The Labyrinth House Murders (1988) by Yukito Ayatsuji

Last year was great for fans of the Japanese honkaku and shin honkaku mysteries with new translations of Akimitsu Takagi's Noumen satsujin jiken (The Noh Mask Murder, 1949), Seishi Yokomizo's Akuma no temari uta (The Little Sparrow Murders, 1957/59) and MORI Hiroshi's Tsumetai mishitsu to hakase tachi (Doctors in the Isolated Room, 1996), but looked forward the most to Meirokan no satsujin (The Labyrinth House Murders, 1988) – written by Yukito Ayatsuji and translated by Ho-Ling Wong. From the occasional reviews over the years ("awesome meta-mystery") to the fascinating, labyrinthine floor plan of the titular house Ho-Ling blogged about in "The Quest of the Missing Map." Fast forward to today and this fabled detective novel is finally available in English courtesy of Pushkin Vertigo.

So immediately pounced on it the moment The Labyrinth House Murders became available for pre-order and only wish I had reread Ayatsuji's epoch-making debut first. The Labyrinth House Murders is a thematic sequel, of sorts, on the first two Shimada Kiyoshi novels, Jukkakukan no satsujin (The Decagon House Murders, 1987) and Suishakan no satsujin (The Mill House Murders, 1988), weaving compelling stories and plots around alternating narratives. The Decagon House Murders plays out in two different places, while The Mill House Murders has two narratives set a year apart. The Labyrinth House Murders has a very meta-ish story-within-a-story structure. So, basically, you're getting two The Labyrinth House Murders for the price of one!

The story begins with Shimada receiving an advanced copy of Shishiya Kadomi's The Labyrinth House Murders, "An Original Honkaku Murder Mystery! The Truth Behind the Labyrinth House Murder Case Finally Revealed," which finally promises to expose the truth of the real-life murder case at the Labyrinth House – "famous for its complex underground maze." The author claims the right to tell the story as Shishiya Kadomi was one of those present, but not under the penname of the book and presents it from the start as a mini-puzzle ("so which of the characters is Shishiya Kadomi?"). So the main body of the book is Shishiya Kadomi's The Labyrinth House Murders book-ended by Shimada starting to read the book in the prologue and meeting the author in the epilogue to cast a new light on the case.

Shishiya Kadomi's The Labyrinth House Murders tells the story of the 60th birthday party of legendary mystery writer, Miyagaki Yōtarō, who persisted in writing traditionally-plotted, fair play mysteries when "the wave of social detective novels took over the world of Japanese mystery fiction." Miyagaki is more than just a mystery writer. He's a mystery fan who dedicated his entire life to the detective story and through his magazine, Reverie, looked for new blood to carry on the genre.

So, on his 60th birthday, Miyagaki, invites ten people to his underground, labyrinthine lair to celebrate. A group comprising of Miyagaki's long-time editor, Utayama Hideyuki, and his pregnant wife, Keiko. Four promising mystery writers, Kiyomura Junichi, Suzaki Shōsuke, Funaoka Madoka and Hayashi Tomoo, who made their debut in Miyagaki's magazine. A well-known mystery critic, Samejima Tomoo, the housekeeper Fumie and, of course, Shimada. Shimada's is drawn to Labyrinth House because it was designed by that eccentric architect, Nakamura Seiji, who "had built a few curious building" like the Decagon House and Mill House – which all had seen their fair share of bloodshed and tragedy ("would the Labyrinth House be next?"). Labyrinth House is practically designed to court tragedy. A small, low stone building, "like a massive crag of rock," which is just the entrance to a massive, underground labyrinth with rooms clustered around them. All the rooms bare names of characters from Greek mythology. This veritable Minotaur's labyrinth has one entrance/exit in the reception room (Ariadne), brilliantly positioned right next to the kitchen. Nakamura Seiji, you genius, you!

When everyone has arrived, they're informed a tragedy has already happened before they arrived. The terminally-ill Miyagaki took his own life and left behind a curious testament on a cassette tape.

Miyagaki invited the four mystery writers because they're his favorites who got their starts in Reverie, but urges them to not assume he has been fully satisfied with their accomplishments. So poses a challenge to the four writers: over the next five days, they have to write a short story in which Labyrinth House is the setting, the characters in the story are the people gathered at the house and "every author must be the victim in their own story." There are three judges, Utayama, Samejima and Shimada, who have to pick the best story with the winner becoming heir to half of Miyagaki's fortune. And pretty much his successor. But if even one person refuses to participate, the contest is canceled and the testament void.

Not that leaving the underground house is an option as they soon find themselves trapped, or locked, inside the house. Before too long, the nearly decapitated body of one of the mystery writers is found in the drawing room (Minotaur). A murder that turns out to be copy of the murder described in the opening pages of the victim's short story, which becomes a pattern as the bodies pile on during their entrapment in Labyrinth House. And as to be expected from "an original honkaku murder mystery," even a fictitious one, succeeding victims leave behind a dying message or get themselves killed in a locked room. However, you shouldn't read it as "The Classic Japanese Locked Room Mystery" promised on the cover as it simply is not that kind of detective novel. The dying message, locked room and every other trope function here as smaller cogs and wheels in a larger plot, except, of course, the meta-narrative – which is the key to the story. Impressively, Ayatsuji uses the story's only genuine flaw to its advantage. Shishiya Kadomi's in-story novelization of the Labyrinth House murder case is fairly solvable. You can reach the in-story solution, or a big chunk of it, simply by asking a very simple and obvious question the characters stubbornly refuse to ask themselves. So the in-story novel reads and feels like a good, fun, but slightly imperfect, shin honkaku mystery.

In most cases, The Labyrinth House Murders would have been another example of the false-solution, flawed as it may be, outshining the correct solution. The slightly less impressive, but correct, solution has some elements that would have cheapened a detective novel of lesser quality. For example, the (ROT13) fbhepr bs gur oybbq gur zheqrere unq gb pbire hc jvgu gur qrpncvgngvba comes across as a bit cheap and banal (uneqyl jbegu gur jbex gung jrag vagb bofphevat gur zheqrere'f traqre) or the locked room-trick being the kind of shenanigans I normally frown upon. I simply worked on the assumption, a very incorrect assumption, the first victim was nearly decapitated because an ax was needed to break down into a locked room later. And destroying evidence in the process that the door was gimmicked to appear locked. Nevertheless, it served as a rock solid foundation for the correct solution to stand on making the false-solution one of the two biggest accomplishments of Ayatsuji and The Labyrinth House Murders. A fantastic use of the false-solution showing once again Ayatsuji is closer to Ellery Queen than John Dickson Carr. The second thing the book does very well is being a meta-mystery with the final meta-twist as the proverbial cherry on top!

