“Fatal Descent”

 Carter Dickson, Cecil Street, classic mysteries, Funny Mysteries, GAD, Golden Age, Golden Age of Detective Fiction, impossible crimes, John Dickson Carr, John Rhode, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, mysteries, mystery, Reading Challenges  Comments Off
May 192013
 

You might think of it as a disgruntled author's revenge: an arrogant and well-disliked publisher gets into his small, private elevator on the top floor of his office building. The door locks automatically and the elevator descends. The publisher can even be seen through windows in the locked access doors, and he is standing in the elevator as it descends. The elevator never stops. Yet suddenly a gunshot is heard, and when the elevator car reaches the ground floor, the publisher is dead - shot through the heart. And there is no way anyone could possibly have shot him in that elevator, especially as there is no gun to be found either in the car or in the elevator shaft.

Impossible? Why of course! Welcome to Fatal Descent, by Carter Dickson and John Rhode - or, to give them their correct names, John Dickson Carr and Cecil Street. Both authors were masters of the impossible crime novel as well as being friends - and they collaborated on just this one book, in 1939. Fatal Descent is the subject of today's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and you can listen to the full review by clicking here.

Fatal Descent is a fascinating mystery, with two sleuths who team up to solve it. One, the Police Surgeon, Dr. Horatio Glass, is very much the type of detective favored by John Dickson Carr - full of ideas that give elegant solutions to impossible problems, brilliant in their conception and flawed only in that they are invariably wrong. Chief Inspector David Hornbeam is a realist who seeks the scientific explanations for crime, and he is quite representative of the kind of sleuth that Street wrote about under his "John Rhode" pen-name. Between them, they will eventually solve the case - but only after a second murder.

It’s a fine story, written with wit and good humor, quite fairly clued for the reader who can find the hints, and with some first-rate characters. It’s a pity that Street and Carr only wrote this one mystery together. Readers who enjoy a good impossible crime story really should read Fatal Descent. It’s been out of print for a while, but there is now an e-book edition available.

This is another entry in Bev's My Reader's Block blog Vintage Mysteries Reading Challenge. As this 1939 mystery was originally published under the title Drop to His Death, I am entering it in the category called "A Mystery by Any Other Name," a book that has been published under more than one title.

 

Unlocking the Locked Room

 classic mysteries, impossible crimes, John Pugmire, Locked Room International, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, LRI, mysteries, mystery, Paul Halter, Web/Tech, Weblogs  Comments Off
Apr 102013
 

One of the genres I most enjoy is the locked room mystery and its broader implementation as the "impossible crime" story. All of Clyde B. Clason's works fall into that sphere. So do most of the works of John Dickson Carr, the acknowledged master of the field. Many other mystery authors, from the Golden Age and beyond, have written in the genre, with varying degrees of success.

So it's important, I think, to recognize that there are still authors writing today who specialize in locked room detective stories. Many of them, unfortunately, do not write in English, and translations are not always easy to find.

Enter translator John Pugmire, whom I mentioned earlier on this blog for his terrific work translating the contemporary French locked-room mystery author, Paul Halter. Pugmire now has begun a website devoted to the genre, called Locked Room International. I like the way he defines the genre:

"What is a locked room mystery? It is ideally a mystery which follows Golden Age Rules about providing fair clues to the reader and also poses the question: how was it done? A "locked room" is a special case of the more general "impossible crime," in which one or more victims are discovered dead in what appear to be impossible circumstances (hermetically sealed room, no footprints in the snow, inaccessible site, etc.) It makes no pretense to be probable, no attempt to analyze the human condition, and no effort to probe the detective's foibles. Its purpose is purely and simply to baffle while entertaining. It challenges the mind, not the heart or the spirit."

The site is still pretty basic, and we are promised additions and improvements as it is developed. It's not primarily a blog. Locked Room International is involved in publishing (as print-on-demand and/or e-book editions) good, English-language translations of locked-room masterpieces by Paul Halter and others; there are hints that we may eventually see translated versions from a modern Japanese master of the form.

The site is well worth a visit from anyone interested in the genre. I have more Halter books in my ever-massive "To Be Read" pile, and I'm looking forward to them and other LRI books.

Hat tip to the Golden Age of Detective Fiction mail group on Yahoo, which alerted me to the existence of this new LRI website.

