MY READER'S BLOCK: May 2024

Monday, May 13, 2024

Bodies from the Library 4

Bodies from the Library 4 (2021) by Tony Medawar (ed)

Another fine collection of little known, rarely (if ever) collection, sometimes unpublished stories by Golden Age detective novelists. Medawar has tracked down stories that appeared in newspapers, magazines, and long out-of-print anthologies. Also radio plays that were never aired or aired long ago, and a few unpublished works discovered among the author's things after death. We have whodunits, whydunits, and howdunits. Stories of murder and thievery and a closed circle mystery where it seems the detective may not get his man (or woman) because the circle has closed so effectively against the law. There is a little something for everyone who loves classic crime.

My favorites of the collection are "The Police Are Baffled," "Shadowed Sunlight," "After You, Lady," and "Signals." These have quite nice little twists to them that made them very interesting. The Lorac story is also good--but a bit short. I found "Child's Play" to be a little more brutal than Crispin's usual fare (particularly given the young victim) and "The Only Husband" by Bailey really didn't catch my fancy. I generally have enjoyed the Reggie Fortune short stories that I've read, but Reggie's conversation in this one leaves a lot to be desired. Overall, a strong outing. ★★★★

"Child's Play" by Edmund Crispin (Bruce Montgomery): A dark story about a governess who notices that three of the children in the house aren't the innocents you'd expect. And when their orphaned cousin dies, she suspects foul play instead of child's play. [3 deaths]

"Thieves Fall In" by Anthony Gilbert (Lucy Malleson): Three people on a bus bound for London. There is a theft and a surprise in store for the thief.

"Rigor Mortis" by Leo Bruce (Rupert Croft-Cooke): Sergeant Beef teaches a Scotland Yard man a thing or two about the importance of paying attention to people instead of fiddling little details like the state of rigor mortis.[one death]

"The Only Husband" by H. C. Bailey: Lord Avalon calls up Reggie Fortune to ask for help with a "family matter." But Reggie arrives too late to prevent his death--he'll have to settle for justice. [2 deaths]

"The Police Are Baffled" by Alec Waugh: A tale of two murders--in which the killers outwit the police using a device that another detective novelist would make even more famous. [2 deaths]

"Shadowed Sunlight" by Christianna Brand (Mary Milne): Involves a charity ball where a valuable emerald is stolen and a boat race with a murder. [2 deaths]

"The Case of Bella Garsington" by Gladys Mitchell: Caratet is a prosecuting attorney in this short radio play. He questions the daughter-in-law of a murdered man and uses her own words to prove her guilt. [one death]

"The Post-Chaise Murder" by Richard Keverne: Sir Christopher "Kit" Hazzard investigates what is first taken to be a simple case of highway robbery gone wrong. But there is a deeper reason for the man's death in the post-chaise.[one death]

"Boots" by Ngaio Marsh: A man confesses to stabbing his wife, but his friend produces testimony that seems to clear him. Inspector Alleyn must decide if it really does.[one death]

"Figures Don't Die" by T. S. Stribling: Dr. Poggioli figures out who is responsible for the death of an accountant--but there is no proof. Justice is served up anyway.... [2 deaths]

"Passengers" by Ethel Lina White: The short story that let to The Wheel Spins which led to Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes. When a young woman insists that an older woman has disappeared from a train, her fellow passengers and the train authorities all treat her like she's crazy and insist the woman never existed.

"After You, Lady" by Peter Cheyney: A mob boss thinks he's come up with the perfect plan to get rid of a returning rival. After all, who would dare to interfere with him? Well.... [one death]

"Too Easy" by Herbert Adams: When a man is poisoned, all evidence points to his secretary. But she insists she's innocent. Will the police arrest the right person? [one death]

"Riddle of an Umbrella" by J. Jefferson Farjeon: An umbrella leaned against a train signal leads an inquisitive young man to a hat in the middle of the tracks which leads him to a dead body.He then finds a second dead body...what exactly happened in the signalman's hut that night?

"Two White Mice Under a Riding Whip" by E. C. R. Lorac (Edith Caroline Rivett): The solution to the kidnapping of a young boy lies in the titular image given by the boy's mother to a psychologist sent to discover the cause of her inability to speak or walk. It takes Remaine, the barrister, to figure out what it means.

