Tag: British Library Crime Classics

Review 2212: Crimes of Cymru: Classic Mystery Tales of Wales

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This latest British Library Crime Classics collection features mystery and crime short stories written by Welsh authors or located in Wales. The stories were written from 1908 to the mid-1980s, and some of them are quite eerie in nature.

For example, in the 1936 story “Change” by Arthur Macken, holiday makers scoff when Vincent Rimmer tells them lights are on all night in the cottages of Tremant to keep the fairies away. Yet later a child is apparently exchanged by the fairies. Or is he?

In “The Way Up to Heaven,” Roald Dahl (born in Wales) tells the story of Mrs. Foster, whose husband purposefully torments her by being late even on the way to her flight to Paris to see her grandchildren for the first time. She figures out a way to take care of that problem.

In “No More A-Maying” by Christina Stead, the lies of two children with a guilty secret create an injustice in rural Wales.

Although most of the earlier stores are more traditional, “Water Running Out” by Ethel Lina White explains how Harvey deals with his aunt, who has been preventing his marriage to Annie for years by blackmail.

And another attempt to prevent marriage is perpetrated in “The Chosen One” by Rhys Davies. Rufus, whose family has occupied his cottage for hundreds of years, gets a note from his eccentric landlady, Audrey P. Vines, telling him his lease is up and she’s throwing him out.

This was one of the more entertaining and atmospheric of these collections that I have read. I usually like them, but prefer getting into a longer work.

I received this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2202: Twice Round the Clock

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Young Helen Manning is astonished when Anthony Fane asks her father for her hand and he agrees. Not only does he agree, but he invites the Fanes and their friends over to celebrate.

The reason Helen is astonished is because she has always been terrified of her father. But her friends, Sir Anthony and his wife, daughter Kay, friends Doctor Henderson, Teddy Fraser, and Bill Brent, accompany Tony to the Mannings for dinner.

All the guests find Manning disturbing, especially when the famous scientist shows them an experiment where he brutally poisons a kitten belonging to the cook, Mrs. Geraint. Unfortunately, a tremendous storm strands them all there for the night.

Bill Brent is awakened at four by a noise downstairs in Manning’s office. When he goes down, he finds Manning dead at his desk with a carving knife between his shoulder blades. The French doors behind him are broken, and the room is in chaos.

This is a lively novel that goes some surprising places, including espionage and hidden family relationships. It has some unlikely plot points, and why everyone’s tires are slashed is never explained. But it’s a quick, fun read.

I received this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2174: The Black Spectacles

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Detective Inspector Andrew Elliot is vacationing in Italy when he overhears an English party discussing some poisonings in a town back home. He is struck at first sight by Marjorie Wills. This proves to be unfortunate, because when he returns home, he is assigned the poisoning case and Marjorie is a suspect.

The poisoning case involves someone substituting poisoned chocolates for harmless ones in a local shop. One boy has died. However, this case is soon overshadowed by the murder of Marcus Chesney, Marjorie’s uncle, under bizarre circumstances. Chesney has a hobby horse that people aren’t observant, so he designs a demonstration of his point. During the demonstration, a bizarrely dressed man comes in to the room where Chesney is manipulating objects at a desk and forces a capsule down his throat. Although this is part of the demonstration, it is not part of it for the capsule to be poisoned. Chesney dies and his assistant is found outside bashed over the head. Later, the unconscious assistant is also poisoned.

Present are Chesney’s friend Dr. Ingram, the assistant, Marjorie, and Marjorie’s fianceé, George Harding, whom she met on the trip. Not present is Dr. Joe Chesney, Marcus’s brother, out on a house call.

As Elliot investigates, things keep pointing to Marjorie, but he can’t prove anything. Finally, he asks Gideon Fell for help.

The Black Spectacles is supposedly Carr’s most popular book, even though it doesn’t feature a locked door mystery, his specialty. I enjoyed it a lot, more than the other books I’ve read by Carr, although I immediately picked out the killer and never wavered. Still, I never figured out exactly what was going on during the demonstration.

