Good Mysteries, Great Stories

There are those for whom everything G. K. Chesterton said or wrote is worth quoting--especially in an argument. I know because I used to be one of them. Having let my conversion to Catholicism sink in over the course of a dozen years, I've mellowed somewhat but I still enjoy Chesterton immensely. In fact, being able to approach him with less reverence makes his work much more enjoyable.

As mystery stories these are entertaining enough--though many in this collection and others turn on double identities, so much so that after a while the listener starts expecting them. And while I always enjoy Chesterton's prose style, bristling as it does with insights that range from the merely descriptive to the deeply social, religious and psychological, it can sometimes become too noticeable and slide into apparent affectation. Finally, his characters have a bad way of slipping into his prose style whenever they attempt to describe or narrate (see the girl's bit of autobiography in "The Head of Caesar").

Nevertheless.

Chesterton's irreverent attitude toward everything his age held (and ours holds) in such high reverence--machinery, technology, psychology, science--and his quiet, persistent reminders that the truth never changes, no matter how much we believe we have, are worth the price of admission every time. While the mysteries are intriguing enough, the commentary they provoke are what really matter:

"What we all dread most," said the priest in a low voice, "is a maze with no centre. That is why atheism is only a nightmare."

"But he died penitent—he just died of being penitent. He couldn't bear what he'd done."

For the whole air was dense with the morbidity of blackmail, which is the most morbid of human things, because it is a crime concealing a crime; a black plaster on a blacker wound.

"There's a disadvantage in a stick pointing straight," answered the other. "What is it? Why, the other end of the stick always points the opposite way."

And Frederick Davidson is the perfect reader to deliver stuff like this.

Sherlock Holmes asserted a detective should never reveal his methods. But Father Brown is a detective with no method other than his grounding in ultimate truth that permits him to see things as they actually are. And that's a mystery that can be more satisfying than the best who-done-it.

12 people found this helpful

these are fun!

gotta love Father Brown. Quaint, down home earthy, and astutely observant.
each chapter is a joy. fun times right here and the book is done too soon

2 people found this helpful

The 1920s casual racism no longer charms

I tried to overlook the racism, really. But it was just spoiled for me. In any case the plots were very contrived. I prefer the TV show.

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Loved it, makes you think

You have to pay close attention every minute to even come close in a guess at what happened, and even then you still won't get it right 90% of the time.

2 people found this helpful

Droll reader quaint at first, but soon tedious

Chesterton's Father Brown stories are all clever and entertaining, yet rife with wisdom. However, the narrator of this edition is problematic.
While his aristocratic English accent is novel and delightfully droll at first, it soon becomes a tedious distraction. His cadences are repetitive, droning on like a bad musical, and his inflections are oddly, even wrongly placed, often making sentence syntax confounding.
Also, his volume trails off at the end of many sentences, so that the listener is forced to rewind several times before giving up on comprehending the full meaning of the sentence.
All this has a somatic, almost hypnotic effect, so that the listener inevitably forgets to listen, attention trailing off into tangential thoughts and daydreams.
In short, it's not an attention grabber.
In all fairness to this narrator, he reads a King Arthur book that I enjoyed; it gave the stories an oddly comical but less off-putting flavor.

2 people found this helpful

Had to read more Father Brown after the first book

What did you love best about The Wisdom of Father Brown?

The stories, like the first book, are wonderful and the mysteries are great fun to solve. As always Father Brown is right in the thick of things, however, Flambeau is almost always present in these stories, which adds a whole new dynamic. I liked that it's almost "the adventures of Father Brown and Flambeau."

Which character – as performed by Frederick Davidson – was your favorite?

The performance was perfect! The narrator sounds just as you think Father Brown ought to and can then seamlessly move into a French accent for Flambeau. There isn't a whole lot of changing the voice to match a character, save if they are notated as being from a specific country of origin, which I liked as it seemed to keep the flow of the book better.

2 people found this helpful

Thoroughly enjoyable. Well read, well written.

The narrator does an excellent job of bringing the text to life with interesting and consistent voice work.

1 person found this helpful

Father Brown Solves Many Short Mysteries.

For some reason I found this book a little harder to follow than the other Father Brown books. These are all masterfully told stories and well worth the listen.

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Slow moving murders

GK Chesterton’s Father Brown stories are in the classic Victorian style with long passages of detailed description and slow-moving but complex and ingenious twisting plots. However, these plots are often driven by national and sometimes viscously racist stereotypes, and even someone used to reading literature from this period will be startled and discomfited by it. The narrator’s dry sardonic style of reading feels a little monotonous after a while. Over all, I was a little disappointed.

Good theology. Great format. Superb performance.

I would suggest that anyone who enjoys thinking through their audiobooks should read this title.