So, yes, I tremendously enjoyed The Labyrinth House Murders. I'm not sure if I would rank it above The Decagon House Murders or The Mill House Murders, purely as traditional fair play mysteries, but as a fun, smart meta-mystery it's first-rate. Something very different from those two previous novels that at the same time feels like a logical next step in the series. Very much look forward to see what Ayatsuji is going to do next with his signature dueling narratives. Pushkin Vertigo has announced that the next translation in the "Bizarre House Mysteries" series is going to be Tokeikan no satsujin (The Clock Mansion Murders, 1991), which means they're skipping Ningyōkan no satsujin (The Doll Mansion Murders, 1989) for now. I don't mind. The Clock Mansion Murders sounds like another treat for detective fans. Anyway, 2025 is off to a good start!

Who Killed the Curate? (1944) by Joan Coggin

Joan Coggin was a British writer of light, comedic mysteries and half a dozen of girls' school novels, published under the pseudonym "Joanna Lloyd," but she's best remembered for her four mysteries starring Lady Lupin Hastings (née Lorrimer) – a former socialite who became a vicar's wife. The late Tom and Enid Schantz, of Rue Morgue Press, reprinted the series in the early 2000s and the big reason why this once obscure, short-lived series is remembered today. Following the Rue Morgue Press reprints, Coggin and Lady Lupin "featured as favorite reading of characters" in the works of Katherine Hall Page (The Body in the Lighthouse, 2003) and Carolyn Hart (Murder Walks the Plank, 2004).

When I discovered the Rue Morgue Press, I was more interested in their reprints of Glyn Carr, Clyde B. Clason, Stuart Palmer and Kelley Roos. So, for one reason or another, I put Coggin together with their reprints of Catherine Aird, Manning Coles and the Littles aside as not of immediate interest. I missed out on Coggin's first return to print, but, twenty years after the Rue Morgue Press republished the final Lady Lupin mystery, the series got picked up by Galileo Publishing.

Last year, Galileo reprinted the first title in the series, Who Killed the Curate? (1944), which is subtitled "A Christmas Mystery" and introduces Lady Lupin Lorrimer as a London socialite dreading that evening's twenty-first birthday party of a friend – because at dinner she's going to sit next to a clergyman ("whatever did one talk about to clergymen?"). She agrees with her boyfriend/fiance to push off early to the Crimson Canary, but when she meets the clergyman, Andrew Hastings, she falls in love. Before anyone knows it, they're married and Lady Lupin is off to the small seaside town of Glanville to start anew as the vicar's wife.

A note of warning here for readers who prefer their detective stories to get on with it, because Who Killed the Curate? is going to severely test your patience.

It's not unusual for mystery writers to indulge their literary craving by taking their time to get to the murder in order to introduce the characters, flesh out their personalities and setting the stage for the crime. Ngaio Marsh made that approach her own as many of her detective novels can be read as a pair of interconnected novellas with the first-half building up the murder and the investigation covering the second-half. But usually that first-half still has a hint of what's coming. I can't remember ever having read a mystery novel in which the first-half reads nothing like it's supposed to setup a whodunit. The first-half of Who Killed the Curate? basically reads like a comedic novel of manners with the entirely clueless, scatterbrained Lady Lupin trying to grapple with her new duties as the vicar's wife, "what with the Guides and the Mothers' Union and the Sunday School." Or a woman coming to her to confess she has been seduced and is expecting a baby ("...whatever else the life of a clergyman's wife is, it isn't dull").

So you have to wait until the second-half, roughly speaking, for ten pounds of the Hastings' household money to go missing shortly followed by the fatal poisoning of Andrew's curate, Charles Young, but was murder, suicide or something else ("well, if it was the fish, we'll probably all go"). The police eventually find their likely-unlikely suspect and Lady Lupin "longed for a chance to show her friendship" is maneuvered by circumstances and position as the vicar's wife, who receives privileged information into the role of amateur sleuth – assisted by her London friends who arrived to celebrate Christmas. But even then, it feels like the detective story had to be drawn from this character novel of manners like blood from a stone. For example, the details of the murder itself are gradually revealed through out the second-half right up to the final quarter of the story. Coggin was a funny writer with an eye for character and dialogue, but it began to wear thin to the point where I stopped caring who killed the damn curate. Good thing, too, as the answer to the question is nothing special or particular memorable. Only thing the story managed to do making me wonder what sulphur cake tastes like.

I don't know if the problem is Coggin using this first novel to flesh out her cast of regular characters and their relationships or that this series just isn't for me. Either way, I'm very sorry to have to end this year's run of Christmas mystery reviews, and the year in general, on a downer. However, the first review of January is going to be banger! Happy New Year and hope to see you all back in 2025!

Murder in Retrospect: The Best and Worst of 2024

 

Last year, I started "Murder in Retrospect: The Best and Worst of 2024" with remembering Rupert Heath, of Dean Street Press, who suddenly passed away earlier in the year and now have begin with acknowledging the passing of John Pugmire – who died in March of this year. John Pugmire and Locked Room International not only helped popularizing translations of non-English detective fiction, but instrumental in rejuvenating and reviving the locked room mystery novel. The locked room novel, not short stories, had been in a deep rut for over half a century, until Pugmire's 2006 translation of Paul Halter's La nuit du loup (The Night of the Wolf, 2000) was published.

I noted in "The Locked Room Mystery & Impossible Crime Story in the 21st Century" it was the first tremor of a massive shift and a decade later the reprint renaissance, translation wave and an honest to god locked room revival were in full swing! Pugmire left an indelible mark on the genre and, more, importantly revived his beloved locked room mysteries by broadening its horizon and bringing in a score of new fans. So he'll be missed, but will be with us locked room fans in spirit for many decades to come.

While LRI closed down, Dean Street Press reopened its doors for business and has began reissuing the courtroom mysteries by Sara Woods. A mystery writer whom Curt Evans called "a major figure in what I call the Silver Age of detective fiction." I'll be sampling one, or two, of those reprints next year. There's more exciting reprints, translations and brand new detective novels coming next year.

