gets into trouble everyday, the remote deserts of helmajistan where sagara and his comrades battle insane villains, the tuatha de danaan (submarine where sagara works) and finally, to hong kong where the last battle in the series takes place. and chidori and sagara have discovered their love for each other!!!!

FMP is a shonen anime which chronicles on the life of sagara sousuke, a sergeant in service of mithril, an organisation which fights for peace in the world. a 17-year-old guy who has spent his whole life on battlefields, sagara found himself unable to adjust to the life of a “normal high school student” in his latest mission to protect chidori kaname, a “whispered” candidate who has extraordinary knowledge and power over the “black technology”. in order to ensure her safety, sagara entered the tokyo jindai high school as a student (and chidori’s classmate), only to get into trouble everyday with his “war-crazed mind”.

chidori kaname, on the other hand, is the most popular girl in school, tough and loud. initially regarding sagara as “nothing but trouble”, she started to develop feelings for him over the six months they spent together in school before sagara was abruptly withdrawn from his mission, thus separating them. in the final episode of TSR, chidori goes to hong kong to find sagara, where he fought the enemies and killed them once and for all. it was a happy ending~ sagara returns to his life with chidori in tokyo, occasionally going for another mission. sigh~

an important aspect in this anime is the use of AI robots  in combats instead of a direct battle between two sides. the ECS mode allows the AI to become invisible in battlefields; and the “lambda driver” allows the pilots to control their AI with their minds. duh~ don’t ask me, i don’t know anything bout robots. in short, this anime focuses a lot on the technology side~ that’s why it’s considered a shonen anime despite all the lovey-dovey things going on between sagara and chidori. not to mention the intense scenes; people getting shot and limbs flying all over, and a part where an officer got his throat cut clean through. yikes!

some other characters in this series include kyoko, chidori’s best friend; teletha testarossa, sagara’s captain who’s in love with him; melissa mao and kurz weber who are sagara’s comrades. also, leonard testarossa !!!!!!  

Jerry burton, the main character in the story, had been wounded in a flight accident and retires shortly to lymstock, a small town in the country, where he gets involved in an exciting adventure of anonymous letters and murders.

Miss jane marple appears briefly in this case, towards the end of the story where she successfully indentified the real culprit of the murder. Basically, the whole case is focused on the “anonymous letters” circulating in lymstock. When mrs. Symmington, the wife of the local solicitor apparently committed suicide after receiving one of them, burton starts to investigate the matter, not long before another body is discovered.

 “The moving finger” is somehow different from the other crime fictions Christie had written. The murder itself is quite simple and straightforward, but foul play was not suspected until much later in the story. Instead of the usual methods of investigation (e.g. clues, suspects, motives, alibis, etc) miss marple delves into the psychological nature of the crime: what was the real reason behind the letters? Was it suicide, or murder? Were the letters intended to induce fear in the victims, or were they used to cover up something much more sinister?

 “The moving finger” only appeals to those who are looking for a light, not too complicated crime fiction. Hardcore fans of Christie would be quite disappointed in it. Personally I have always preferred hercule poirot but for beginners, this might be something really worth looking.

cover characters: zero kiryuu, yuki cross and kaname kuran

yay! hottest vampire~ kaname kuran!!!!!!

zero~ he’s cute too

yuuki cross~ torn between two love?

chairman cross~ eccentric guy

members of the night class~ all vampires (creepy)…..

i must confess that VK is one of the most decent “vampire animes” i’ve watched in a while. some of them are so lame that i couldn’t be bothered to get past the second episode. i prefer yaoi stuffs to vampires, anyway. so when i read a review on VK a few months ago i decided to give it a try (in case they have some really hot bishies in there)

VK is a story which mostly revolves around the three main characters, yuuki cross, kiryuu zero, and kuran kaname (hot vampire!!!!!) set in the cross academy, an established boarding school which is divided into the “day class” (ordinary students) and the “night class” (vampires). i guess you could call it a love-triangle-affair story between the three. personally i’ve always preferred [yuuki XXX kaname] as compared to [yuuki XXX zero], but i guess most of the fans like zero more. i mean… zero’s hot, but somehow i find kaname more attractive (dark-haired protagonist with unbelievably good looks, a dark past and cunning mind)~

OP of vampire knight season 1 episode 1~

fans of the series would notice some differences between the manga and the anime~ first there’s the order of the events which is slightly different. and zero and kaname’s characters are somehow lighter in some parts of the manga, as compared to the anime where they’re all serious-looking. and i suppose zero looks way hotter in the manga with the bloody rose (his vampire-killing gun)….

