Reading Journal Entry: Mr. Monk goes to the Firehouse by Lee Goldberg

Mr. Monk Goes To The Firehouse is a tie-in novel for the TV series Monk, which stars Tony Shaloub as an obsessive compulsive detective. It's a wonderful show, that I have seen less of than I would like (I just put the first season on reserve to rectify that).

Shaloub's performance is wonderful, and Goldberg really captures the quirky charm of the character. The book is written from the point of view of his assistant Natalie, which is a nice touch.

I very much appreciated that it starts off as an invetigation of the murder of a dog impaled by a pick-axe, a nice touch of the hat to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon, about an autistic boy investigating the murder of a dog.


5 comments:

Lee Goldberg said...

"a nice touch of the hat to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon, about an autistic boy investigating the murder of a dog."

Finally, someone noticed! As far as I know, you're the first one who has. Thanks for the kind words.

Anonymous said...

Mapletree,

you should "get" the episode (I believe of the same title) that Goldberg wrote. It's interesting because of all the changes that were made from the book, which Lee writes about on his blog.

Also, beware that a few episodes of the series are "lesser" than others -- they are always funny, but often the mysteries are ridiculous and obvious.

Nowhere near as good as that spec for MONK your incredibly brilliant sister wrote.

Also, the mystery-format has changed over time. At the beginning, it was more common for the audience to find out in the teaser who the murderer was, and the excitement of the episode came from Monk figuring it out during the investigation. Now, they're reverted by and large to the classical Sherlock Holmes form, in which both the audience and Monk discover the killer at the same time.

Lee Goldberg said...

The title of the episode is MR. MONK CAN'T SEE A THING and aired this summer. It should rerun in the next month or two.

Devid said...
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Devid said...
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