This year, British Library Crime Classics is reprinting Carter Dickson's The Ten Teacups (1937), Anthony Berkeley's Not to Be Taken (1938), Christianna Brand's Cat and Mouse (1950), Carol Carnac's Murder as a Fine Art (1953), Fiona Sinclair's Scandalize My Name (1960) and publishing an anthology, "a jam-packed travel case of short mysteries," entitled Midsummer Mysteries (2025) – edited by Martin Edwards. Otto Penzler's American Mystery Classics is going to reprint the rare, long out-of-print Obelists en Route (1934) by C. Daly King. Rufus King's Murder by the Clock (1929) is also returning to print. There are, of course, the translations. Pushkin Vertigo is diversifying their output of Japanese mysteries with translations of Seishi Yokomizo's Kuroneko tei jiken (The Murder at the Black Cat Cafe, 1947), Yukito Ayatsuji's Tokeikan no satsujin (The Clock Mansion Murders, 1991), Yasuhiko Nishizawa's Nanakai shinda otoko (The Man Who Died Seven Times, 1995), Taku Ashibe's Oomarike satsujin jiken (Murders in the House of Omari, 2021) and two novels by horror Youtuber "Uketsu." The BBB is currently serializing MORI Hiroshi's Warawanai sugakusha (Mathematical Goodbye, 1996 and complete edition will likely be out before spring. On top of a ton new titles.

So enough to look forward to in 2025, but 2024 needs to be tidied up first. First of all, I compiled a couple of lists this year under the collective title "The Hit List." The most recent one is "Top 12 Favorite Christmas Mystery Novels & Short Stories," but also did "Top 10 Works of Detective Fiction That Have Been Lost to History," "Top 10 Beneficiaries of the Reprint Renaissance" and "Top 10 Best Translations & Reprints from Locked Room International." I also rambled about "The Locked Room Mystery & Impossible Crime Novel in the 1980s" as a prelude to the previously mentioned piece about the 21st century impossible crime novel. So with that out of the way, all that's left to do is wish you all a Merry Christmas and best wishes for next year! Now let's get to the best and worst detective fiction read in 2024.

THE BEST DETECTIVE NOVELS:

The Tragedy at Freyne (1927) by Anthony Gilbert

A promising debut and a better than average, 1920s manor house mystery novel concerning the mysterious poisoning of Sir Simon Chandon solved by a young, rising politician, Scott Egerton.

The Creeping Jenny Mystery (1929) by Brian Flynn

This is a lighthearted, lightly plotted and written 1920s romp that reads like a fond farewell to the Twenties with its country house setting, stolen jewels and cast of bantering Bright Young Things. Flynn's doing a bit of webwork plotting gave it a hint of what was in store for the detective story in the decade ahead.

Murder Yet to Come (1929/30) by Isabel Briggs Myers

A rival of Ellery Queen's The Roman Hat Mystery (1929) for the first prize in a writing competition and both, interestingly enough, pay homage to the doyen of the American detective story, S.S. van Dine. The Van Dinean treatment considerably freshened up the turn-of-the-century tropes Myers paraded out in this entertaining locked room mystery, which makes it a pity her second detective novel bombed so bad it torpedoed her mystery writing career.

The Red Widow Murders (1935) by Carter Dickson (a reread)

The third recorded case of Sir Henry Merrivale is a classic take on the room-that-kills scenario bringing to Old Man to Mantling House and the notorious Widow's Room, which had claimed a handful of victims over the century – before getting permanently sealed. Widow's Room remained sealed for more than half a century, but only a few hours passed between the unsealing and the room claiming a fresh victim. A vintage H.M. and a fantastic Golden Age detective novel.

Death of an Author (1935) by E.C.R. Lorac

My favorite Lorac reprint to date! An excellent detective novel and a perfect example how you turn an ultimately simple situation into a dark, maze-like structure simply by playing an elaborate game of Guess Who? I'm still keeping my fingers crossed for reprints of Murder in St. John's Wood (1934) and her "Carol Carnac" novels Murder As a Fine Art (1953) and The Double Turn (1956).

Murder in the Family (1936) by James Ronald

A surprising, unexpectedly good (superb even) and deeply human, character-driven crime novel from a writer better known for his thrillers, gangster stories and pulp-style (locked room) mysteries. It can even be read as criticism of the detective story treating murder as a parlor game, but it was all done so well, I couldn't help but enjoy it. Never let it be said I only care about plot-mechanics.

They Can't Hang Me (1938) by James Ronald

Arguably, the definitive pulp-style locked room mystery. The kind of pulp-style locked room mystery John Russell Fearn and Gerald Verner made their own, but Ronald nailed it to near perfection. Simply the best treatment of the house under siege by an apparently near omnipotent murderer who seems to have the run of the place. The best of the pulps!

The Footprints on the Ceiling (1939) by Clayton Rawson (a reread)

Rawson is remembered today for Death from a Top Hat (1938), but it's classic status has not aged very well and, upon rereading The Footprints on the Ceiling, found it to be a superior detective novel. A bizarre, tightly packed mystery novel taking place on a small river island with a helter-skelter plot that had no right to work, but it did, which makes it one of the best tricks Rawson played on his readers.

Green for Danger (1944) by Christianna Brand (a reread)

The most well-known, widely celebrated British World War II mystery novels taking place in a military hospital during the Blitz with the death of a patient on the operating table bringing Inspector Cockrill to the scene. Even though Death of Jezebel (1948) has toppled it as the definitive Brand novel, Green for Danger still lives up to its reputation. One of the best pure whodunits of the 1940s!

Shadowed Sunlight (1945) by Christianna Brand

A short-ish novel, originally serialized in Woman, but never reprinted in book form and the story was, sort of, forgotten about – until it appeared in Bodies from the Library 4 (2021). An admittedly minor, but solid, mystery novel about an impossible poisoning aboard a pleasure yacht deserving of its own edition.

Nomen satsujin jiken (The Noh Mask Murder, 1949) by Akimitsu Takagi

The translation wave has brought us not only some gems of today's premiere Japanese mystery writers, but also previously inaccessible, Golden Age detective fiction. This classic Japanese locked room mystery involves the impossible murder of the family patriarch involving the titular mask with a 200-year-old curse attached to it.