[spoilers]

old friends were on a holiday trip at the cornish resort of st.loo, when poirot made acquaitance with a young, attractive girl, nick buckley, the mistress of end house (which is located on the cliff overlooking the sea). a casual remark on how she (nick) had escaped death 3 times within a week aroused poirot’s curiosity, and he was determined to protect nick after discovering that someone had attempted to shoot her while she was talking to poirot and hastings (there was a bullet hole in her hat).

fast forward to the main point. having been convinced by poirot that her life is indeed in danger, nick telegraphs to her cousin, maggie buckley, to come and stay with her. during the night of the fireworks, maggie was killed, in what appeared to be an accident since the one targeted was nick. there were a few suspects; charles vyse (nick’s cousin), freddie rice (nick’s best friend), jim lazarus (guest at the house), commander george challenger (who was in love with nick) and mr. croft (a lodger at end house). to be absolutely sure of nick’s safety, poirot arranges for her to stay in a nursing home, only to have the murderer strike again by sending a box of poisoned chocolates to nick.

poirot was puzzled by the case; he felt that all along there was something important that he had missed. poirot gathered all the suspects together at end house (along with inspector japp, a good friend of poirot) and eventually revealed that the culprit was… nick herself! she had staged all the murder attempts on herself to convince others that her life was in danger, but in truth she wanted maggie dead so that she could inherit the money from maggie’s dead fiance. michael seton, the heir to a vast fortune, had died in an air crash, leaving everything to his fiancee, magdala buckley (maggie), without knowing that maggie and nick actually share the same first name! the murder was in fact, to remove maggie so that nick could inherit seton’s money, since he was a good friend to her to begin with (it makes me wonder, is there anything like a good friend who doesn’t even know your real name?)

the story was a bit confusing, especially bout the two “magdala buckley”s part. christie had a reputation of producing complicated solutions to her mysteries, and the murderer often turned out to be the one least suspected. of course, i do enjoy christie’s works immensely, but sometimes it seems a bit absurd that the murderer
1. is one of the main characters in disguise (as in three-act tragedy and death in the clouds)
2. is the apparent victim (as in death comes as the end and a murder is announced)
3. had committed the murder under impossibly bizarre situations (as in death on the nile)

in any way, christie is a master storyteller who had written many wonderful crime novels which her fans all over the world had enjoyed. “peril at end house” may not be her best work but its still quite an entertaining read. next i will be writing reviews on “ordeal by innocence” and “hercule poirot’s christmas”

p.s. to all readers i apologise for my bad english in writing this review

this is the ED of junjou romantica season 1. its fast becoming my #1 favourite song now. the lyrics is soooo good too!

here’s a summary of JR season 1. i’m doing a review on the relationship between the three couples:
couple #1 junjou romantica
usami akihiko XXX takahashi misaki

takahashi misaki, an 18-year old student, aspires to enter the prestigious mitsuhashi university, majoring in economics. episode 1 shows us how misaki walks home from school one day, worrying bout his poor results in the test. when he opens the door and sees another man hugging and clinging to misaki’s older brother (takahiro), let’s just say that that was the beginning of everthing.
usami akihiko (nicknamed usagi), the man who was hugging takahiro, is a super-rich 28-year old author of hot BL (boys love) novels, as well as the youngest recipient of the naomori award in history who graduated ahead of his classmates (majoring in law). he has been in love with takahiro ever since they were young, but his love was unreturned as takahiro doesn’t have a clue of how usagi feels bout him, not to mention that takahiro is a “straight” man.
circumstances forced misaki to live with usagi, it was then when misaki discovers usagi’s love for his brother. at first he was outraged; but after he sees how deeply usagi cares for takahiro, misaki could feel the hurt, too when takahiro decided to get married. and thus the two of them (akihikoXmisaki) ended up together as the series progresses, their relationship grows stronger. misaki could not accept this new relationship; in his own words, “i was raised as a normal boy for 18 years! how could i not be bothered by this?” not to mention that usagi has been doing “things” to misaki. it doesn’t help that usagi uses misaki’s name in his BL novels, creating steamy love scenes between “akihiko” and “misaki” in the stories.

couple #2 junjou egoist
kamijou hiroki XXX nowaki kusama

hiroki, who works in mitsuhashi university under the literature department, was sitting alone in a garden, thinking bout his love for his best friend, usami akihiko (the writer from JR). akihiko has never returned hiroki’s feelings as he was in love with takahiro at that time, something that hiroki regretted very much. all of a sudden a plastic rocket launched nearby landed in front of hiroki, and it was then that his destiny is about to be changed. the guy who launched the rocket was kusama hiroki, a young man working six odd jobs who was orphaned at a very young age. seeing hiroki crying, he grabbed his hand, patted his head and told him that everything would be all right. it was the beginning of their relationship.
nowaki, named so because of a typhoon on the night he was found at the orphanage, tried to do everything he could for hiroki, whom he fell in love with at the first sight. but hiroki’s not making it easy for him; hiroki still couldn’t forget akihiko, his childhood love. nowaki managed to persuade hiroki to be his tutor, saying that he would like to continue with his studies. when nowaki suddenly disappears for a whole year (or was it six years? i’m confused) without contacting hiroki at all, the latter was angry and hurt. it turns out that nowaki went to the US to study medicine to be a paeditrician, in order to be “someone whom hiroki would be proud to have as boyfriend”. it was sooooo sweet~

