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Thread: Advice Needed on Similiar Book Plots

  1. #1
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    Advice Needed on Similiar Book Plots to The Count of Monte Cristo

    The Count of Monte Cristo is my favorite book as I have read it 6 times in different versions.

    Please divulge other books that have hidden treasure used for revenge or similiar plots.
    Last edited by veronique8; 07-23-2007 at 06:59 PM. Reason: Make the title more accurate

  2. #2
    Umm... Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson, had a treasure, but not much revenge.

    I'm not sure about other stories that center around revenge. I'll admit that I'm still half asleep right now.

    Good luck.

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    revenge.... REVENGE... Hhahahah
    Last edited by fishfool; 06-30-2008 at 02:06 PM.

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    Well here is a story from the news you might find interesting. Consider the story of a Mister Eric Volz. He is a man in his late 20's from Tennessee. He becomes Fluent in Spanish and moves to Nicaragua and for a while sells real estate. He then starts a successful magazine and has a gorgeous Nicaraguan girlfriend. Then he breaks up with her and moves to another Nicaraguan town two hours away. Then she is murdered. And it is brutal--rape involved and everything. He is two hours away, has ten witnesses as a alibi. He even served as a pall bearer. Sure enough he gets pinned for the murder. he finds himself hated as an outsider--at the middle of a horrible political conflict and imprisoned wrongly. The sentence he got was 30 years!!!! He is stuck there for almost two years in deplorable conditions and hated by everyone in the country all for a misunderstanding. And get this! The probably guilty guy who fingered him for the murder was named Danglas.

    Danglas/Danglars--some coincidence eh? Anyway he finally got out. Now if that guy gets some great book deal and makes a bunch of money. . . maybe he has some unfinished business with those guys.
    Last edited by Chap; 07-07-2008 at 01:58 PM.

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    Georges!

    I have just read an amazing, unknown work by Dumas. It is called Georges! It is a very short piece written one year before the THree musketeers and The Comte de Monte Cristo. Even for those of you who may not be enthralled with Dumas, you will love this book. I could not put it down. It is full of the drama, romance, suspence and action he is known for and is his only work about race.
    If you want to be transported, read this book!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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    Quote Originally Posted by veronique8 View Post
    The Count of Monte Cristo is my favorite book as I have read it 6 times in different versions.

    Please divulge other books that have hidden treasure used for revenge or similiar plots.
    Well, I'm not sure about the treasure bit, but there's one book about revenge which is quite famous (and it has to do with ships and the sea). I think it's called Moby Dick

    But as for treasure, try reading The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett (it was made into a famous movie with Humphrey Bogart). Though not set in the time of Napoleon, it's a detective story and actually the FIRST hard-boiled detective novel written.

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    Similar plot huh? Spoiler alert!!

    I have it for you--Sylvandire. It is also by Dumas. Read no further if you want to retain all the surprise!




    Ok So I just finished this book that is considerably less often read. It takes place at the final years of the reign of the Sun King, though he does not really appear in any overt way. Maria, Louise de Valliere, and Madame Montespan are all out of the picture, and Madame De Maintenon seems to be running the show. Versailles is a drag. Court is no fun; the hip crowd is in Paris making fun of Court.

    But the novel begins in the country. Our hero is Roger Tancrede, the Chevalier of Anguilhem. He is from a once noble family that has fallen on hard times--funds all but dried up. The neighbors are a more wealthy family and are a snooty bunch, except for the saintly, young daughter, aptly named Constance. The two youngsters fall deeply in love but are kept apart by their families--for class differences. Roger's family does not want him to propose, because a refusal would be scandalous. Constance's family doesn't want her to marry Roger because they see a dead end there and have higher hopes.

    Suddenly Roger's family comes into the possibility of a huge fortune--into the millions. A distant relative has died intestate. One other man has a claim to the fortune, the relative's Indian-born son. It becomes Roger's goal to travel to Paris, enter society, and convince the judges and lawyers (who all seem to be on the take) to look favorably upon him. He is befriended by some Paris coolios and learns the ways of the courtier. It becomes clear that in order to win his case he must marry the daughter of one of the judges. He expects her to be an ugly beast, but she is gorgeous. Her name is Sylvandire. So he is on the twin horns so to speak--a pietas question. Where does duty lie--true love, or filial responsibility? Save mom and dad from poverty and forsake his own happiness, or make them paupers for his own selfish desires?

    It is at this point that we see the narrative enter what most refer to as the rough draft of Monte Cristo.

    Roger marries Sylvandire out of a sense of duty to his parents resigning himself to a life of misery that is tempered by Sylvandire's smokin' hotness. For a while she is model wife. Then she has designs on entering court society. She buddies up to this guy Royancourt, who is Close to Madame Maintenon. There is an affair. She desperately wants into that Versailles crowd, only Roger's friends convince him that that whole scene is dead--it's like a nursing home. There is a falling out between Sylvandire and Roger to the extent that she defies him, and he out of anger goes to England. Upon his return he is imprisoned for mistreating his wife and for composing verses that make fun of Maintenon. There follows a long prison sentence where Roger's foppish naivte is stripped away, and he kind of finds himself.

    Upon his release he sets out upon exacting his revenge upon Sylvandire and her lover. There is a scene that echoes Milady's reckoning. Of course this frees him to persue his true love, Constance. However, the story has some final twists and turns.

    The book frankly reeks of Maquet with a little bit of Dumas tweaking. This had to be good practice for Monte Cristo which was published two years later in '45.

    Great read.
    Last edited by Chap; 11-04-2008 at 03:10 PM.

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    Count of Monte Cristo and similar.

    [QUOTE=veronique8;416917]The Count of Monte Cristo is my favorite book as I have read it 6 times in different versions.

    Strangely, two books have recently been published in the UK and I happened to read both of them (almost one after the other) before realising half way through they were both based upon Dumas' tale of treachery, redemption and revenge. The first is by Jeffrey Archer, 'A Prisoner of Birth'. Really quite good. The second by Stephen Fry 'The Stars Tennis Balls'. I would describe this as very good indeed.

    I enjoyed both books and in both cases the similarity of plot with Count of Monte Cristo really does sneak up on you and take you by surprise.

    Enjoy.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Chap View Post
    I have it for you--Sylvandire. It is also by Dumas. Read no further if you want to retain all the surprise!
    Wow, seems really exciting! It indeed reeks of Maquet with some Dumas...

    This book has now officially moved onto my list.

    Thanks for the suggestion.
    One has to laugh before being happy, because otherwise one risks to die before having laughed.

    "Je crains [...] que l'âme ne se vide à ces passe-temps vains, et que le fin du fin ne soit la fin des fins." (Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac, Acte III, Scène VII)

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    Delighted to hear that another Dumas fan will read this wonderful book.

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