The Footprints of Satan (1950) by Norman Berrow (a reread)

Berrow's most impressive contribution to the locked room mystery and impossible crime story partially based on the reported 1855 incident of the Devon hoof-marks. Berrow used the story of the devil's hoof-marks to turn the already tricky problem of impossible-footprints-in-the-snow into an Olympic winter sport!

The Case of the Burnt Bohemian (1953) by Christopher Bush

An excellent mystery concerning the murder of a reclusive, completely unknown artist and a fine example of Bush finding his footing again in the 1950s with one the last appearances of the great Superintendent George Wharton, before Bush decided to phase him out of the series.

Riddle of a Lady (1956) by Anthony Gilbert

This is a late-period Golden Age mystery novel and all the more interesting for it as it offers a glimpse of what the plot-driven detective story could have been like in the age of the character-driven crime and thriller novels. Gilbert basically polished, what's ultimately, a sordid crime story into a detective story by presenting it as an ambiguous inverted mystery. Arthur Crook being Arthur Crook always helps. Not to the police. Certainly not them, but his clients and readers are always happy to see him make an appearance.

Akuma no temari uta (The Little Sparrow Murders, 1957/59) by Seishi Yokomizo

A solidly-plotted, lavishly-spun whodunit bringing Japan's most iconic detective figure, Kosuke Kindaichi, to the small, remote mountain village of Onikobe. A two-decade old, unsolved murder hangs like a dark cloud over its inhabitants and fresh murders are committed not long after Kindaichi's arrival – bizarrely patterned after the lyrics of temari song. So an Agatha Christie-style nursery rhyme mystery and perhaps the most accessible translations for readers who find the usual honkaku-style mysteries a bit strong with its chopped up bodies, eccentric architecture and multiple impossible crimes, unbreakable alibis and dying messages.

Tsumetai nisshitsu to hakase tachi (Doctors in the Isolated Room, 1996) by MORI Hiroshi

Maybe a little too technical and specialized for some, especially since the characterization is not great, but found this story about a double murder in the low-temperature laboratory of a Polar research facility to be better than Hiroshi's famous and celebrated Subete ga F ni naru (Everything Turns to F: The Perfect Insider, 1996). Yes, I can be an annoying contrarian at times.

Hoshifuri sansou no satsujin (Murders in the Mountain Lodges Beneath the Shooting Stars, 1996) by Jun Kurachi

Contrary to what most readers have come to expect from shin honkaku mysteries, Murders in the Mountain Lodges Beneath the Shooting Stars is a non-impossible crime without the usual trappings – like strange architecture, corpse-puzzles and locked room murders. I called it a no-gimmicks-needed, simon-pure jigsaw detective novel in the classical mold that's a must-read for fans of Ellery Queen and Alice Arisugawa.

 

Rurijou satsujin jiken (The "Lapis Lazuli Castle" Murders, 2002) by Takekuni Kitayama

Masahiro Imamura's Shijinso no satsujin (Death Among the Undead, 2017), a locked room mystery infested with zombies, has popularized the hybrid mystery among Japanese writers, but the form has been explored and experimented before. The "Lapis Lazuli Castle" Murders is a particular fine example in which reincarnation ties the main characters together over a 700 year period. So a novel structured like an interconnected short story collections stretching from 13th century France to 1980s Japan. The locked room murder at the Library at the End of the World is the impossible crime story on steroids!

Jikuu ryokousha no sunadokei (The Time Traveler's Hourglass, 2019) by Kie Houjou

Kie Houjou can now be counted among my favorite mystery writers on the strength of her first and third hybrid mystery in the Ryuuzen Clan series. The Time Traveler's Hourglass, first in the series, is a brilliantly plotted time travel mystery, but even more distinguishing is that the characters have heart and the story a soul. It allowed for an ending that would have died a death in the hands of a less talented writer.

 

Mortmain Hall (2020) by Martin Edwards

Another intricate, webwork-plotted and classically-styled detective novel masquarading as retro-pulp from the Nestor of the Golden Age Renaissance. So the nature of the plot doesn't allow much room for discussion or being described, but the next two titles in the series, Sepulchre Street (2023) and Hemlock Bay (2024), are on the big pile for next year.

Meitantei ni kanbi naru shi wo (Delicious Death for Detectives, 2022) by Kie Houjou

Arguably, my favorite detective novel read this year and the third novel in the Ryuuzen Clan series, which brings Kamo Touma to closed circle event to test a new virtual reality mystery game. And to say he gets an immersive gaming experience would be an understatement. I believe Delicious Death for Detective could very well end up becoming the iconic detective novel of the 21st century like Christie's And Then There Were None (1939).

 

Bunraku Noir (2023) by K.O. Enigma

A self-published "murder mystery for the modern, online age" from "the Ellery Queen of the Vtuber Era" and is a clever, genre-savvy genre parody and better than most would expect from a fan written web release.

 

Gospel of V (2023) by H.M. Faust

A thoroughly bizarre, but pleasing, highlight from the budding independent scene and locked room revival. The book is a challenge to describe or properly summarize. For example, the story has a disconnected, but thematically consistent intermission, "The Jesus Christ Murder Case," retelling the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as unexpectedly good locked room mystery. There's logic to all the madness. Sure, the logic of a mad dream, but still... I loved it!

77 North (2023) by D.L. Marshall

The third and apparently final entry in John Tyler series of action packed mystery thrillers packed with locked room murders and impossible crimes. This time, Tyler is dropped in the Arctic circle to retrieve a bioweapons expert from a Cold War era facility, a "hotel," where the KGB with ESP, astral projections and telekinesis – someone died under impossible circumstances in the nuclear bunker. Hopefully, 77 North is not the last we have seen of Tyler and the impossible crimes he encounters in all those remote, dangerous places.

The Mystery of Treefall Manor (2023) by J.S. Savage

A genuine retro-GAD locked room mystery, introducing Inspector Graves and Constable Carver, hitting all the familiar notes, but there's nothing stock or time-worn about the excellent solution. A homage to the Golden Age mystery novel that would have actually been quite at home in the 1920s or '30s. I was less enamored with Savage's second, modern-set locked room mystery, Sun, Sea and Murder (2024), but look forward to the second Graves and Carver novel, The Riddle of the Ravens (2024).