couple #3 junjou terrorist
miyagi yo XXX takatsuki shinobu

a very complicated relationship!
miyagi yo, a literature professor working together with hiroki (from JE) in mitsuhashi university, has just gotten divorced with his wife. as fate would have it, he would find a new love soon. takatsuki shinobu, the “terrorist” in this story, is the brother of miyagi’s ex-wife, which means that shinobu is his brother-in-law. they have a 17-year gap in their age (miyagi is 35 while shinobu is 18), but that doesn’t stop shinobu from “falling in love” with miyagi. a determined young man, shinobu invades miyagi’s life, insisting that miyagi “takes responsibility and fall in love with me”!!!!!! miyagi, who has no intention of being together with shinobu, tries to avoid him, but when shinobu ended up staying at miyagi’s house, we can already imagine what would happen between them the least developed story of the three couples, miyagiXshinobu only appears in episode 10 onwards. we’ll have to wait for season 2 to find out!

its a shame that most of the narrator(s) who turned out to be the culprit are usually very likable characters. having read the review before, i knew from the very beginning that dr. sheppard is the murderer. in many scenes from the story we can read bout how poirot compared sheppard to his (poirot’s) own best friend, captain hastings, who has always been a source of inspiration to him

in “roger ackroyd”, readers are brought into the world of king’s abbot, a not-so-tiny village located somewhere in england, by dr.james sheppard, the narrator of the story, who wrote and kept a manuscript on the events surrounding the death of his good friend, roger ackroyd. first, the sudden demise of mrs.ferrars, a woman whom ackroyd has an interest in. second, the fact that mrs ferrars had been blackmailed for many years by someone unknown and third, as the title suggests, the murder of ackroyd himself.

playing an important part in the story is hercule poirot, the famous detective with an egg-shaped head that we all have come to love so much. tired of his work (as a detective), poirot came down to live peacefully in king’s abbot and grow vegetable marrows, til the day when his “little grey cells” were awaken again in his search for the murderer of ackroyd. oh, how i love poirot!

dr.sheppard narrates the story well, (but keeping the fact from us that he was the murderer, of course) taking us step-by-step the methods used by him and poirot ro unmask the murderer (how ironic!). how they eliminate the suspects from the list one by one, by some chance discoveries and (of course) poirot’s infamous little grey cells. the climax of the story, where poirot reveals to sheppard that he (poirot) knows bout sheppard’s guilt from the very beginning. it is in this story that poirot gave the murderer a chance to escape justice, giving sheppard a chance to commit suicide. it reminds me of another christie story, “dumb witness”, where poirot allows the murderess to commit suicide for the sake of her children.

all in all, “the murder of roger ackroyd” is quite an entertaining read. as penned by sheppard in his final moments (sort of epilogue of the story): “i have no pity for mrs ferrars. her death was a direct consequence of her own actions. i feel no pity for myself either. what should it be? an overdose of veronal? then veronal let it be. but i wish to god that hercule poirot has never come here to grow vegetable marrows” 

some scenes from stage 1:

summary of the story:
fujiwara takumi, a 17-year old high school student has been helping his father to deliver tofu by car for five years. every morning at 4am, takumi drives the car through mount akina to deliver his goods. having driven on that tricky course for five years, often in adverse weather conditions, takumi has gotten used to the akina course and knows it by heart. using his father’s toyota trueno AE86, takumi often practises “drifting” on the road, letting his car skid, the tyres grabbing the drains. over the years he has perfected his skills on mount akina and thus the legendary “ghost of akina” is born.

in the first race of the series which covers about 6 episodes, takumi’s racing instincts were awaken by the race between him and keisuke takahashi, the driver of mazda RX7 FD3S from team “akagi redsuns”. the redsuns (which is my favourite team, by the way) has not lost a single race up to then, and when keisuke lost to takumi, the redsuns’ winning streak has ended, prompting ryosuke (keisuke’s elder brother) to declare, “we shall have revenge with my FC soon”. oh, ryosuke-sama…

second race of the series is the battle between akina’s 86 with nakazato takeshi of the myogi “night kids”, who drives a nissan skyline GT-R32, a monster car which, according to nakazato, is “the fastest car both on the street and on the circuit”. fuh~ needless to say, takumi won the race, and nakazato’s car is damaged in the process (due to his own poor skills, i might add) what is interesting in this race is ryosuke’s FC followed them (AE86 and GT-R32) all the way, with ryosuke analizing takumi’s movements and keisuke (sitting in the passenger seat) getting goosebumps over takumi’s skills. “this guy lacks a few nuts in his head”, so he said. haha! i love keisuke!