"Signals" by Alice Campbell: A barrister is passing an inn one night when he notices an odd thing--a woman's silk stocking dangling from the pub sign. Curious, he goes in and finds a scantily clad woman being accused of murdering another of the inn's customers. Determined to see fair play, he proves that the woman couldn't be responsible, could she? [one death]

"A Present from the Empire" by G. D. H. & M. Cole: Lady Bowland hates going to the annual dinner for the "Malaria empire-builders." Not only is it boring as anything, but she doesn't care to be reminded of Malaria. This year she finds an old acquaintance seated on her right at dinner....part of what she doesn't want to remember about Malaria. But what will be the outcome of this chance encounter? [two deaths]

First line (1st story): "And of course," said Mrs. Snyder, "you'll have to make allowances for Pamela, at first."

Last line (last story): "It is just a complete mystery."

Wednesday, May 8, 2024

Sepulchre Street

Sepulchre Street (2023) by Martin Edwards

The fourth book in Martin Edwards' Golden-Age-inspired mystery series finds Rachel Savernake asked by the victim to solve her murder before it happens. Damaris Gethin is a surrealist artist whose work has confounded the general public. She's been out of circulation for a little over a year and invites Rachel and several other very special guests to her grand return exhibition at the new Hades Gallery. In the audience, are former lovers, rivals, and persons who appear to have no connection to Damaris--but appearances are deceiving. Journalist Jacob Flint is also on hand--but his interest is in the flamboyant socialite who is rumored to have ties to a Very Important Person.

The exhibition's theme revolves around famous murderers--with live actors portraying "waxwork" figures and waiters dressed as policeman. Damaris takes on the role of Marie Antoinette, complete with a guillotine. The onlookers are somewhat amused when the artist goes to the extent of placing her neck in the contraption, only to be appalled when the blade falls and Damaris is killed. Rachel is ready to look into who could have interfered with the works to murder Damaris, but it isn't long before it's clear that Damaris did it herself--on purpose. The only way to fulfill her promise to the artist is to discover who drove the woman to such a desperate act. Running underneath (to the side?) the main story is a hint of secret service--a certain top secret group are very concerned that the socialite will ruin the Very Important Person and are willing to do anything to prevent that. Does that have anything to do with Damaris and her death? Rachel will need to discover the answer to that question too.

This particular entry in the series is closer to the thriller/adventure story than the classic mystery--though there are definitely clues to pick up and a detective plot to unravel. Jacob finds himself in the role of the thriller's hero even more than usual and gets himself into ticklish situations right and left. At one point it looks like he might get himself put away for murder. But Rachel keeps him out of the police's way while tracking down the culprit. Edwards provides us with a nice twisty solution that is very satisfying. I wish I could say I saw it coming, but I missed some of the clues he points out to us in the "Clue Finder" at the end of the book. ★★★★

First line: "I want you to solve my murder," said the woman in white.

Last line: Rachel shook her head as she raised her glass. "To living dangerously."
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Deaths = 13 (one beheaded; one heart attack; four shot; one hit on head; one drowned; one smothered; two car accident; one stabbed; one beaten)

Sunday, May 5, 2024

The List of Adrian Messenger

The List of Adrian Messenger (1959) by Philip MacDonald

Adrian Messenger presents his old friend George Firth with a list of ten names with addresses. While he is on a short trip to America, he would like Firth, an official with Scotland Yard, to check up on these men--without knowing the whys or wherefores. He just wants the answer to one simple question: Are these men living at these address? Firth owes Messenger many favors, so, of course, he agrees. But Messenger never makes it to America. The plane he's flying on goes down over the Atlantic. Three people make it out of the plane alive--including Messenger--but he dies of his injuries before help can arrive. A tragic accident. Or is it?

Raoul St. Denis, famous French journalist & former member of the French resistance during the war, was also on that plane. And he was one of the survivors. St. Denis is very familiar with the sound of explosive devices and he's quite certain that one went off before the plane went down. It begins to look like someone didn't want Messenger to make that trip to America...especially when reports begin to come in on the ten men. Every one of them but one has died in an accident within the last five years. Or what has been officially declared an accident. Firth calls on General Anthony Gethryn, former intelligence officer and master at unraveling out-of-the-way puzzles. Could someone be orchestrating this deliberate elimination of the men on Messenger's list? Would someone really blow up a plane and (in another instance) derail a train to get at a particular man? And, if so, to what purpose?