Rechercheur De Klerck en de status in moord (Inspector De Klerck and the Status in Murder, 2024) by P. Dieudonné

A good, old school detective novel presented as a typical, Dutch police novel in which the combination of old world problems and solutions result in complicated murder case with multiple victims. Better than the previous, double-sized Rechercheur De Klerck en de sluier van de dood (Inspector De Klerck and the Veil of Death, 2024)!

The Dry Diver Drownings (2024) by A. Carver

A detective's coming-of-age, of sorts, in which Alex Corby is invited to the shoot of a crossover episode for two horror web series at an abandoned building, but without her great-aunt Cornelia. Alex is pretty much on her own when the subject of the two web series, Dry Diver, apparently stirs to live and begins picking people off in locked and watched room. Not the locked room spectacle of novels, but still an excellent, classically-styled contemporary whodunit. And love the idea of a creepypasta character coming to live who can dive through locked doors and solid walls as though they're made of water.

Cabaret Macabre (2024) by Tom Mead

A locked room mystery with a pair of skillfully-handled impossible murder, notably the body on the lake providing the story with an original two-pronged impossibility, but they're only one part of web work plot of "byzantine complexity." The best of the Joseph Spector novels, so far!

THE BEST SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS AND SHORT STORIES

Short Story Collections:

The Communicating Door and Other Stories (1923) by Wadsworth Camp

Les veillées de la Tour Pointue (The Secret of the Pointed Tower, 1937) by Pierre Véry

13 to the Gallows (2008) by John Dickson Carr and Val Gielgud (a reread)

The Casebook of Jonas P. Jonas and Other Mysteries (2012) by E.X. Ferrars

The Killer Everyone Knew and Other Captain Leopold Stories (2023) by Edward D. Hoch

Golden Age Whodunits (2024) edited by Otto Penzler

Short Stories:

"The Talking Stone" (1955) by Isaac Asimov (a reread)

"Greenshaw Folly" (1956) by Agatha Christie

"Murder Behind Schedule" (1963) by Lawrence G. Blochman

"Cardula and the Locked Rooms" (1982) by Jack Ritchie

"The Sweating Statue" (1985) by Edward D. Hoch

"The Murder in Room 1010" (1987) by Edward D. Hoch

"Murder in the Urth Degree" (1989) by Edward Wellen

"The Theft of Leopold's Badge" (1991) by Edward D. Hoch (reviewed together with "The Murder in Room 1010")

"The Adventure of the Glass Room" (2002) by Philip J. Carraher

"Kanojo ga Patience wo korosu hazu ga nai" ("She Wouldn't Kill Patience," 2002) by Ooyama Seiichiro

"Knockin' On Locked Door" (2014) by Aosaki Yugo

"De schilder die de waarheid liefhad" ("The Painter Who Loved the Truth," 2019) by M.P.O. Books" (reviewed together with "Murder Behind Schedule")

"Jack Magg's Jaw" (2022) by Tom Mead (reviewed together with "Murder Behind Schedule")

"Eggnog and the Cylinder" (2023) by Miogacu (reviewed together with "Cardula")

“The Silent Steps of Murder" (2023) by James Scott Byrnside (reviewed together with "Murder Behind Schedule")

THE WORST OF DETECTIVE NOVELS AND SHORT STORIES:

The Girl in the Fog (1923) by Joseph Gollomb

A badly written, poorly plotted, unforgivably dull and ludicrous pulp-style mystery with a villain named Pete Ennis. Sometimes it's not difficult to understand how some writers completely disappeared into obscurity, because that's where they belong.

Who Goes Hang? (1958) by Stanley Hyland

Started out strong and promising, hobbled along to a splendid, midway twist before going to pieces, but enjoyed putting together my own solution.

The Crossword Mystery (1979) by Robert G. Gillespie

One of those attempts to incorporate classical tropes, locked rooms, dying messages and secret codes, into a modern crime novel, but not a very successful one. Phillips Lore made a much more valiant effort a year later with Murder Behind Closed Doors (1980). 

 

Ubume no natsu (The Summer of the Ubume, 1994) by Natsuhiko Kyogoku

Nobody is a bigger fan and supporter of the shin honkaku mystery than I am, please ignore Ho-Ling and everyone else around here who can read Japanese, but even I can admit they produce a stinker every now and then. This is one of them. A historically important work for the second wave of shin honkaku mystery writers and a fascinating contrast with other seminal, second wave novel, Hiroshi's The Perfect Insider – which is blend of scientific mystery and futurism. The Summer of the Ubume, on the other hand, blends folklore with the supernatural, but it was a boring drag to read. And the ending was simply infuriating!

The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning (2021) by P.J. Fitzsimmons

P.J. Fitzsimmons is a ghostwriter for mainstream genres who "dreams of an alternative reality in which P.G. Wodehouse wrote locked room mysteries." Not content with waiting for the Mandela Effect to release a reality-update to patch that flaw, Fitzsimmons took matters into his own hands with the Anty Boisjoly series of classically-styled, "strictly for laughs," historical locked room cozies – nine to date published between 2020 and 2024. Fitzsimmons describes his literary shenanigans as "either an inexcusable offense to several beloved canons or a hilarious, fast-paced, manor house murder mystery."

I was honestly put off a little by the "cozy" label, but the second novel in the series, The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning (2021), is a seasonally appropriate mystery. So why not give it a shot and see if the series is worth pursuing.

The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning, set in 1928, brings professional idler and man-about-town, Anty Boisjoly, to the dairy town of Graze Hill to spend Christmas with his Aunty Azalea at Herding House. Upon his arrival, Aunty Azalea greets her nephew with the following lines that open the story, "Merry Christmas Anty dear. There's a dead body under the tree." The victim is her neighbor, Major Aaron “Flaps” Fleming, who garnered fame as brave, dare devil World War I flying ace – "credited with shooting down forty-one enemy aircraft." After the war ended, the reclusive Flaps Fleming retired from public life and took Tannery Lodge in Graze Hill. That's where Aunty Azalea found him on Christmas morning with a knife-handle sticking out of his back, but there are two worryingly aspects about the murder.