third race, between takumi’s 86 and shoji shingo from the night kids (don’t they ever learnt their lesson?) shingo is highly dissatisfied with nakazato’s leadership in the team, so he decided to defeat the 86 and take over as the head of night kids (team politics!). driving a honda civic (automatic), shingo proposed that they used the “duct tape death match” rule in the race, which is extremely unfair to takumi, since he drives a manual car and therefore needed both his hands to steer (according to the duct tape death match rule, drivers need to have their right hand fastened to the steering wheel). takumi, who was initially uninterested in the race, got the wind up after shingo hurts his (takumi’s) friend in a car accident. he accepted the challenge, and won.

fast forward to the next race, takumi goes to mount usui to race against the famous “impact blue” team which consists of two women, mako and sayuki. driving a blue nissan sil-eighty, they’re extremely familiar with the course, putting takumi at an disadvantage because takumi has never raced on any course other than akina, before. takumi followed them closely, copying their speed and drifts to keep up with them, up until mako loses control over her car and spins, thus letting takumi take over and wins.

meanwhile, takahashi keisuke has challenged nakazato to a race on myogi, and it is here that takumi races against kenta nakamura (akagi redsuns) in heavy rain. being over-confident of his ability to drive in rain, kenta eventually loses to takumi, who has more experience because of his job (delivering tofu in bad weather).

in the final race of the series (the BEST race ever), ryosuke sent a bouquet of roses to takumi and challenges him to a race on mount akina. takumi was stressed by ryosuke’s superstar status, by the fact that takahashi ryosuke has never lost any race before, ever. nicknamed as the “white comet of akagi” and the “king of all streets”, ryosuke, who drives a white mazda RX-7 FC3S, formulates a plan to defeat takumi once and for all. takumi’s chances of winning were slim in the race with ryosuke following him closely to put pressure on him, and it is by chance that takumi wins in the end, when ryosuke’s tyres gave up and he slips out of the ideal line, giving takumi space to overtake.

the series ended with ryosuke telling takumi “not to be satisfied with akina’s small stage”, and it is in stage 2 when we will see all those (most beloved) characters again.

summary of the story:
elinor katharine carlisle was happily engaged to her childhood love, roddy welman, and both of them were expecting a large inheritance from their dying aunt, laura. when it happens that their aunt has taken a liking to the lodgekeeper’s daughter, mary gerrard, both elinor and roddy went to visit their aunt in a bid to protect their inheritance (from mary). things get complicated when roddy fell in love with mary and dr. peter lord, the local physician (who was treating laura) admires elinor greatly after their first meeting. (this is what i call the roddy-elinor-peter-mary love affair, haha). there were several other characters involved, namely nurse hopkins and bob gerrard (mary’s father). when laura dies, her estates went to elinor as her nearest surviving relative and elinor settled a sum of two thousand pounds on mary as a wish from her aunt.

fast forward to the day of the murder. elinor was hosting a mini-tea party with fish-paste sandwiches and tea but the drama begins with mary’s death after consuming the food. elinor was immediately suspected and tried for murder, allegedly poisoning mary with morphine in the sandwich. peter lord, the doctor, appeals to hercule poirot (famous belgian detective) to help get elinor acquitted. poirot managed to discover that the morphine (supposedly stolen from nurse hopkins) was actually in fact, apomorphine hydrochloride, a powerful emetic, and thus impossible to be used as a murder weapon.

after much investigations by poirot, it was eventually revealed that the murderer was… nurse hopkins!!! she had poisoned mary by morphine in the tea and afterwards, injected herself with apomorphine hydrochloride to get rid of the poison (since she had drunk the tea herself to avoid suspicion). it appears that mary had written a will before she died, leaving all her money to her aunt (hopkins, but nobody knows bout this) and as the illegitimate child of laura, she (mary) stood to inherit very much indeed. mary died without knowing that laura was her actual mother. very complicated, isn’t it? i had a hard time figuring it out myself. duh~

my comments:
as i said earlier, this is one of my personal favourites. maybe its because i symphatise with elinor (who was wrongly accused and lost her fiance to mary), and peter’s attempts to free her are somehow funny, i’m not sure. i just found this more interesting than other christie works (such as the body in the library and murder on the orient express). maybe its because i’ve always favoured murders by poison (ugh!!!). gunshots and stabbings are too… normal i suppose.
at the end of the story, poirot hinted that elinor is likely to go with peter (since he was the one who saved her) and i think i agree with that. somehow peter is more likable than roddy (who doesn’t have much character at all). fans of christie will already know that poirot has a tendency to play matchmaker in some of his stories. ahh… how i miss poirot!!!