The Club Dumas (ISBN 0151001820)

Amazon.com Review:
Fallen angels, satanic manuals, and a passion for the works of Raphael Sabatini and Alexandre Dumas among others--this is the stuff of Spanish author Arturo Pérez-Reverte's engrossing novel The Club Dumas. Set in a world of antiquarian booksellers where dealers would gladly betray their own mothers to get their hands on a rare volume, The Club Dumas is a thinking person's thriller: in addition to a riveting plot, the book is full of intriguing details that range from the working habits of Alexandre Dumas to how one might go about forging a 17th-century text. Woven through these meditations is enough murder, sex, and the occult to keep both the hero, Lucas Corso, and the reader hopping. As in his previous novel, The Flanders Panel, set in the world of art restoration, Mr. Pérez-Reverte has written a literary thriller to tease both the intellect and adrenaline gland. Lucas Corso makes a complex, ultimately sympathetic hero, and there's plenty to delight in the intricate twists and turns the story takes before the mystery of The Club Dumas is finally solved.

Too much information:
After reading all of the above reviews, you may not need to read THE CLUB DUMAS after all since so much of the book's plot has been revealed by those who still feel that a book review is just an assignment to be turned in to teacher in English IV just to prove that you read the book. It's as if someone tells you what the movie was all about before you've seen it. Just you don't hate it when that happens? That said, I would like to say that if you enjoyed reading John Durnning's BOOKED TO DIE or THE BOOKMAN'S WAKE (the Cliff Janeaway novels) I would highly recommend The Club Dumas. A bizarre labyrinth of mystery, murder and the book arts. Mr. Perez-Reverte must be praised for his research and if you are not well versed in Alexandere Dumas' literary career (the author of 257 novels, histories and memoirs), take heart, you will become very enlightened. If you are interested in a limited history of the book and its role in the mystery genre... and the occult, this book will keep your fingers flipping pages. It's just an added layer in the creative complexity of a novel with many layers.... Although, to be honest, I did think the ending was a bit over the top. Hope you will enjoy it as well. I've just finished the FLANDERS PANEL and have started THE FENCING MASTER. I had to place a hold on THE SEVILLE COMMUNION. I think you get the idea.

Interesting, but oddly disappointing:
This book came to my attention only after I saw the movie The Ninth Gate, and I was immediately interested. The movie seemed to leave several questions unanswered, and I believed that a book would be a better medium for a mystery about books than film. Well, it was, but I was still left with unanswered questions. The book follows the expolits of Lucas Corso, an alcoholic anti-hero, as he tracks down the source of exceedingly rare occult literature as a mercenary book trader. The best parts of the book center around his relationship with a strange girl with green eyes, who joins him for unexplained reasons on his quest. However, loosely connected to this intriguing investigation is a manuscript chapter from The Three Musketeers, which takes on strange dimensions as character parallels from the Musketeers oppose him on his journey. The background is peopled with unique characters, and various asides are devoted to describing the murky world of the rare book black market, the biography of Alexandre Dumas, or the nature of the devil and medieval occult practices. These excerpts answered many of the questions posed by the film, fleshing out my understanding of plenty of side-issues. Several illustrations in the book also made these chapters more enjoyable. It was only at the end that I despaired of an explanation that united the two detective stories of Dumas and the devil. Instead of everything "coming together" as in a Sherlock Holmes story, the motivation for the entire quest comes unravelled into two distinct threads which are only coincidentally united. I admit that the movie had spoiled the final twist for me, which is perhaps the reason I found it unsatisfying. However, the author seems to have made some effort to assert the unity of the two strands of plot via Corso himself, who reflects to himself that he is caught in a literary twilight zone and refuses to be surprised by events which refer to literature. During the pursuit, I was pleased by all of this, but only on the condition of an eventual rationale. The rationale, once revealed, left me unimpressed. Not that the book is without its charm; in fact, much in the style of Umberto Eco, the answer to the mystery is not the fanciful one the main character supposes- or rather, not the whole answer. The Club Dumas reminded me of Eco's book Foucault's Pendulum in particular, although this one is much more digestable to a leisurely fan. I will continue to suspect that the movie for The Ninth Gate spoiled the book for me; therefore, I would recommend anyone interested in this subject to read the book prior to the movie. The aftertaste may be more palatable.

Perez-Reverte, In Spanish or English, a great author.:
Much better than the movie. Great info on forgeries, book making,engraving and of course the history of books dealing with the "devil." I read this in English first and was so impressed I had to read the original. I found the original as easy to read as any English novel.

Literary mystery has fun with the conventions:
Literary mystery has fun with the conventions, switching voices and perspectives to effectively mask what is a basically a simple mystery. Like a magician, the trick is clearly solvable, but the author scatters enough slight of hand to misdirect the reader away from it. The plot hings on Dumas' classic Three Musketeers, and along the way one learns some interesting background on the author, his writing process, and the book (plural, actually, as Dumas wrote over 200 romantic serials that sold millions of copies in many languages). A manuscript copy of one of the chapters of the book has shown up, confirmed as genuine, in Dumas' own hand, as well as one of his collaborators. At the same time , the book dealer/fixer/detective evaluating the manuscript is also put on the trail of a banned book of black magic; banned and supposed to be destroyed, there is one known copy and two others he must track down to confirm authenticity. As I said, the threads of the two searches get entwined, and the reader, as the book detective, make some faulty assumptions that end up quite redirecting and misdirecting the outcome. Nearly a classic in its own right, this book reads fast, and has given this reviewer incentive to read the Dumas classic.

Anticlimactic:
An interesting framework that combines elements of Dumas, Sherlock Holmes, Phillip Marlowe, and The Da Vinci Code that, at least for me, didn't quite work. I actually thought The Club Dumas started out quite well - I flew through the first 100 pages thoroughly engrossed in the story as the mystery was established, but unfortunately it fell flat as it unfolded, in my opinion. Quite simply, I found the resolution of the various questions/mysteries raised anticlimactic. I will admit I did appreciate finding as many references to Dumas, Conan Doyle, and other works as I could (I'm sure there are a lot I missed, I'm not all that well-read), but for me that didn't make up for a relatively flat story. I did not, on the other hand, appreciate the frequently awkward attempts at Chandlerian similes. At the risk of stating the obvious, if you're thinking of reading this I would, at the very least, be sure to read The Three Musketeers first.