Messenger's only comments to Firth about the situation was that "It's so big, and so--so preposterous, I daren't tell anyone yet." The only way for Gethryn and the Scotland Yard men to track the culprit is to find out what ties these ten men together. Their first clues come from St. Denis, who gives a near-verbatim recital of Messenger's last words before his injuries got the better of him But even then they don't catch all of the clues before the villain starts on the second part of his plan...They're going to have to move fast to catch him before he completes it.

This was the first MacDonald book I ever read...many moons before I ever even knew what a blog was. And it was one of the first mysteries I read where a killer was working his way through a group of people for purposes of his own; purposes that our detective had to discover in order to make sense of the apparently randomness of the group. And definitely one of the first where the motive wasn't psychologically driven. I thought it was a knock-out book that kept me reading like mad to get to the end. It made enough of an impression on me that once I got settled in again, I remembered what the connection was. But the book is so good that it didn't matter. I loved following the investigation with Gethryn and the way he worked with St. Denis in the last half of the book. And I still love the poetic justice (mentioned in the last line of the book--below) that comes to the killer in the end.

Outstanding book that was made into a movie in 1963 with Kirk Douglas and George C. Scott (among others). Now I just need to find time to sit down and watch it too. ★★★★★

First line:For several years after it was all over, there was understandable resistance in high places to the public telling of the story, and even now the project is eyed askance.

Last line: "What you would call, I think, a justice poetic..."

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Deaths = 14 (two airplane (bomb); one cycling accident; three fell from height; four car/motorbike accident; two drowned; one shot; one hit by a bus)

Saturday, May 4, 2024

Write Murder Down

Write Murder Down (1972) by Richard Lockridge

Once again Lieutenant Nathan Shapiro, the Eeyore of the NYD detective branch, is--according to him--in over his head. Captain Bill Weigand has this tendency to give Shapiro cases where he has to deal with people he just doesn't understand...from artists to actors and now authors. He just doesn't understand what a smart man like Bill Weigand is doing giving these investigations to a man who's just good with a gun. But as Weigand points out to him (for the umpteenth time), he always manages to get his man (or woman as the case may be) without needing his gun.

When Miss A. Jones is found dead in her apartment--an apparent suicide involving pills and slit wrists--homicide detective Nate Shapiro is given the case because of one little detail. The body is chock full of barbiturates and there is nary a pill or pill bottle in the near-empty room. Finding a room key for the Algonquin Hotel leads Shapiro to the discovery that Miss A. Jones is really Miss Jo-An Lacey, a recent best-selling author. Apparently Miss Lacey was using the apartment as a writing hide-away. But the typewriter she worked on and the huge stack of typewritten pages containing what was meant to be her next best-seller have disappeared. Shapiro, assisted by his right-hand man Detective Tony Cook, is going to have to make his way through the foreign world of publishers, agents, options and contracts. A world where someone just might kill to get their hands on a sure-fire best-seller...and most likely has.

Despite his woe-is-me attitude, I like Nate Shapiro. He is a very smart and observant man (his own opinion notwithstanding). He knows when something doesn't look or sound right and when the clues aren't adding up to the obvious solution. But I really like Detective Tony Cook. His work on the cases and his relationship with Rachel really make the Shapiro books for me. It would have been interesting if Lockridge had decided to bring Cook to the forefront in a series of his own. He and Shapiro work very well together and have a good relationship beyond the work. Lockridge is very good with characterization and even characters who aren't on stage for long seem like real people. Since Lacey and her brother (who is on the scene because he had been worried about a lady like his sister being at the mercy of a Northern big city) are Southerners (deep South Southerners--dilapidated family plantation and all), Lockridge is able to provide an interesting contrast to his usual cast, as well as make some subtle comments on race. There are unpleasant racial stereotypes in play--but Lockridge makes it clear where he stands on the subject. Our heroes always look askance at anyone who employs such language and make it clear that they don't hold with such views.

My one complaint about this (and several of the Lockridge books) is the lack of real suspects. There aren't many to choose from, so the mystery itself isn't terribly complex. The real difficulty as far as I can see is proving it. I'm just not sure the District Attorney is going to have a solid case to go to court. ★★★ and 1/2

First line: They walked down Sixth Avenue from Charles Restaurant.

Last line:He poured them fresh drinks.
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Deaths = 3 (two airplane crash; one stabbed)