“Blind Drifts”

 classic mysteries, GAD, Golden Age, Golden Age of Detective Fiction, ILAM, ILoveAMystery Newsletter; locked rooms, impossible crimes, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, mysteries, mystery, Reading Challenges  Comments Off
Apr 082013
 

When one of the directors of the Virgin Queen Gold Mine was shot, deep inside the mine, it happened in front of seven witnesses. Unfortunately, none of them apparently saw the shot fired, nor did they have any idea who might have fired it. And there was no sign of a gun. It was, to be blunt, an impossible situation. So it was probably a good thing that one of the witnesses on hand was a professor of Roman history and amateur detective named Theocritus Lucius Westborough, a man who had earned something of a reputation for solving impossible crime puzzles. He does so again in "Blind Drifts," a 1937 "impossible crime" novel by Clyde B. Clason which is the subject of today's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast. You can listen to the full review by clicking here.

Professor Westborough, having inherited a large amount of stock in the Virgin Queen mine from his brother, finds himself at the mine in Baddington, Colorado and caught in the middle of a power struggle between two groups of directors seeking control of the mine. The more he investigates, the more he finds himself caught up in the remarkable violence that seems to befall some of the key players in the power struggle. Another of the mine’s directors has vanished, and may be the victim of foul play. That director’s daughter has also vanished, last having been seen walking onto the campus of the local university – and apparently vanishing. As the situation grows more complicated and dangerous, the local sheriff is more than happy to have assistance from Professor Westborough.

In the 1930s, writing during America's Golden Age of Detective Fiction, Clyde B. Clason made a reputation for himself as an author with a knack for coming up with ingenious locked room/impossible crime situations. Although I find his stories are less exciting than those of John Dickson Carr, whose gift for creating eerie atmospheres was unequalled, I think Clason's books about Professor Westborough are clever and quite enjoyable. "Blind Drifts" takes the reader into a very unusual world - a world of gold mining, drifts, adits, crosscuts, stopes, vugs, strikes and more. The action is fairly slow to start, but once it picks up and the bodies start falling, and believe me they do, it moves to a good, tight conclusion.

"Blind Drifts" is another book read for the Vintage Mystery Reading Challenge under way at Bev's Reader's Block blog. I'm putting it in the category called Amateur Night: a book with a "detective" who is not a P.I., police officer, official.

It's also another book which I have reviewed for the I Love a Mystery newsletter, edited by Sally Powers, who has graciously given me her permission to use portions of that review here and on my podcast. She also provided me with a copy of the new Rue Morgue Press edition of "Blind Drifts" for my review.

 

“No Coffin for the Corpse”

 classic mysteries, Golden Age, impossible crimes, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, mysteries, mystery  Comments Off
Feb 182013
 

As a general rule, I suppose, mystery readers expect the bodies of fictional murder victims to behave with some decorum. Granted, a clever writer may occasionally arrange for a body to be moved, the better to hide it; in one notorious book, Edmund Crispin managed not only to dispose of a body but also the entire toy shop in which it was found. But, as experienced mystery readers, we know those disappearances are temporary; there is no question that the victim, once dead, remains immobile.

But what if the victim is quite clearly dead - and yet his ghost appears to be wreaking considerable havoc in the neighborhood? That appears to be the case in the rather unnerving - and quite well written - 1942 mystery, "No Coffin for the Corpse," by Clayton Rawson. Here, we have a man, apparently killed in a fight, buried by several witnesses...but who seems intent on coming back and terrorizing the people responsible for his death. "No Coffin for the Corpse" is the subject of this week's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and you can listen to the entire review by clicking here.

The central problem here is the constant reappearance of what appears to be the ghost of the man who was killed. He appears and disappears inside a house wired with a sophisticated alarm system, yet the alarm is not triggered. He appears to have the ability to travel through walls, to escape from locked rooms - and to commit murder in front of witnesses and then disappear.

It is up to Rawson's detective, the stage magician known as The Great Merlini, to explain what is really going on in this classic "impossible crime" mystery. Rawson was one of the four founders of the Mystery Writers of America, and he was a skilled magician himself. The reader will learn a great deal about some of the tricks of the trade in the course of this mystery. But before it is over, I suspect many readers will echo the sentiments voiced by the story's narrator: “What we all needed at that moment more than anything else was a week or two in bed in a quiet secluded sanitarium with no visitors allowed.”