I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2143: Death of an Author

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Death of an Author wasn’t my favorite book by E. C. R. Lorac, but it certainly is a clever one. And Lorac airs that recurring question, Can a women’s writing be differentiated from a man’s? in her book set in the publishing world.

Andrew Marriott, the managing editor of a publishing company, is asked by one of his best-selling authors, Michael Ashe, to invite another of his authors, Vivian Lestrange, to dinner along with himself. Since Lestrange is a recluse, this subterfuge is necessary if Ashe is to meet him. Lestrange accepts, and Ashe is astonished to meet a self-possessed young woman.

A few months later, the same young woman goes to a police station. There she explains that she is Eleanor Clarke, the secretary for the author Vivian Lestrange, and she fears something has happened to her employer, as when she tried to go to work, no one answered her knock.

The police find the house impossible to enter except through a walled door and have to climb a ladder to get in. They find a perfectly cleaned house with no one inside but open French doors with a bullet hole through one. Miss Clarke says that not only is her employer missing but his housekeeper, Mrs. Fife, is not even known at the address she gave Clarke.

Inspector Bond is suspicious of Miss Clarke, and after some investigation shows no proof that Lestrange even existed, he theorizes that she was the author of the Lestrange books and is for some reason spoofing the police. However, Chief Inspector Warner is inclined to believe her, and his belief seems justified when a body with Lestrange’s notebook in his pocket is found burned up in a remote cottage.

After learning about Michael Ashe’s interest in Lestrange, the police look for him, but he appears to be out of the country. However, the timing of his departure makes it feasible for him to be the killer.

The detectives find a possible connection to two brothers, one of whom embezzled funds from a trust both were responsible for and escaped, while the other served in prison for it claiming he was innocent. Could one of the authors be one of these brothers? or both?

Although I had a feeling that the police made a mistake about the brothers, I did not figure out exactly what happened. I’m not quite sure why I didn’t enjoy this one as much as some others by Lorac, though.

I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2132: Death of Mr. Dodsley

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On his rounds, a young police constable encounters a drunken young man late one night. The man tells him he saw a door opened and closed by a cat, so after the man leaves, the constable goes ahead checking doors and finds the door to a bookstore open. When he looks into the store, he finds a man shot to death in the office. It’s Richard Dodsley, the owner.

Inspector Mallet’s team finds that someone, possibly two people, waited in the store while Dodsley was out and shot him when he returned late to work on a sale catalog. They also learn that a mystery was recently published by Margery Grafton, the daughter of a prominent politician, the circumstances of which closely match those of the murder. It seems more than a coincidence that Margery Grafton is keeping company with Dick Dodsley, the dead man’s nephew, who worked in the shop.

The police find that Dodsley hired a private investigator, MacNab, to find out who has been stealing rare books from his store. MacNab has not been successful, but he gets more closely involved when Margery Grafton hires him to find the murderer because she thinks the police suspect Dick.

Death of Mr. Dodsley does not present us with a super-complicated puzzle , which is a point in its favor. On the other hand, characterization isn’t super important and there are a few important characters that we see almost nothing of, such as Dick Dodsley, the prime suspect. MacNab himself is a fairly laid-back character, and at times the plot seems to be moving very slowly.

Although it’s possible to guess the murderer, there is a surprise at the end that I didn’t see coming. It’s also fun that British Library has been lately publishing these “bibliomysteries.”

I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2122: The Mysterious Mr. Badman

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The Mysterious Mr. Badman starts out with an intriguing premise. Athelstan Digby is on holiday in Keldstone waiting for his nephew, Jim Pickering, to be free for a walking trip through Yorkshire. His landlords have to attend a funeral, so Digby offers to watch their bookstore. During the afternoon, three men come in at separate times looking for John Bunyan’s Life and Death of Mr. Badman—the rather shifty looking Reverend Percival Offord, a foxy looking man, and a genial chauffeur. Shortly after Digby has disappointed them, a boy comes in with books to sell, including Life and Death of Mr. Badman.

