There are a few points I’d like to discuss in this book review. These are: a. Introduction (including facts about the writer) b. The main characters
c. The summary of the book
d. My opinion Introduction I read the book ‘A kiss before dying’ by Ira Levin. Ira Levin was born In New York in 1929. He studied at Drake University, Iowa, and New York University. He wrote several well-known books, including the filmed ‘Rosemary’s baby’ and ‘The boys from Brazil’. He’s also famous because of his often interesting plots. The main characters The Kingship family

Dorothy Kingship: The first part of the story is about her. She has a boyfriend, but in the first part you don’t get to know his name (later he turns out to be Bud Corliss, the murderer in the story). She gets pregnant and tells Bud. But he’s only after the money of Leo Kingship, Dorothy’s father, and he knows he won’t get any money if Leo Kingship finds out about the pregnancy. So he tries everything to convince Dorothy that a baby will ruin their promising future. But Dorothy doesn’t care about money and she wants to marry Bud. Ellen Kingship: The second part of the story is about her. She’s a very curious and quite stubborn person. She’s definitely not so credulous as her sister Dorothy. After Dorothy’s death she wants to find out herself what really happened, because she doesn’t believe that Dorothy committed suicide. Marion Kingship: The third part of the story is about her. She’s as well as her sisters Dorothy and Ellen a daughter of Leo Kingship. She’s quite a shy person and she loves art. Bud contacts her after the murder of Ellen and he says he still has a book he borrowed from Ellen. Then Marion falls in love with Bud and they make plans for marrying. But her father doesn’t like this… Leo Kingship: He’s the father of Dorothy, Ellen and Marion. He’s the the owner of the Kinghip Copper Corporation, therefore he’s very rich. He doesn’t like Bud from the beginning. Dwight Powell: He studies at the same university as Dorothy and Bud. Ellen suspects him of murdering Dorothy, but later he convinces Ellen of his innocence. Then Bud kills him and after that Ellen too. Burton Corliss (Bud): He’s after the money of Leo Kingship, and he murders everybody that tries to stop him from obtaining it. He grew up in a poor family, and now he wants his mother to be proud of him. Because she’s always had faith in him. Gordon Gant: At first Ellen suspects him of murdering Dorothy, but he proves his innocence to her. Then he and Ellen become good friends, and he continues investigating after Ellen is murdered. He visits Leo Kingship and tells him what he found out. The summary of the book The story is divided in three parts: Part One: Dorothy
Part Two: Ellen
Part Three: Marion
Dorothy
Bud is Dorothy’s boyfriend. Dorothy’s father is very rich, because he owns Kingship Copper Corporation. Bud wants to be rich and he thinks the best way is marrying a rich girl. Then He meets Dorothy. Everything goes according to plan for Bud, but then Dorothy tells him she’s pregnant. Bud knows that they won’t get any money from Dorothy’s father if he finds out. So he gives her pills to get rid of the baby, and he promises to marry her if the pills won’t work. The pills don’t work, so he thinks of a plan to get rid of Dorothy and he wants it to look like a suicide. The plan works, and after the murder everybody, except for Ellen, is sure it was a suicide. Ellen
Ellen doesn’t believe Dorothy committed suicide and she decides to investigate herself to find out what really happened. She thinks there are two suspects: Gordon Gant and Dwight Powell. Gordon convinces her of his innocence, so she thinks it must be Dwight. She meets Dwight using a false name and she goes out with him. Then Dwight comes up with some strange story, so Ellen really thinks Dwight is the murderer. But then Dwight finds out her real name and he also convinces her of his innocence. Then Bud kills him and Ellen sees Bud with Dwight’s dead body. Bud claims Dwight is Dorothy’s murderer and that he wanted to kill her as well, but that he was killed by his own gun when Bud attacked him. Then they drive away and he stops behind a closed restaurant, there he murders Ellen too. Bud waits a few months before contacting Marion Kingship. Marion
Some months later Bud gives Marion a ring and tells her he has still got a book that he borrowed from Ellen. Then Marion falls in love with Bud and they plan to get married. Meanwhile Gordon Gant suspected Bud and he found some evidence pointing in his direction, but it wouldn’t be enough for the police to believe it. So Gordon decides to contact Leo Kingship and he shows him the evidence against Bud. Then Gordon and Leo try to convince Marion that Bud is nothing but a liar and a murderer. And after a bit of a stuggle, they succeed in this. Then Leo wants to show Bud one of the factories of his company and Gordon accompanies them using the name Gordon Dettweiler. In the factory they walk over a catwalk of about 12 metres high, and then they confront him with all the evidence against him. In the beginning he denies the charges, but all of a sudden he realises they want him to fall off the catwalk. So he confesses, but he’s unlucky and he slips on the wet surface and he falls into a vat full of boiling copper beneath them.
My opinion I think the plot was very good, because the book remained exciting for a long time. I thought I exposed the murderer in the beginning, but my suspect was killed as well. I really enjoyed reading the book, I wasn’t bored any moment, except for the last part, because the book contained very detailed descriptions of the scene. This was sometimes very nice, because you could really imagine the situation, but in the last part I got bored by the endless descriptions of the factory. What I also liked about the book was that you saw things from different eyeviews. Because this revealed how different persons felt about different situations. All in all I found ‘A kiss before dying’ a very good book with an interesting plot and nice, but very different characters. I hope my opinion gave you a good impression of how I experienced the book.