Eliot Paul, Waylaid in Boston: A Homer Evans Mystery

Eliot Paul, Waylaid in Boston: A Homer Evans Mystery
Coachwhip Publications, 2016 (reprint of 1953 original)
ISBN 978-1616463427

Homer Evans and Finke Maguire (Finke is a PI in LA, Evans is…well, it's not clear quite what he is) are in Boston on a more-or-less vacation.  One evening, over drinks, one of their group of friends, acquaintances, and hangers-on proposes a bet:  That an ordinary citizen could not undertake to follow someone and attempt to discover things about him, without making a hash of it.  Obviously, the bet is accepted, and what ensues can justifiably be called a catastrophe.  The book does have, however, a rather neat money-laundering scheme applicable (in this case, to Argentina) for people trying to get money out of a country with stringent currency controls.  Paul wrote a lot, and, if this is typical, it's perhaps unsurprising that he is  not well-remembered.

Ellery Queen, Ten Days' Wonder

“Ellery Queen,” Ten Days’ Wonder
Mysterious Press/Open Road Integrated Media, 2013
© 1948 Little, Brown and Co.  Renewed, 1976, Ellery Queen
ISBN 978-1-4532-8967-9

A man awakens in a room he has never, to his current knowledge, seen before.  As he investigates, he discovers he is in a flophouse, broke, and has evidently been in some sort of altercation.  He finally realizes who he is—Howard Van Horn.  He gets to New York, and his friend from his days as a student sculptor in Paris, Ellery Queen.  He asks Queen’s help if discovering what, if anything, he has done, and it emerges that he has been subject to similar blackouts, of varying duration, and with no apparent common cause, for years.  He persuades Ellery to come home with him and try to unravel this mystery.  Home is a rich father’s opulent estate in Wrightsville, the setting of two earlier Queen mysteries.

And Ellery goes to Wrightsville, for the third time, with the excuse that he needs a retreat to complete his current mystery novel (which, as it happens, he does need to do).  He meets Howard’s family—his father, Diedrich Van Horn; his uncle, Wolfert; and his step-mother, Sally (who is, as it happens, younger than Howard).

Things get quite confusing, Ellery’s investigation is not making much progress, when blackmail intervenes.  The blackmail leads to two thefts, and, eventually, to murder.

Now none of this is really much of a surprise, and it’s certainly no surprise that Ellery, in a scene with all the principals, and the police, unravels the entire chain of events with his usual remorselessly logical analysis of the evens.

Everyone—except the murderer—is relieved, and, if the blackmailer is not clearly identified, at least there is a resolution.

Except…more than a year later, a new bit of information emerges, and Ellery realizes that he got it all wrong.  So we’re back to Wrightsville for a second bite at the apple.

What I found myself thinking, at the end, is that this is an almost perfect meta-analysis of all the Ellery Queen mystery.  The obscurity of the events and the evidence, the logical interpretation of it all, and the solution.  But here, we’re shown just how shallow Ellery’s conclusions can be.  Based on the evidence he has, and some assumptions he makes, he reaches a conclusion.  Here’ we’re shown that the same evidence, with a (slightly) different set of assumptions, a (slightly) different analysis can lead to a very different conclusion.

And in doing this, we should bring the entire Ellery Queen series of mysteries to an end.  Because we have just been shown how contingent all of the solutions have been.  The previous 17 Ellery Queen cases have, in effect, been shown to have been constructed on…nothing.  The famous “Queen Method” is as fallible, as liable to false conclusions, as any other method.

And, in its own way, this is a magnificent book, a work of great honesty and, if you will, integrity by its authors.  They show us the mechanism, they let us see  how fragile it is, how illusory their conclusions are.  Here, then, the series should end. 

But, of course, it doesn’t.  Another 16 book length cases follow, as well as a number of short stories.  I think that, had I been coming at this series as it was written, Ten Days’ Wonder would have been the last book I would have been able to read.  I would be conscious, as I would not have been before, of the (logical) error that lies at the heart of the Queen method and the Queen stories.  One small change in one’s assumptions, and the edifice crashes.

Bill Crider, Dead, To Begin With

Bill Crider, Dead, To Begin With
Minotaur/St. Martin’s Press © 2017
ISBN 978-1-250-07853-7
Also available as an ebook

Jake Marley, who has been a recluse for decades (since shortly after his younger sister died in an automobile accident, has recently purchased the old, abandoned, and decrepit opera house in Clearview.  He intends to renovate it, and, for the first event, has commissioned a version of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, to be set in Texas.   And then he is found--dead--inside the opera house, by Aubrey Hamilton (a local realtor who worked with Marley on his purchase of the opera house.

