Now let me see... Sinterklaas candy has been on store shelves for months now, closely followed by Halloween ornaments and Christmas decorations, while the days get shorter, colder and darker – which can mean only one thing. It's that time of year again. The time for pepernoten, treats, presents and spreading cheer and goodwill during the miracle of the Christmas season. It's also the time when fans of Golden Age detective fiction turn their pile of seasonal mystery novels to read or, as it used to be more often is the case, reread one or two of the classic Christmas-themed mysteries published during the genre's golden decades.
I made it a tradition to read, and revisit, these merry mayhem mysteries during the holiday month and have read enough to do a seasonal edition of The Hit List. Like previous editions, I make an earnest attempt to avoid making a basic listicle or use it as an excuse to ride my locked room mystery hobby horse by picking somewhat unusual topics – allowing to avoid lists dominated with all usual suspects. So decided mix novels and short stories for this festive list ensuring there would be no easy pickings.
Hopefuly, some of you'll find the list handy to help pick, choose and put together your annual pile of Christmas mysteries to enjoy this month.
L'assassinat du Père Noël (The Murder of Father Christmas, 1934) by Pierre Véry
Véry's The Murder of Father Christmas is not the most devious, intricately-plotted title appearing on this list, however, the book certainly embodies the essence the spirit of Christmas. A gentle, fairy tale-like detective story about the search for a fabled relic, two gems spirited away from a vault and the body of Santa Claus found near the entrance of an underground passage to a castle. A charming, lighthearted seasonal mystery novel written in the spirit of G.K. Chesterton's short story "The Flying Stars" (1911).
Thou Shell of Death (1936) by Nicholas Blake
Last December, I revisited Blake's Thou Shell of Death and was surprised to find a better detective novel than I remembered it to be from my first read. Nigel Strangeways spends Christmas at the home of World War I flying ace, Fergus O'Brien, who's found shot and killed in the garden hut on Boxing Day – only a single track of footprints going from the veranda to the hut. I honestly had forgotten Blake at his best wrote and plotted the same legends league as Christianna Brand, John Dickson Carr and Agatha Christie. Blake delivered with Thou Shell of Death a serious rival to another entry on this list for the title of best Golden Age Christmas mystery novel.
"Blind Man's Hood" (1937) by John Dickson Carr (writing as "Carter Dickson")
Lighting a fire to gather around to drink hot cocoa and telling ghost stories was once a staple of the good, old-fashioned family Christmas celebration, "there'll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago," during that most wonderful time of the year – which is the premise of this small classic. A newlywed couple arrive at the home of friends to celebrate Christmas, but find the front door standing open and the house apparently abandoned. They're eventually greeted by a woman who tells them the household is away to attend a special church service, which is an excuse to be away from the house at a specific time on Christmas Eve. She then them about a murder that happened in the house decades ago as the ghost story slowly takes over the reigns from the detective story. Leave it to the maestro to turn a detective story into a ghost yarn without ruining the detective story part.
Hercule Poirot's Christmas (1938) by Agatha Christie
Christie's Hercule Poirot's Christmas is the quintessential, über conventional seasonal country house mystery, but, until rereading it in 2022, I had forgotten why it had been the Christmas mystery novel for ages. The book is simply a vintage Christie in which she applies her plotting talent to the problem of the brutal murder of nasty, old Simeon Lee on Christmas Eve. A murder methodically unraveled by Hercule Poirot with a keen eye for both the physical and psychological clues. Hercule Poirot's Christmas has become a model for the-country-house-family-Christmas-party-interrupted-by-murder, but rarely equalled or surpassed. A Christmas mystery classic!
Murder After Christmas (1944) by Rupert Latimer
One of those little-known, forgotten festive murder mysteries that had been out-of-print for nearly eighty years, until British Library reprinted it in 2021. Latimer's Murder After Christmas had no business languishing in obscurity as it ranks alongside Blake and Christie's Christmas mysteries as one of the best of its kind. A richly-plotted detective novel with the customary body in Santa Claus costume and a whole array of bizarre clues as slippery as red herrings, which range from a track of footprints to a toppled snowman to a parcel of mince-pies sewn in the upholstery of an armchair – which enough to make Superintendent Culley wonder if he's going balmy. A fun and unexpectedly excellent Golden Age mystery. One that's going to be fun revisiting in a few years time.
"The Christmas Bear" (1990) by Herbert Resnicow
Just like the first entry on this list, Resnicow's short story "The Christmas Bear" is not the most intricate, deviously-plotted yuletide puzzle, but it's a heartwarming story fully embracing the spirit of Christmas – taking place during a fundraiser in a poor neighborhood. A little girl needs a liver transplant and the neighborhood is trying to raise the money, which is why Miz Sophie Slowinski taker her great-grand daughter, Deborah, to the toy auction at the local firehouse. Deborah falls in love with a very odd, funny looking teddy bear. However, the bear disappears, presumably stolen, but how could it have been taken from the top shelf without collapsing the whole rickety, shaky structure? Yes, plot-wise, "The Christmas Bear" is very light bordering "Every Day Life Mystery," but, to quote Mike Grost, "every part of the story is developed with rich detail in the Van Dine School tradition." Simply a perfect little Christmas mystery.