Firstly, there are two trails of footprints in the snow leading to Tannery Lodge. One track of footprints belong to Flap Fleming and the other track of footprints to Azalea, which is good news for the police, but her nephew won't stand for Detective-Inspector Ivor Wittersham measuring his aunt's neck for a noose. But how did the real murderer escape from the lodge without leaving footprints in the snow? Secondly, hours after the murder was discovered, Flaps Fleming apparently walked into the Sulky Cow and "stood everyone a round of drinks" before walking back to the lodge to resume his duties as corpse. This is not going to be the last time a fresh murder victim decides to have a final drink at the local pub. Not to mention the problem of the theft of the church's weather vane from the tower without any footprints of the thief on the snowy roof.

In that regard, The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning follows the pattern of today's emerging locked room specialists who aren't satisfied with merely one, or two, impossible crimes and inexplicable situations – preferring to string together numerous, often interconnected impossibilities. Where the story differs, however, is the focus on the characters, potential motives, a webwork of secrets and comedy rather than plot-mechanics. I understand the other novels give more attention to the locked room problems, but here Anty has to poke around the depleted regulars of the Sulky Cow ("...Graze Hill is something of a ghost town over Christmas") and some other curious arrivals in town. Such as the victim's foppish nephew, Cosmo Millicent, who's determined to write his uncle wartime biography and one of Flap Fleming's old wartime flying buddies, Flight-Lieutenant Montgomery Hern-Fowler. And he has his own Christmas ghost story to tell. The whole thing is drenched in witty dialogue and hilarious misunderstandings in the great tradition of British comedy.

Fitzsimmons noted that this series is a homage to the likes of P.G. Wodehouse, Jerome K. Jerome, Margery Allingham and Dorothy L. Sayers, but The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning stands closer to comedic mysteries of Leo Bruce, Edmund Crispin, R.T. Campbell and David Renwick's Jonathan Creek. A comedic highlight of the story is Reverend Padget composing a Christmas carol, "intended to be sung to the tune of In dulci jubilo," which recounts in rhyme "the events leading to the death by stoning of Saint Stephen." Anty had "rashly lavished" praised on the atrocity without reading it nor knowing what it would lead to. So the book is never boring, always amusing and sometimes genuinely funny, even if Anty puts it on a little too thickly at times. So it handily avoided one of the biggest sins a detective story can be guilty of, namely being dull and boring, but worried about the plot and where the ending was heading. Could a comedic, tongue-in-cheek mystery deliver on the intriguing premise when the plot-mechanics haven't been given the fullest attention and consideration? Surprisingly, it did. Well, mostly.

The solutions to the various impossibilities are, pleasantly, neither routine nor uninspired and think its actually quite clever how more than half of those various, different impossible situations (SPOILER/ROT13) jrer rkcynvarq ol gur zheqrere univat npprff gb gur pybpx gbjre jvgu vgf sbhe-fvqrq, vaqrcraqrag pybpx snprf. A glimpse of what could have been had Christopher Bush fully applied himself to the impossible crime tale. I'm still in two minds about the murder and ghostly appearance of Flaps Flemings at the Sulky Cow. Anty needed to do a lot of talking to make it sound halfway convincing, not even wholly unsuccessfully, because I can see how it would work when (SPOILER/ROT13) gur vzcrefbangvbaf ner vagregjvarq naq rirelbar unf frra/vagrenpgrq jvgu obgu irefvbaf. But why? I thought the motive and reasoning behind that part of the solution to be a trifle weak, but, other than that, The Case of the Ghost of Christmas Morning proved to be a better than expected and welcome addition to the growing list of Christmas (locked room) mysteries. The Case of the Canterfell Codicil (2020) and The Tale of the Tenpenny Tontine (2021) are going to be added to the big pile for 2025.

Ho-Ho-Homicide: "A Murder in Christmas Village" (2015) by Alex Colwell

I first read about Alex Colwell's short story, "A Murder in Christmas Village" (2015), on a now long since deleted website, "The Locked Room Mystery," containing a page listing nineteen seasonal detective novels and short stories – titled "A Locked Room Christmas." Colwell's "A Murder in Christmas Village" was the last, then most recent entry on the list and introduced as the first in "an exciting new cozy mystery series set in quaint, idyllic Christmas Village" where "no one locks their door but locked room mysteries and impossible murders abound."

Normally, the phrase "cozy mystery" is enough to make me turn around, but the idea, or gimmick, of an annual series of Christmas-themed locked room mysteries appealed to me (of course!). So chucked the short story on the big pile and forgot about it.

I recently went through the archived pages of the defunct "The Locked Room Mystery" website and it reminded me "A Murder in Christmas Village" was still residing on the big pile. So looked up the series, to see what has been added to it in the intervening years, but Colwell appears to have abandoned the series after only a single short story – proceeded to drop off the map. A second short story, or novel, seems to have been in the works with "Halloween Villa" in the title. Nothing materialized and this short story is no longer available. I got my hands on a lost locked room mystery, before it got lost 

Alex Colwell's "A Murder in Christmas Village" is a short, sweet and simple seasonal locked room mystery with the kind of killing one doesn't usually associate with cozies. Willard "Wild Willy" Wilkinson, of Wild Willy's Western World, got his throat cut in the property room of the Crestview Theater. The body is lying some five feet into the room and the floor is covered in fresh sawdust, which has impressions of two sets of print, but "neither of which could have belonged to the killer." No weapon was found in the room and the only door locked.

So a double impossibility with a body inside a locked room and a murderer who left no footprints in the fresh sawdust on the floor. Maybe even a triple impossibility, if you count the absence of a murder weapon as an impossible problem. Sheriff Fell is tasked with investigating this bizarre, locked room slaying assisted, sort of, by Mrs. Maribel Claus ("yes, he's my husband"). The clueing here is so fair blatant, the solution is not too difficult to put together before Mrs. Claus passes Sheriff Fell that to-do note to catch the murderer. "A Murder in Christmas Village" only true shortcoming, however, is not that it's too easy to solve, but that it could very well have been a minor locked room gem had it been just a little more original. The solutions to the problems of the locked door, no-footprint and absentee murder weapon are all tricks more than a little familiar to mystery fans – especially those obsessing over impossible crimes. The tricks were put to good use, but not enough to make it anything more than a charming, if bloody, little holiday locked room mystery perfectly suited to warm and brighten those cold, dark days of December. Hey, freshly spilled blood from a severed carotid artery is bright and warm!

A shame Colwell gave up on this series after only a single short stories, and writing in general, because would have liked to see him develop and continue this tradition of holiday-themed impossible crime stories. A tradition that would eventually have added up to a charming (Crippen & Landru?) collection of short stories (Ho-Ho-Homicide: Mrs. Claus Celebrates the Holidays).