Although it looks like Marley has fallen from a catwalk, Sheriff Dan Rhodes has his doubts.

Of course, that’s not all that’s going on in Blacklin County, Texas.  For one thing, Elaine Tunstall has gone off her meds and is threatening to inflict serious damage (with a sledgehammer) on The Beauty Shack, where she got what she regards as a bad haircut.  And we have a case of disputed possession of an item at a garage sale, for another.

But Marley’s death is the main event.  The question is, why, if it is murder, anyone would want to murder an extremely wealthy recluse who has come out of seclusion with plans to spend a lot of money to restore the opera house?

Another question is why, in his will, he specifies that he wants the Sheriff to be present at the first performance of the play.  More, why has he named four of his fellow high school students to four specific roles in the play (Scrooge, and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Christmas Present, and Christmas Yet To Come)?  Why will he be playing (of course) the ghost of Jacob Marley?  How, is at all, is his sister’s death related to all this?

Perhaps more than usual, the town of Clearview is a character in this episode of the series.  Its part is, more or less, that of the aging and declining world that was in a world in which it may no longer has a role.

And there may be ghosts.  So C.P. (Seepy) Benton, math professor at the community college, and Harry Harris, English professor (and designated author of the play Marley wanted written), as Clearwater Paranormal Investigations, crash the investigation/

Rhodes pursues his investigation in his usual way, asking questions, stirring up (in this case) decades-old memories, and provoking responses from all the folks concerned.  I was pleased that Rhodes’ wife Ivy has a larger than usual role in the book, as a participant in the investigation.  And Rhodes’ dogs, Yancey and Speedo, are not just doing their doggie thing, they make a contribution to fighting crime.

Crider’s been doing this for a while (this is the 24^th book in the series; the first one—Too Late to Die—was published in 1986, and, as in any long-running series, there are commonalities among the tales.  But that doesn’t mean it’s all become formulaic.  The plot here is quite intricate, and the events, from Marley’s emergence from seclusion to the opera house rehab and play to the ultimate solution raise interesting questions about motive, about community, and about justice.  Crider is at the top of his form here, in one of the best books in a fine series.

E.J. Copperman, Dog Dish of Doom

E.J. Copperman, Dog Dish of Doom
Minotaur/St. Martin’s Press © 2017
ISBN 978-1-250-08427-9
Also available as an ebook

The first in a projected series featuring Kay Powell (an entertainerturned lawyer turned talent agent—she represents animals) and her parents (Jay Powell & Eleanor Ray); as a trio, they played resort hotels as Jay, Kay, and El until Kay broke up the act by going semi-straight.  Her parents forged ahead as a double act on cruise ships.

Kay’s office in in New York and she lives in New Jersey with her two dogs, Steve and Eydie.  Her newest client is Bruno, who’s up for the part of Sandy in a revival of “Annie,” slated to replace the current performer (Horatio).  Bruno is a large, shaggy sweetheart of a dog and a natural performer, of indeterminate breeding.  His owners (Trent and Louise Barclay) are something of a problem at the audition, but that gets partly resolved when Trent is murdered later late that night.

Kay sort of tries to stay out of things, but the detective in charge of the investigation pretty much coerces her into becoming a CI (confidential informant), because she knows both the people involved and the environment in which they work.  And in short order things get complicated.  Someone wants Bruno, and is apparently willing to go to great lengths to get him.  But what’s going on?  Why would anyone want a mutt?  Is this related to Trent’s murder or not?  Why is the Les the director’s assistant (Akra) acting so strangely?

In the end, of course, everything becomes clear, Bruno is saved, and justice is done.  (And, given when I was reading the book, I sort of needed that.)

Kay’s narrative voice is very good, and her parents are delightful (El has a great response early on when Kay says “Mom, I don’t think you’re getting exactly what I’m risking here;”Jay is constantly playing a part).  Copperman does the settings, both in the city and in Jersey, very, very well.  And sneaks in a reference that made me smile.  I’m assuming that Jay and El will manage to find their way to the NY/NJ area in subsequent adventures (I’ll miss them if they’re not there).  And I’m hoping Kay’s assistand in the agenting business, Consuela, and Consuela’s son Dee, will be part of the ensemble (with more to do.

This is probably going to get tagged as a “cozy,” and maybe it is.  But it’s also pretty tough underneath.  I think you’ll enjoy this installment; I know I’m already looking forward to #2.

 

Copycat Photoblogging: Memoies of WW2

Ingrid Robeyns (http://crookedtimber.org/2017/08/12/sunday-photoblogging-never-forget/#comments) reminds us that we should never forget the mass deaths of World War II.  I'd agree.

