Review: A QUIVER FULL OF ARROWS, Jeffrey Archer

• this edition published Pan Books 2013
• ISBN 978-1-5098-0729-1
• 266 pages

Synopsis (publisher)

Quiver Full of Arrows is a collection of twelve exciting short stories from bestselling author, Jeffrey Archer.

Two friends fall under the spell of a New York beauty – with an unexpected outcome. A casual remark is taken seriously by a Chinese sculptor, and the British Ambassador becomes the owner of a priceless work of art . An insurance claims adviser has a most surprising encounter on the train home to Sevenoaks.

This marvellous collection of twelve stories ends with a hauntingly written, atmospheric account of two undergraduates at Oxford in the 1930s, a tale of bitter rivalry that ends in a memorable love story.

My Take

Stories in this collection

• The Chinese Statue
• The Luncheon
• The Coup
• The First Miracle
• The Perfect Gentleman
• One-Night Stand
• The Century
• Broken Routine
• Henry's Hiccup
• A Matter of Principle
• The Hungarian Professor
• Old Love

Followers of my blog will have noticed a penchant for Jeffrey Archer short stories just recently.
That is simply because they are so good. Sometimes mystery, sometimes just simply quirky, all with marvellously drawn characters.

In this collection Archer says that 11 of the stories are based on known incidents and only one is totally the result of his own imagination. Each of them is 20-30 pages long. Just right for a bit of night time distraction.

My calculation now is that I have read at least 60 short stories by Archer and he really is the master.

My rating: 4.5

The other collections I've read
A TWIST IN THE TALE
4.7, TELL TALE
4.6, CAT O'NINE TALES
4.5, TWELVE RED HERRINGS 

Review: TWELVE RED HERRINGS, Jeffrey Archer - audio book

• audio book from Audible.com
• Narrated by: Alec McCowen
• Length: 5 hrs and 28 mins
• Abridged Audiobook
  Release date: 06-01-07
  Collection printed 1994
• Language: English
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan Publishers Ltd.

Synopsis (Audible.com)

An imprisoned man is certain that his supposed murder victim is very much alive; a female driver is pursued relentlessly by a menacing figure in another vehicle; a young artist gets the biggest break of her career; a restless beauty manages the perfect birthday celebration; an escaped Iraqi on Saddam Hussein's death list pays an involuntary visit to his homeland. How will they react? How would you?

Twelve Red Herrings is the third collection of irresistible short stories from a master storyteller. Cleverly styled, with richly drawn characters and ingeniously plotted story lines, each of the 12 tales ends with a delightfully unexpected turn of events.

From Wikipedia
The book contains 12 stories.

• "Trial and Error"
• "Cheap at Half The Price"*
• "Dougie Mortimer's Right Arm"*
• "Do Not Pass Go"*
• "Chunnel Vision"*
• "Shoeshine Boy"*
• "You'll Never Live to Regret It"*
• "Never Stop on the Motorway"*
• "Not for Sale"
• "Timeo Danaos"*
• "An Eye for an Eye"*
• "One Man's Meat..."

In the preface the author notes that the stories indicated with an asterisk are "based on known incidents (some of them embellished with considerable licence)."


My Take

Once again a batch of short stories, involving some mysteries, but most are on the edge of crime fiction.
This audio production makes good listening particularly as the narration by Alec McCowen is so well done. Each of the stories has an unexpected twist in the final moments.

My rating:4.5

I've also reviewed
A TWIST IN THE TALE
4.7, TELL TALE
4.6, CAT O'NINE TALES 
They are all collections of short stories.

Review: CAT O'NINE TALES, Jeffrey Archer - audio book

• audio book from Audible.com
• Narrated by: Anton Lesser
• Length: 6 hrs and 56 mins
• Unabridged Audiobook
• Release date: 01-30-07 
• firsts published 2006
• Language: English
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 

Synopsis (Audible.com)

Cat O' Nine Tales is the sixth collection of irresistible short stories from this master storyteller. These 12 yarns are so satisfying because they are ingeniously plotted, include richly drawn characters, and have deliciously unexpected conclusions. They feature the mad, the bad, and the dangerous to know, as well as some more poignant and telling characters.

Many of these stories came to Archer while he was incarcerated for two years in five different prisons, and so they have a prison theme. Others were inspired after he was released. All in all, they confirm his position as one of the best storytellers alive.