Naturally, Digby takes the book home. Later that night, someone breaks into the bookstore. Digby confides in his landlord, Mr. Lavender, who suggests they put a note in the bookstore window asking the person who accidentally took the book to return it. That will prevent further break-ins.

The boy who brought the books in says they were given to him by Miss Diane Conyers. Before Digby and Jim have a chance to talk to her, Digby finds a letter in the book that brings to mind a recent crime. A man named Neville Monkbarns was to be hung for murder but he was reprieved and sent to a mental hospital. However, the letter shows that Neville Monkbarns is actually the estranged son of the Home Secretary, Sir Richard Mottram. Sir Richard is Diane’s father, and it’s clear that the letter was going to be used to blackmail him.

Then, the body of the foxy looking man is found on the moor.

If you ignore the unlikelihood that any of the unsavory characters would know about the letter, this situation kicks off a lively and adventurous investigation, with Digby and Jim trying to help Diane protect her father. The main characters are likable and interesting, the dialogue is often amusing, and the book is light and fast-moving. I would like to read more of Digby’s adventures.

The cover explains that the original novel has been exceedingly rare, so I’m glad British Library Crime Classics chose to reprint it.

I received this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2091: Final Acts: Theatrical Mysteries

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British Library Crime Classics’ latest collection of mystery short stories has some connection to the theater. Some stories are only peripherally connected—feature an opera singer, perhaps—while others are set there and show a deep knowledge of that environment. As usual, the stories are ordered chronologically, beginning with a 1905 story by Baroness Orczy and ending with one from 1958 by Christianna Brand.

Baroness Orzcy’s “The Affair at the Novelty Theater” is a complicated story about the disappearance of some priceless pearls.

“The Affair at the Semiramis Hotel” by A. E. W. Mason is one of the super-complicated crime stories common in the earlier years involving people in costumes, a robbery, and a burglary.

“In View of the Audience” by Margarite Steen is a creepy one about a young man who gets on the wrong train and ends up accompanying a strange man to a derelict theater, where he hears about an old unsolved murder.

“Blood Sacrifice” by Dorothy Sayers leaves the reader to decide if there is a crime or not. Young playwright John Scales is furious with Mr. Drury, who has bastardized Scales’s play to make it a success. Then an accident places Drury in Scales’s power. This is the first story in the book in which characterization plays much of a role.

“The Blind Spot” by Barry Perowne is about a playwright who had a brilliant idea for a locked room mystery when he was drunk but can’t remember it sober.

“I Can Find My Way Out” by Ngaio Marsh probably shows the most knowledge of the theater, as a leading man is murdered in his dressing room.

“The Lady Who Laughed” by Roy Vickers is a strange story about a clown who murders his wife for finding him funny.

I enjoyed the satisfying surprise ending of “The Thirteenth Knife” by Bernard J. Farmer.

In “Credit to William Shakespeare” a poisoning onstage is solved through a man’s knowledge of Hamlet.

I think my favorite story was “After the Event” by Christianna Brand, where her detective, Inspector Cockrill, ruins the Great Detective’s favorite story by explaining how he got it wrong.

I received this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2089: The White Priory Murders: A Mystery for Christmas

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Although The White Priory Murders is not explicitly set at Christmas, it has a nice, snowy setting. I received this novel just recently and thought I’d post my review in time for Christmas.

Carter Dickson is a pseudonym for John Dickson Carr, who was known for locked door mysteries. I confess to not being big on them, but this one is a different sort from the usual very cerebral locked door mystery and has some moments of true suspense.

James Bennett is the American nephew of Sir Henry Merrivale, an amateur sleuth. He has traveled to England with a group of people in the movies and is concerned about an attempted poisoning, so he consults Merrivale. The people concerned are centered around Marcia Tait, a glamorous actress who was ignored by the British acting establishment but has since made it big in America, so she is determined to star in a historical play in England. With her are Rainger, a director; John Bohun, a theatrical presenter; Jervis Willard, an actor who will play opposite Marcia; Emery, her publicist; and Louise Carewe, the daughter of a potential investor, Lord Canifest, who wants to marry Marcia. Someone has sent Marcia a box of chocolates, and Emery was slightly poisoned after eating one. Merrivale says the attempt was not serious.