(May 2000)

George Bellairs, Death of a Busybody

George Bellairs, Death of a Busybody
British Library Crime Classics © 1942 George Bellairs
Reprinted 2016
ISBN 978-0=7123-5644-2

Bellairs was a second- or third-tier writer of mystery novels in what we now call the “golden age.”  The English version of this encompassed members of the various police forces (often a Scotland Yard detective working with a local police unit, as in the case of this book) and “gifted amateurs,” often aristocratic (Campion, Wimsey), but not always (Marple).  He was also fairly prolific, having written 58 books featuring Superintendent Thomas Littlejohn between 1941 and 1980.  Unfortunately, this is a pretty unrelievedly bad book.

The “busybody” of the title is Ethel Tither, a middle-aged spinster in a small village, who wages a one-woman war against immorality, directly confronting those who offend her, urging religious tracts upon them, and insisting that they repent.  Her body is discovered in the septic system of the vicar’s residence, where she had been placed within a very short window, and in which she drowned. 

Littlejohn quickly discovers that Tither had recently—the day before her murder—written a new will (without consulting her solicitor).  What’s not clear is whether the new will—which alters the primary legatee from a cousin to an organization based in London and having as its stated purpose rescuing poor women from a life of degradation—matters.  The investigation does not focus on any particular individual, or small group, mostly because Littlejohn doesn’t learn much of anything pertinent until near the end (and then mostly because people just tell him things).  The real detective work is done in London and its environs, by his Scotland Yard-based assistant Sgt. Cromwell.

Almost all the characters (including the local vicar, the village constable, and Sgt. Cromwell, but not including Littlejohn) have minor (Cromwell’s identification with the Lord Protector) or major (the vicar’s 1,000+page treatise on bee-keeping) eccentricities.  And we have the usual run of “cute” names-the vicar is Mr. Claplady, for example.

This is the third of his Littlejohn books I’ve read, and the characterizations of our protagonist have been fairly inconsistent.  In this instance, he spends a lot of time knocking back the odd glass of beer, making notes, walking around the neighborhood…but remarkably little actually detecting.  The book shares one feature with the other Bellairs books I’ve read—an annoying use of dialect in the conversations Littlejohn has with the locals; the use of dialect seems mostly designed to point out how unsophisticated, or backward, or stupid the people are.  And it extends to using spellings (e.g., “wuz”) in which (as far as I can tell) the pronunciation is the same in the dialect and standard presentation of the words.

Many of the books in the British Library Crime Classics series are actual classics or are worth reading even though they are not classics.  This book is neither.

John Bude, The Cheltenham Square Murder

John Bude, The Cheltenham Square Murder
British Library Crime Classic, 2016 reprint of 1937 original
© 2016 Estate of John Bude
ISBN 978-1-4642-0669-6

John Bude is a pseudonym of Ernest Carpenter Elmore, who published 36 books (30 as Bude) between 1935 and 1957 (the year of his death).  Superintendent William Meredith appears in 23 of the books, including this one.

It’s a bizarre and obscure crime.  There’s a square on which 10 homes are located, mostly in the English style—abutting each other, but separate structures.  While things seem fairly serene on the surface, emotions seethe beneath, and the book opens with some hints at these underground issues. 

Captain Cotton, employed as a car salesman (and continuing to be referred to with the rank he held 20 years earlier in the Great War, has entered into an affair with one of the residents of the square (Isobel West, wife of Arthur West, who works in a local bank).  One evening, Cotton drops in on Edward Buller, a semi-retired stockbroker.  And, while seated in Buller’s second floor study, with only the back of his head visible above the back of the chair,h aving a drink and a talk about Cotton’s recent inheritance, Cotton is shot, through the open window.  By an arrow.  Loosed, as we shall discover by a 6’ long bow.  And several residents of the square are members of an archery club.

Meredith, who is in Cheltenham visiting a friend, is asked, unofficially, to assist the local police Inspector Long.

Their investigation takes a number of turns, some down blind alleys, before reaching a conclusion.  One thing, though, which seemed obvious to me, apparently does not occur to the police until quite late in the game.

I’d call this a workmanlike effort, but not a classic.  Meredith and Long rather quickly conclude that the murder must be one of the people living in the square, although it’s not clear why.  Cotton’s background remains murky for longer than (it seemed to me) it would have in a real investigation.  And, as I have already suggested, they miss a point that seems both obvious and important.  I’ve read three of four of Bude’s other books, and this one is not up to the others.  Solid, readable, but a little labored and plodding.  If you have not read anything by Bude before, I’d start with Death on the Riviera or The Lake District Murder (his first book).