Rawson only wrote four novel-length books about The Great Merlini, but many readers believe "No Coffin for the Corpse" was the best of them. It's a fascinating puzzle, and the reader can only hang on for dear life and follow Merlini as he struggles to explain an apparent ghost and an impossible murder. The book is hard to find in print editions, but The Mysterious Press, through Open Road Integrated Media, has released it in electronic formats for the Kindle and other popular readers. If you enjoy classic locked room puzzles, this should be on your reading list. 

"The Case of the Gilded Fly"

 classic mysteries, Funny Mysteries, impossible crimes, locked rooms, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, mysteries, mystery  Comments Off
Jan 072013
 

Witnesses hear a gunshot. Investigating, they find the victim lying alone in a locked room, gun next to the body. Powder burns suggest suicide - and, besides, witnesses outside the room insist it would have been impossible for anyone to enter or leave that room without being seen. So the police are sure it was a suicide.

Not Gervase Fen, Professor of English Literature at Oxford University. He is certain it is murder - and, to the evident distress of the police, he sets out not only to prove his point but also to discover who did what to whom - and how. (With accident ruled out, suicide and murder both seemingly impossible, one police inspector observes, gloomily, "The only conclusion is...that the thing never happened at all.")

That's the plot, in a nutshell, of a remarkably high-spirited mystery, "The Case of the Gilded Fly," by Edmund Crispin, the 1945 mystery that introduced Professor Fen to readers who found the combination of quirky humor, intelligence, fascinating characters and a complex, often-twisting plot absolutely irresistable. "The Case of the Gilded Fly" is the subject of this week's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and you can listen to the entire review by clicking here.

The plot centers on the members of the Oxford Repertory Theatre and the people associated with the group, along with a number of outsiders, including Professor Fen. As the blurb on one edition of this book notes, "Being a Don notwithstanding, Fen's true interest is police work. Fittingly, the real interest of Sir Richard Freeman, Oxford's Chief Constable, is English literature. Each has developed a fine scorn for the other's reputed field of competence."

That's true enough, and the scenes involving the two men (and Fen's persistent annoying of the Chief Constable) add considerably to the humor. Crispin, particularly in the earliest Fen books, has a wonderful way of throwing the reader off his/her stride by sudden mood shifts. Crispin also provides some inside jokes for mystery readers to enjoy; at one point, talking with his friend (and Watson in this book), Nigel Blake, Fen suddenly stops:

He broke off, staring blankly in front of him. "Lord, Lord, what a fool I've been! And yes - it fits - absolutely characteristic. Heaven grant Gideon Fell never becomes privy to my lunacy; I should never hear the end of it." He gaped.

Nigel regarded him coldly, "Stop this exhibition," he said, "which you know perfectly well is unintelligible to everyone but yourself, and let's go."

That's pretty typical. Crispin has Fen invoke (as if they were real people) fictional detectives, including J. D. Carr's Dr. Fell. He does so, as Nigel Blake suggests, to tweak the reader's nose.

If it sounds as if I'm thoroughly enchanted by Fen and by Crispin, well, yes. I am. "The Case of the Gilded Fly" has flaws, but who cares? It is available in a very good edition from the Felony & Mayhem Press. If you have a good sense of humor and enjoy a fine "impossible crime" mystery (and don't mind having your nose tweaked a bit by a playful author), make it a point to find and read "The Case of the Gilded Fly."

 

Stocking Stuffer from the Pit

 classic mysteries, ebooks, General Suggestions, impossible crimes, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, Looking Back, mysteries, mystery, ramble house  Comments Off
Dec 192012
 

If you're looking for a definition of the word "eclectic," I can offer you one in three words: Ramble House publishers. This small and very independent press publishes all kinds of books, including some fine mysteries. Fender Tucker, who runs the place, publishes all of Rupert Penny's Golden Age novels, for example, as well as reams of Harry Stephen Keeler books (I've never read any, but I promise to get around to it very soon and report back).

More to the point, at this holiday season, when you or someone you love may be looking for great e-books as stocking stuffers for that new, or old-and-treasured, e-reader, Ramble House's entire backlist is now available in several popular ebook formats at just six bucks a book.