Later, though, the entire group goes to stay at the White Priory, a centuries old house owned by John Bohun’s brother Maurice and also occupied by his niece, Katherine. Bennett arrives very early in the morning to find that John Bohun has just discovered Marcia’s body in the pavilion where she insisted on spending the night. She has been beaten around the head, but the biggest mystery is the fresh snow around the pavilion, unbroken by any footprints except John’s, going in. According to the events established during the night, she must have been murdered after the snow began falling.

Everyone has secrets, and soon there is a series of attempted murders, attempted suicides, and successful murders, as Inspector Masters summons Merrivale to help him figure it all out.

I received this novel from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2080: Death on the Down Beat

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Conductor Sir Noel Grampion is shot in the heart during a concert. Because of the angle of the shot, most of the orchestra members are suspects. Since Sir Noel was disliked by most of them and known as a womanizer, the list of suspects is a long one.

D. I. Alan Hope is assigned the case. Possibly wanting to try something new, Sebastian Farr tells the story in letters from Hope to his wife. Aside from the ethical and legal considerations of a husband telling everything about the ongoing case to his wife, let alone in writing, the device is an unfortunate one, for in trying to make the letters seem real, Farr expands the novel to include all kinds of unnecessary information, even things that don’t make sense. For example, he includes a long description of the house he was staying in before the murder. Since he writes to his wife at least once a day, surely he would have done that at the beginning of his visit, especially as the place has nothing to do with the murder.

Next, we’re subjected to maps of the orchestra and a complete list of players. No doubt about it, this is a puzzle mystery, in which readers are swamped with information, even some pages of the score.

Unbelievably, not a single member of the orchestra is interviewed by the police. Instead, Hope asks them to write about themselves. So we have to read page after page of mostly colorless letters that all say, “I don’t know nuttin’,” which in itself is hard to believe. Farr seems to think that musicians are either looking at the score or the conductor. The reality is that they are usually looking at both at the same time, so it’s hard to believe that no one could have seen who shot him. These letters start around page 90 and before that, we have no details about any of the suspects, although we have read several concert reviews to little purpose. After the letters, Hope goes back through one by one and makes comments on the individuals, forcing us to flip back and forth if we care to pair up the letters with Hope’s remarks. I didn’t.

When the second set of letters began, because Hope/Farr hasn’t eliminated more than a few of the many (about 60) suspects, nor do most of them have anything about them that distinguishes them from anyone else, I threw up my hands and skipped 50 pages to the last letter. There I read the identity of the killer and the name meant nothing to me. I started to read the explanation, and I got so bored I just quit reading.

I understand Sebastian Farr is a pen name for a renowned music critic of the time. I commend the novel in a small way for originality but believe he should have stuck to reviews.

I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2071: Death of Jezebel

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Seven years before the action of the novel, Isabel Drew essentially pimped out innocent Perpetua Kirk to Earl Anderson by helping him get her drunk. Perpetua’s fiancé, Johnny Wise, broke in upon them and then drove his car into a tree.

Now the three people involved are working on a pageant. Inspector Cockrill is in town for a conference when Perpetua tells him she has received a threat to her life, blaming her for Johnny’s death. Later they learn that Isabel and Earl have also been threatened. It’s odd that so many of the people involved in the pageant knew and loved Johnny.

The pageant calls for 11 knights to ride out in front of a tower, from which Isabel, as the queen, comes and gives a speech. But Isabel falls from the tower and is found to be strangled.

Death of Jezebel is an example of the Golden Age puzzle novel, where the detectives concentrate on how the murder was done instead of who did it. My problem with this type of mystery is that the murders are usually ridiculously complicated and we have endless discussions involving the action of the knights and the backstage participants.

I received a copy of this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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