My take

Another impressive set of short stories, a couple really almost novellas.
Beautifully and cleverly narrated.
I really am hooked on Archer's short stories.

The list of stories
    The Man who Robbed his own Post Office
    Maestro
    Don’t Drink the Water
    It Can’t Be October Already
    The Red King
    The Wisdom of Solomon
    Know What I Mean?
    Charity Begins at Home
    The Alibi
    A Greek Tragedy
    The Commissioner
    In The Eye of the Beholder

They range from a tale of ‘The Man Who Robbed His Own Post Office’, to the story of a company chairman who tried to poison his wife while on a trip to St Petersburg – both with unexpected consequences. In another, ‘Maestro’, an Italian restaurateur ends up in jail, unable to explain to the tax man how he can own a yacht, a Ferrari and a home in Florence, while only declaring a profit of £70,000 a year.

‘The Red King’ is a tale about a con man who discovers that an English Lord requires one more chess piece to complete a set that would be worth a fortune. In another tale of deception, ‘The Commissioner’, a Bombay con artist ends up in the morgue, after he uses the police chief as bait in his latest scam. ‘The Alibi’ reveals how a convict manages to remove an old enemy while he’s locked up in jail, and then set up two prison officers as his alibi. In total contrast is the accountant, who, in ‘Charity Begins at Home’, realises he has achieved nothing in his life, and sets out to make a fortune before he retires.

And then there is Archer’s favourite, which he came across after leaving prison, ‘In the Eye of the Beholder’, where a handsome premier division footballer falls in love with a 20-stone woman … who just happens to be the ninth richest woman in Italy. - this extract from Archer's website.

My rating: 4.6

I've also reviewed
A TWIST IN THE TALE
4.5, ONLY TIME WILL TELL- #1 Clifton series
4.7, TELL TALE 

Review: TELL TALE, Jeffrey Archer - audio book

• source: my local library
• Narrated by: Robert Bathurst
• Length: 5 hrs and 1 min
• Unabridged Audiobook
• Release date: 11-02-17
• Publisher: Macmillan Digital Audio

Synopsis

Nearly a decade after his last volume of short stories was published, Archer returns with his eagerly awaited, brand-new collection, Tell Tale, giving us a fascinating, exciting and sometimes poignant insight into the people he has met, the stories he has come across and the countries he has visited during the past 10 years.

Find out what happens to the hapless young detective from Naples who travels to an Italian hillside town to find out ' Who Killed the Mayor?' and the pretentious schoolboy in A Road to Damascus', whose discovery of the origins of his father's wealth changes his life in the most profound way.

Revel in the stories of the 1930s woman who dares to challenge the men at her Ivy League university in 'A Gentleman and a Scholar' while another young woman who thumbs a lift gets more than she bargained for in 'A Wasted Hour'.

These wonderfully engaging and always refreshingly original tales prove not only why Archer has been compared by the critics to Dahl and Maugham but why he was described by The Times as probably the greatest storyteller of our age.

My Take

An excellent and intriguing set of short stories, some crime fiction amongst them. The opening 100 word story Unique gets the reader thinking, and the novella The Senior Vice President is wonderful.

Well read in this audio book version.

My rating: 4.7

I've also read
A TWIST IN THE TALE
4.5, ONLY TIME WILL TELL- #1 Clifton series 

Review: ONLY TIME WILL TELL, Jeffrey Archer

• published 2011 by Macmillan
• ISBN 978-0-230-74822-4
• 388 pages
• source: a friend
• #1 in the Clifton series

Synopsis ( Macmillan)

The epic tale of Harry Clifton's life begins in 1919, in the backstreets of Bristol. His father was a war hero, but it will be twenty-one tumultuous years before Harry discovers the truth about how his father really died and if, in fact, he even was his father.

Only Time Will Tell takes a cast of memorable characters from the ravages of the Great War to the outbreak of the Second World War, when Harry must decide whether to take his place at Oxford, or join the fight against Hitler's Germany.

In Jeffrey Archer's masterful hands, you will be taken on a journey that you won't want to end, even after you turn the last page of this unforgettable yarn, because you will be faced with a dilemma that neither you, nor Harry Clifton could ever have anticipated.

Only Time Will Tell is part of The Clifton Chronicles series, but can be enjoyed as a stand-alone novel.

My take

I read this because first of all a friend loaded four of the books onto me just before Christmas, and secondly, because I have read some Jeffrey Archer novels and short stories quite a long time ago and enjoyed them.