Which brings me to my main point: I've posted here about "Rim of the Pit," by Hake Talbot, one of the best "impossible crime" books I've ever read. It rivals John Dickson Carr in its ingenuity and its atmosphere; it requires a lot of bravery to read it at home alone on a stormy night. It opens with the line: "I came up here to make a dead man change his mind." And it just keeps getting better - impossible murder, seances, footprints that begin and end in unbroken fields of snow, a giant flying...something...what's not to like?

My point is, if you have an ebook reader that takes either EPUB (Nook and, I think, Sony?) or MOBI format, you can get it now from Ramble House for six bucks. It may be the best six bucks you ever spent on a traditional, well-written, truly terrifying mystery. Check out the "back cover map" - one of the best of its kind - here. Email Ramble House for details on how to get the ebook version - fender@ramblehouse.com

Lamentations

 classic mysteries, Golden Age, impossible crimes, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, Looking Back, mysteries, mystery  Comments Off
Oct 202012
 

Every time I discuss the books of Michael Innes, I always find myself saying, "Well, yes, [title being discussed] is excellent - but, in my mind, the best and most dazzling Michael Innes book is "Lament For A Maker."

I have written about it here on many previous postings, and there is an audio review done a few years ago which is still available if you click here. "Lament for a Maker" is set in a remote castle in Scotland, whose miserly and mad owner walks through the frozen, gloomy halls in the dead of winter, chanting the medieval poem, "Lament for the Makers," by William Dunbar. The Latin refrain of that great poem, repeated every fourth line - timor mortis conturbat me - the fear of death confounds me - becomes a haunting theme for the events of the book. There will be murder - an impossible crime, to be sure - and much more; I find that some of the scenes in this beautifully written book stay with me long after the final pages. It is written in the style pioneered by Wilkie Collins in "The Moonstone," with a series of narrators, each peeling away additional layers to reveal the complex plot. There is a great deal of Innes's humor - but there is also genuine tragedy and complex human emotions.

It is, in short, a work I always recommend. The book is still available in print, and Amazon has a Kindle edition available.

"Death Leaves No Card"

 classic mysteries, GAD, Golden Age, Golden Age of Detection, impossible crimes, locked rooms, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, mysteries, mystery  Comments Off
Sep 102012
 

If it was a case of murder, it was a case with remarkably few clues. When members of the Maplewood family and their servants broke down the bathroom door, they found the body of Basil Maplewood, who apparently died while getting into his bath. Certainly there was nobody else in the locked bathroom. And yet there was no indication at all of how the young man might have died. Even the post-mortem didn't come up with a likely cause of death. You'd have to say, really, that in this case, "Death Leaves No Card." Which is the title of the Golden Age mystery by Miles Burton which is the subject of today's audio review on the "Classic Mysteries" podcast. You can listen to the full review by clicking here.

"Miles Burton" was one of the pen names used by Cecil John Charles Street, who also wrote as John Rhode and Cecil Way. As Burton, he produced a long series of mysteries featuring Scotland Yard Inspector Henry Arnold and amateur investigator Desmond Merrion. Merrion is absent from "Death Leaves No Card," and Arnold has the field to himself in this very enjoyable locked room/impossible crime mystery from 1939.

As I said earlier, the victim was found alone inside the locked bathroom. He had not drowned. He had not been poisoned. There were no marks of violence on the body. He was, physically, in good health. So how did he die? And why? And who did it? Let me warn you: readers may think they have some pretty good ideas on the subject - but are likely to find that Burton has quite skillfully misled them.

"Death Leaves No Card," in other words, is an excellent traditional mystery, and the "howdunit" is every bit as important as the "whodunit" element. Inspector Arnold, even without his usual cohort, Desmond Merrion, is no slouch and connects the dots quite thoroughly to reveal a pattern that is likely to surprise the reader.

One note on editions: "Death Leaves No Card" is in print, or, to be accurate, print-on-demand, from Ramble House. The Amazon links above will tell you that only a hardcover edition is available. Not so. If you're interested in the trade paperback edition, you can use this link to find and order it directly from Ramble House.

Looking Back: "The Roman Hat Mystery"

 classic mysteries, ellery queen, Golden Age, impossible crimes, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, Looking Back, mysteries, mystery  Comments Off
Aug 172012
 

Who poisoned the man in the audience of the Roman Theatre in New York City? How was it done? And what happened to the victim's top hat?

That last, I assure you, is not a frivolous question - for the answer will be critical to the solution of "The Roman Hat Mystery," the first mystery novel written by "Ellery Queen."

