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Book Review of The Phantom of Manhattan

The Phantom of Manhattan
reviewed on


I was rather disappointed in this book. The writing is not at all stimulating, and completely ignores the adage of "Show, don't tell." While it is mildly interesting, it is forgettable. Certain plot points appear out of nowhere, with no build-up or even a believable background, most noticeably the ending. Very little time is spent on the characters we love, Erik gets only a single, three-page chapter to himself, Christine is all but ignored, and Raoul gets only a cameo appearance. The story could have been compelling and interesting, but the plot fell flat, along with most of the characters.

In fact, the only two characters that had any amount of interest to them were Charles Bloom and Father Joseph Kilfoyle, the former of which nearly saved the book, the latter which was barely explored. In fact, if you skip every chapter except Bloom's, you would be able to understand not only the entire plot, but you would have saved yourself time and a great deal of poorly written "story".