Alias Simon Hawkes (2002) by Philip J. Carraher

I generally prefer homages, parodies and spoofs over outright pastiches, because pastiches seldom measure up to the original and rarely add or outshine the original – imitation has its limitations. So never understood why the estate of Agatha Christie commissioned a bunch of new Hercule Poirot novels, which were never going to be as great or rival the originals. Why not commission writers, like Sophie Hannah, to write a series of Sven Hjerson mysteries under the "Ariadne Oliver" name? Ariadne Oliver and Sven Hjerson can be used to expand on Christie's work without intruding on it. Not to mention fairer to whomever is doing the writing considering it's less of a Herculean task than expecting them to create a new Poirot novel from scratch.

Another problem I have with pastiches, especially Holmesian pastiches, is writers selling their own ideas short by presenting them as imitations. A problem that becomes even worse when the characters and writing aren't perfect imitations of the original. No matter how good the writing, characterization and plot actually is.

For example, Roy Templeman's short story collection Sherlock Holmes and the Chinese Junk Affair & Other Stories (1998), which features a pale shadow of the Great Detective, but the plots of "The Chinese Junk Affair" and "The Trophy Room" aren't without merit – fun impossible crime stories in the David Renwick mold. Sherlock Holmes and the Chinese Junk Affair has very little to offer for hardcore Sherlockians and ignored everyone else not interested in the "further adventures" of Sherlock Holmes. That's how today's subject got overlooked for more than two decades.

Philip J. Carraher's Alias Simon Hawkes: Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in New York (2002) is one of three volumes of Sherlock Holmes pastiches chronicling his long-lost adventures in New York City during the Great Hiatus. A period during which the Great Detective concealed his identity under the alias "Simon Hawkes." I likely would have never known about Carraher or Alias Simon Hawkes had Brian Skupin not mentioned the collection in the introduction to Locked Room Murders: Supplement (2019). Skupin noted the stories are "decidedly non-Holmesian, but clever" with "a good locked room mystery." Only locked room fan who acknowledged the collection is Hal White who listed Alias Simon Hawkes ("worth reading") on his website under "Suggested Reading & Viewing." And the few reviews from Sherlock Holmes fans are a bit mixed. So enough to place Alias Simon Hawkes on my special locked room wishlist, but never gave it special attention or top priority.

Why this rambling, quasi-coherent preamble about pastiches? I recently found out Alias Simon Hawkes is still in print and dug around a bit to see if it was worth to snatch up a copy with, as you have seen, meager results, but enough to pique my curiosity – especially the two stories listed in Locked Room Murders: Supplement. They impressed me stories more suitable for today's locked room revival than the lean years of the early 2000s ("The Locked Room Mystery & Impossible Crime Story in the 21st Century"). I decided to just order a copy and judge the stories solely on their merits as detective stories/locked room mysteries rather than Holmesian pastiches.

"The Adventure of the Magic Alibi," a novella, is the first of four stories making up Alias Simon Hawkes and is an inverted mystery in which the murderer is known, but the bastard has an alibi that stands like a fortress. The murderer is question is Clifford Greenleaf, a rich man, who's hobby is magic tricks and is himself a gifted amateur magician. Greenleaf has gained a reputation for throwing fancy dress parties ("imaginative affairs") for high society and entertaining his guests with "feats of wizardry and pretend-witchcraft." Greenleaf is planning a very special theatrical trick, "a feat of magic," performed during a Halloween party to serve as a cover for murder and creating an unbeatable alibi in the process.

During the festivities, Greenleaf is going to enter a specially prepared room, on the second floor, which has only one door and a window permanently nailed shut that morning. The door is going to be locked behind him and guarded by a Chief Inspector of the New York City police, William "Big Bill" Devery. After a minute, the room is unlocked to allow twenty, ten men and ten women, randomly selected party attendees to go inside and investigate – only to discover their host has inexplicably vanished from the locked and guarded room. Apparently having crossed "the unseen bridge between this physical world and the world of departed souls" as promised. Before the trick can be completed with Greenleaf's reappearance, the murder of Virginia Greenleaf is discovered. She had been fatally wounded in her bedroom, but lived long enough to scrawl her murderer's name in blood, "Cliff killed me." Nothing cryptic about that dying message! Only problem is her husband has a very strange, but incontestable, alibi. There are over twenty people, including Devery, who swear Greenleaf was in the locked, guarded room with them without actually seeing him ("...a very unique alibi"). Inspector Cullen's colleagues belief the dying message was a fake, based on the strength of her husband's alibi, but if he's guilty how did he manage to get out and back into the room?

Inspector Cullen turns to Simon Hawkes for help. Hawkes had assisted Cullen before in The Adventure of the Dead Rabbits Society (2001) and the problem of the magical alibi appears to be better fix to keep boredom away than his usual 7% solution. The setup of the story is great! A crime adhering to Tetsuya Ayukawa's believe that an alibi is a locked room in time and a locked room an alibi in space, which Carraher smashed together. For example, the plan requires a fake locked room-trick to explain Greenleaf's unseen presence inside the locked, watched room. So the setup is first-rate stuff. Unfortunately, the second-act and solution to the locked room alibi are not. And that while there was a much better, more convincing solution staring you in the face (ROT13): nyy lbh arrq vf tvzzvpx gur jvaqbj gb znxr vg nccrne vg jnf anvyrq fuhg (phg-bss anvyf, rgp. cvpx lbhe gevpxf). Nsgre ragrevat gur ebbz, Terrayrns fvzcyl bcraf gur ebbz, fgrcf bhg ba n ynqqre, pybfrf gur jvaqbj naq rvgure tyhrf vg fuhg be hfrf pynzf gb znxr vg nccrne sebz gur vafvqr vg'f ybpxrq naq anvyrq fuhg. Ohg hfvat tyhr jbhyq tvir uvz nabgure ernfba gb jnvg jvgu evfvat gur nynez, orfvqr przragvat uvf nyvov. Vg arrqrq gvzr gb qel. Jura gur zheqre vf qvfpbirerq naq thneqf ner chyyrq njnl sebz gur ybpxrq qbbe, Terrayrns fvzcyl hfrf uvf fcner xrl gb tb onpx vafvqr gb or sbhaq jura gur ebbz vf haybpxrq. Not a blistering original solution, but it eliminates (ROT13) gur arrq sbe n crfxl, gebhoyrfbzr nppbzcyvpr jub arrqf qvfcbfvat naq Terrayrns univat gb qvfthvfr uvzfrys nf n jbzna. Fhpu vzcrefbangvba gevpxf vaibyivat jvtf, naq jungabg, eneryl pbzr npebff nf nalguvat ohg frpbaq-engr. This would have shortened the novella to a short story, but sometimes less is really more. Still enjoyed the overall story, despite the second-half and ending failing to live up to the excellently posed problem of the miracle alibi.