Crimes are committed and there is mystery but this book is on the very edge of the crime fiction genre (you will see from my labels that I have allowed myself to label it "not crime fiction"). To my mind it is more a historical saga focussing on the life of Harry Clifton.

Harry is always told his father was killed in the Great War, but he himself was born in 1920, so he knows that just can't be true. Harry has "the voice of an angel" and that becomes his passport into a choral scholarship and a good education. Harry is a quick, intelligent child, who endears many people to himself, and behind the scenes they contribute to the costs of keeping him at school. And then what really happened to his father has left many people feeling guilty and they also keep a watchful eye on his progress. Ironically Harry's life becomes inextricably linked to the lives of the family who have done him the most damage.

So here I am having enjoyed the first in the Clifton series and with the second ready at hand. The ending of the first has left me hooked to know what happens in the second.

My rating: 4.5


THE CLIFTON CHRONICLES SERIES
BOOK 1: Only Time Will Tell
BOOK 2: The Sins of the Father
BOOK 3: Best Kept Secret
BOOK 4: Be Careful What You Wish For
BOOK 5: Mightier Than The Sword
BOOK 6: Cometh The Hour

I have also read
A TWIST IN THE TALE

Forgotten Book: A QUIVER FULL OF ARROWS, Jeffrey Archer

I've based my contributions to Pattinase's Friday's Forgotten Books this year on books I read twenty years ago in 1992.
The little green book (depicted right) where these records are kept is beginning to look a bit battered these days, and needs to be handled with care.

By 1992 I was already addicted to crime fiction and read very little else. But I also didn't read as many books as I do now. In 1992 I read just 87 books whereas this year I am heading for about 50 more than that.
During 1992 I discovered a number of authors such as Ruth Rendell, Colin Dexter, and P.D. James and read multiple titles by them. What all that amounts to is that my options for the rest of this year are rapidly dwindling.

However early in the year I read Jeffrey Archer's A QUIVER FULL OF ARROWS, a collection of short stories published in 1980.

Synopsis (from Fantastic Fiction)

Two friends fall under the spell of a New York beauty - with quite unexpected results. An offhand remark is taken seriously by a Chinese sculptor, and a British diplomat becomes the owner of a priceless work of art. An insurance claims advisor has a most surprising encounter on the train home to Sevenoaks. 
The openings to three of this marvellous collection of stories that ends with a hauntingly-written, atmospheric account of two undergraduates at Oxford in the thirties, a tale of bitter rivalry that ends in a memorable love story. 

The Kindle version has given this collection a new lease of life.

List of stories (Wikipedia)

• 1 The Chinese Statue
• 2 The Coup
• 3 The First Miracle
• 4 The Perfect Gentleman
• 5 One Night Stand
• 6 The Century
• 7 Broken Routine
• 8 Henry's Hiccup
• 9 A Matter of Principle
• 10 The Hungarian Professor
• 11 Old Love
• 12 The Luncheon" was later made into an episode of the TV series Tales of the Unexpected

Review: A TWIST IN THE TALE, Jeffrey Archer

Macmillan Digital Audio, read by Martin Jarvis, ISBN 978-0-230- 70043-7, 4 hrs 30 mins, on 4 CDs.
A collection of 12 short stories first published in hardback in 1988. Macmillan Digital Audio edition published 2008.

Publisher's blurb:

A man calls unexpectedly on his mistress and sees another man leaving her flat. Accusing her of being unfaithful, he quarrels with her, strikes her. She dies. Leaving unseen, he tips off the police so that the other man is arrested and charged . . . Has he achieved 'The Perfect Murder'? A tantalising opening to A Twist in the Tale.

Consider also: a wine-tasting with a bizarre difference, a game of sex with a sexy stranger, a violent row in a golf clubhouse bar, a rivalry founded on eating cornflakes . . . just some of the openings in this cunningly constructed, fast-moving, entertaining set of stories from THE bestselling author of our time.

Just a very short mini-review from me:
These stories made a car drive go very quickly. I thought the stories were a little patchy, and one just downright boring. However as one of Amazon's reviewers commented "The book is very appropriately named, because the very end of each story has a bizarrre "twist" that you don't expect. The twist happens literally in the last sentence or two of each story, and the reader is completely surprised."
There were a couple of tales which were very very good.

My rating: 4.1