This book starts its journey with BookCrossing from Delphi, Greece
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" Introduction and Notes by David Blair, Rutherford College, University of Kent.

The Moonstone, a priceless Indian diamond which had been brought to England as spoils of war, is given to Rachel Verrinder on her eighteenth birthday. That very night, the stone is stolen. Suspicion then falls on a hunchbacked housemaid, on Rachel's cousin Franklin Blake, on a troupe of mysterious Indian jugglers, and on Rachel herself.

The phlegmatic Sergeant Cuff is called in, and with the help of Betteredge, the Robinson Crusoe-reading loquacious steward, the mystery of the missing stone is ingeniously solved. "


~~~~~~To the person who found this book:~~~~~~

Welcome to BookCrossing.com, where we are trying to make the whole world a library!

If you have not already done so, please make a journal entry so we know this book has found a new home. Drop a few lines on where and how you found this book and what you thought of it. You don't need to join BookCrossing and you can remain completely anonymous. However, I encourage you to join so that you can follow this book's future travels. It's fun and free, and your personal information will never be shared or sold.

This book is now yours, and you can keep it if you choose, although I would love you to read and then share it. You can pass it on someone you know or release it once again in the wild, leaving it on a park bench, a phone booth, a hostel lobby...wherever you think it's suitable for the book to continue it's journey. If you pass it along, please make a release note to let others know where you left it.

I hope you enjoy the book!

Well... The Victorian era was full of prejudices, weird beliefs, terrible class distictions and I think it was a difficult era to live in, even if one was a member of the higher/more well-off classes. But among other achievements, the Victorians have offered some very interesting literature, often featuring writing techniques and themes which remain timely even nowadays. Many people consider The Moonstone as one of the first real detective stories in the modern meaning of the term. I think they are right.

This book contains many characters who might be culpits, there are many plot twists and surprises, there are many central characters who use their logic and try (not always succesfully) to focus on the facts and evidence in their hands to solve the mystery, there is humor and satyre and generally speaking, there are all these elements that hold a reader's interest.
It's written on epistolary form from multiple points of view. As it often happened on this era, originally it was published little by little on a periodical, so there are many short-ish chapters, each ending on some sort of larger or minor cliff-hanger to retain the suspense. As a whole I found the book well-written and entertaining.

The negative points are that sometimes it feels a bit naive and a modern audience should turn a blind eye to the prejudices of the era in order to enjoy it. Some characters are sterotypical and caricatures, while towards the end the plot gets too farfetched and "convenient" for the author to offer the solution of the story and to tie all the loose threads. I think that the book could be somehow shorter without losing its appeal.

All in all, this kind of read isn't for everyone, but if you enjoy the language and themes of the Victorians, you will like this one too. I enjoyed it!

Released somewhere on Thissio area in Athens!

Good Luck little book and Don't forget to write your news from time to time!