As most classic mystery buffs know, Ellery Queen was the pen name used by two cousins, Frederick Dannay and Manfred B. Lee. It was also the name of their principle detective character; Ellery (the character) was the son of New York City Inspector Richard Queen and - in many of the books - helped his father solve particularly difficult cases.

I reviewed "The Roman Hat Mystery" a few years back. My blog post is here, and my audio review may be heard by clicking here. At the time, it was only available in a three-novel collection, now out of print, then offered by the Mystery Guild. So I am delighted to find The Mysterious Press offering "The Roman Hat Mystery" in a variety of electronic editions. They were kind enough to provide me with a copy for my Amazon Kindle. I was very pleased to find that the e-book editions include some essential diagrams, lists and illustrations from the original "hard-copy" book.

If you have any e-book reader - or if you simply want to read it on your home computer - I would urge you to give "The Roman Hat Mystery" a try. I think it is unconscionable that the Queen books are just about universally out of print. Ellery Queen, particularly in the first phase of his literary and detecting career, was one of the most powerful influences on American detective stories - at least the traditional story, in its "pre-hardboiled" days. The early books, the ones with titles patterned as "The [Nationality] [Noun] Mystery," are puzzles in their purest form. Readers are given all the clues available to the detective, and there is a formal challenge to the reader, before the final sorting-out, inviting him or her to solve the mystery before it is revealed:

"Who killed Monte Field?" "How was the murder accomplished?" ...Mr. Queen agrees with me that the alert student of mystery tales, now being in possession of all the pertinent facts, should at this stage of the story have reached definite conclusions on the questions propounded."

 I never could do it.

"The Roman Hat Mystery" was the first Queen novel; I don't think it's necessarily the best. The character of Ellery Queen was still pretty raw, still based far too much on the amateur dilettante model of S. S. Van Dine's Philo Vance. And Ellery is totally missing from the final explanation, which is handled by his father - who does credit his son with making all the deductions for him!

As I say, it's good to have this back in print (all right, in pixels). It's a good example that I wish more publishers would follow - making older authors and the backlists of newer authors available to a new generation of readers at a relatively low cost and with few problems of building up unwanted and expensive inventory.

So take advantage of it. If you have never read the early Ellery Queen, this is the place to start.

White Wine or Red? (Or, Wait in the Carr)

 Carter Dickson, classic mysteries, General Suggestions, Golden Age, impossible crimes, John Dickson Carr, locked room mysteries, Locked Rooms/Impossible Crimes, Looking Back, mysteries, mystery, Out of print  Comments Off
Aug 112012
 

There has been an interesting discussion lately among members of the Golden Age of Detection mail group on Yahoo about two particularly fine books by John Dickson Carr, the master of the locked room/impossible crime genre. The debate is about which is better - "The Three Coffins" (known in the UK as "The Hollow Man) or "The Judas Window."

To me, it's like having an argument over which is better - white wine or red. I would have to agree that both books are among Carr's best plotted and written.

For "red wine" lovers, there's "The Three Coffins," a book whose opening paragraph defines the mysteries within and challenges the reader to solve them. The detective is Carr's main series detective, Dr. Gideon Fell. It's also famous for the chapter called "The Locked Room Lecture," in which Dr. Fell expounds on the various ways in which seemingly impossible crimes can be created - and explained. Unfortunately, it is out of print - and getting harder to find.

For those who prefer "white wine," there's "The Judas Window," written by Carr using the name "Carter Dickson," and featuring his other primary series character, Sir Henry Merrivale. This doesn't pose the same direct challenge to the reader, but it is one of the best-plotted mysteries I have ever read - and the reader's nose will be rubbed quite thoroughly in the concept of a "judas window,"  through which murder can be committed in a locked room, before the solution is explained. This one IS still available, thanks to the Rue Morgue Press.

Which is "better"? Both. As a matter of personal preference, I still like "The Three Coffins," because Carr manages to create such a frightening and uncanny atmosphere around the events of the story. On the other hand, "The Judas Window," with some classic Merrivale humor, can be quite funny even as the central character's life and freedom are threatened. But both books are well plotted - and both give the reader all the necessary clues, marvelously hidden. to solve the puzzle - if you can.

White wine? Red wine? Both can complement a meal very nicely, thank you. No need to choose - enjoy them both!

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