The second and first short story of the collection is "The Adventure of the Captive Forger" and brings Simon Hawkes into contact with an art dealer, named William Lancaster, who has "a reputation for being able to discern forgeries." Lancaster tells Hawkes at the Dead Rabbits Society he has gotten a lucrative, but troublesome, offer to go the home of one Charles Buonocore to appraise some sketches. A battered Lancaster returns the next day with a strange story of a long carriage ride in the dark to a remote, lonely house where a young woman's being held captive and barely escaped the ordeal with his life. And he has no idea how to find the house again.

If the premise sounds somewhat familiar, you're correct. "The Adventure of the Captive Forger" is a rewrite of one of Conan Doyle's worst Sherlock Holmes short stories, "The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb" (1892). Only real difference is in the characters and settings, but, in every other regard, they are essentially the same story following exactly the same pattern – right down to the ending (ROT13: ubhfr sver naq bar bs gur pevzvanyf trggvat njnl). Even worse, Holmes barely does anything in the original short story except retracing the route the house by figuring out the carriage-trick. Only thing Hawkes has to here is to recall the case of that young engineer Victor Hatherley, "he too was taken on a ride in a carriage," and remarking how striking the similarities between cases are. No shit, Sherlock! And, no, I don't accept the argument that the story is clever self-parody about forgers missing the creative spark to create art themselves.

Detective story or pastiche, either way you cut it, "The Adventure of the Captive Forger" is lazy, irredeemable trash and a case-in-point why not every detective fan is keen on exploring the lost adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

Fortunately, "The Adventure of the Glass Room" is the best story of the collection and the reason why Alias Simon Hawkes was even noticed by Skupin and White. A tricky, complicated locked-room-within-a-locked-room mystery. The story begins with Sherlock Holmes, alias Simon Hawkes, is talking at the Dead Rabbits Society with a former client and devout spiritualist, Alwyn Pritchett. Pritchett is boosting to Hawkes about a method he devised "to assure the authenticity of any psychic phenomenon" during a séance. A glass structure, or cube, erected in his own parlor with a glass door that can be bolted from the inside. The only furniture in the glass room is a small table and two chairs. One for Pritchett and the other for the spiritual medium, Charlotte Davreux. Nobody's allowed inside the parlor, beside Pritchett and Davreux, which is also securely locked. So no room for the usual trickery. Hawkes is surprised when the news arrive the next day Pritchett and Davreux died in an apparent murder/suicide.

According to the evidence, Pritchett shot Davreux before turning the gun on himself. They were all alone, sitting in the glass room, the door bolted from the inside and the parlor securely locked ("...a sealed room of glass that is itself standing within a locked room"). So the involvement of a third person seems impossible. Hawkes finds an explanation to explain the seemingly impossible from droplets of blood found in an odd place and reasoning from there. The locked room-trick is complicated and a bit patchy with some points raising an eyebrow, but not bad and a really involved solution fits the tricky, equally complicated and involved presentation of the murders. Just read it before any of the other stories, because you'll appreciate it more (SPOILER/ROT13): fvzvyne gb gur svefg fgbel, gur fbyhgvba erdhverf n crfxl, oheqrefbzr nppbzcyvpr naq gur zheqrere vzcrefbangvat n jbzna.

If "The Adventure of the Magic Alibi," is too long, "The Adventure of the Talking Ghost," the fourth and final story, is too short. Simon Hawkes receives news from London that "the criminal empire of Professor Moriarty now lay shattered" ("an exception of note was the escape of Colonel Sebastian Moran") and considers shedding his new identity to resurrect Sherlock Holmes. While pondering his option, Hawkes receives the news that an ex-client, Joseph Carter, was shot and killed by a gypsy fortune teller. Madam Tollier claimed she shot Carter in self-defense after he tried to attack her with his sword stick. But why? Carter tried to kill the medium to "silence a ghost." Carter's daughter died recently in a drowning accident, but her ghost told him she was murdered ("my killer must be punished"). After his daughter's accident, his wife was killed during a mugging in Central Park. Now he has been shot!

Something fishy is going on! "The Adventure of the Talking Ghost" should have been an intriguingly played, meticulously executed breakdown of Madam Tollier's identity and motive, which would have justified the length of the opening novella. Now it almost feels like the solution is thrown out there when the time comes for Hawkes to simply recognize her (SPOILER/ROT13: pbzcyrgr jvgu chyyvat njnl n jvt. Lrf, gur guveq fgbel va juvpu gur zheqrere hfrf n tbqqnza jvt). There's undoubtedly a good, Doylean-style detective story hiding in here, but Carraher only caught a glimpse of it.

Alias Simon Hawkes is the expected mixed bag of tricks with the first-half of "The Adventure of the Magic Alibi" and "The Adventure of the Glass Room" standing out, but, read back-to-back, the stories come across as repetitive and derivative. Funnily enough, there's a short "About the Author" stating that Carraher believes "each new book should not merely be a practiced variation of the previous one." These stories are all practiced variations on previous/other stories. I already mentioned (SPOILER/ROT13) gjb bs gur fgbevrf eryl ba gebhoyrfbzr nppbzcyvprf naq gur zheqrere vzcrefbangvat n jbzra, juvpu ur ergheaf gb va gur guveq fgbel jvgu n oybaqr jbzna vzcrefbangvat n tlcfl jbzna jvgu n oynpx jvt naq znxrhc, ohg gurer'f nyfb gur fcvevghnyvfg frg qerffvat naq jnyxvat fgvpxf uvqvat jrncbaf. That's why I recommended reading "Glass Room" first. It's the best and most practiced variation of Callaher's favored plot-ingredients. And the only story I can honestly recommended to impossible crime fanatics.