Mom Meets Her Maker (1990) by James Yaffe
A radical departure from the conventional, British country house mysteries of previous entries or the seasonal whimsy of Resnicow and Véry. Yaffe does the murder around Christmastime the American way! Very loud, punctuated by the sound of gunshots. It all begins with a dispute over the Christmas decorations of Reverend Chuck Candy, a veritable light show complete with sound installation blasting holiday jingles, which devolves into murder rife with small town politics, religious strife and a dying message. A better Ellery Queen-style Christmas mystery than Ellery Queen's The Finishing Stroke (1958).
Original Sin (1991) by Mary Monica Pulver
If you, like me, can't help but shudder at modern mysteries advertised as loving send ups of the classic, snowed-in country house mystery at Christmas, rest assured. Pulver's Original Sin is not a tangle of poorly dome, often mishandled cliches and tropes presented as a clever, humorous take on the snowed-in gathering at Christmas – rudely interrupted by murder. I don't want to give too much away, but the plot-patterns emerging from this story are both original and very pleasing. Like the modern crime novel is performing a synchronized dance routine with the ghost of the Golden Age detective around the Christmas tree. So a modern-ish country house mystery that actually has something to say and new to add to what came before.
"La marchande de fleurs" ("The Flower Girl," 2000) by Paul Halter
I need to reread "The Flower Girl" and refresh my memory, but remember being convinced the story would become a staple of future impossible crime-themed anthologies. This time, the impossibilities concern physical evidence for the existence of Santa Claus. Evidence that would implicate Santa Claus in the murder of a Scrooge-like figure trying to ruin Christmas for a 12-year-old girl. A slightly darker, shorter, but better plotted, take on Véry's fairy tale-like The Murder of Father Christmas.
"The Miracle on Christmas Eve" (2016?) by Szu-Yen Lin
This story appears to have become a fan favorite shortly after its English translation was collected in John Pugmire and Brian Skupin's The Realm of the Impossible (2017), which rivals the disgustingly warm, sugary sweet content of Resnicow's "The Christmas Bear." Meng-Hsing Ko was raised by his kindhearted, widowed father who wanted to give him good, carefree childhood and instilled in him a believe in goodness – including a genuine believe in the existence of Santa Claus. That painted a target on his back in school, but his father invited the bullies over for a sleepover on Christmas Eve to prove Santa Claus is real. A sleepover ending with a sack of presents appearing as by magic inside a locked, closely guarded room and the children seeing the silhouette of Santa Claus flying across the sky in his sleigh. Years later, the now adult Ko asks the detective Ruoping Lin how his father managed to pull off a miracle like that. Only thing this story needed was "A Message from the Heart," as opposed to "A Challenge to the Reader," giving the reader to option to stop reading and keep the miracle in tact.
"Het huis dat ongeluk bracht" ("The House That Brought Bad Luck," 2018) by Anne van Doorn
This short story by M.P.O. Books, writing as "Anne van Doorn," has another interpretation of the Christmas tradition of telling ghost stories. The setting is a gated villa, somewhere in Oosterbeek, haunted by the ghost of a Nazi soldier who died there during Operation Market Garden. The current owner believes her ex-husband is behind the revived haunting and hires two private investigators, Robbie Corbijn and Lowina de Jong, to put a stop to paranormal activity. Corbijn is present at the villa, on Christmas Eve, to witness the apparent supernatural, inexplicable phenomena first hand. I called it a snowfall of impossible crime material. So "The House That Brought Bad Luck" is the kind of short story Hake Talbot would have written had he been around today.
The Christmas Miracle Crimes (2023) by A. Carver
This final, most recently published entry takes a novel-length approach to the snowfall of impossibilities at Christmas and upped the ante to brings a Christmas mystery like no other before. Alex Corby and her great-aunt Cornelia find themselves stranded at Whitefell Chimneys, a valley mansion somewhere in the middle of nowhere, which is conventional enough, but the mansion is invaded by a shotgun carrying Santa Claus who disappeared up the chimney – leaving behind a body in a locked room. This is only one of many, many Christmas-themed impossible crimes, locked room murders and attempted murder, eight in total, littering this ambitious holiday mystery. A holiday mystery in which Christmas is an integral part of the plot and not merely background decoration. Just take your time reading and digesting this delicious, rich plum pudding of a Christmas mystery novel.
Five Honorable Mentions: Moray Dalton's The Night of Fear (1931), Clifford Witting's Catt Out of the Bag (1939), Georgette Heyer's Envious Casca (1941), Francis Duncan's Murder at Christmas (1949) and Cyril Hare's An English Murder (1951).
And Two Dishonorable Mentions: I gave a seasonal twist to the title of this post, which is technically incorrect, because this should be The Nice List. The Naughty List simply sounds better for a best-of list of mystery novels than The Nice List. That and an accurate naughty list would only have two entries, Mavis Doriel Hay's The Santa Klaus Murder (1936) and Gilbert Adair's The Act of Roger Murgatroyd (2006). One is deadly dull and the other insultingly bad. A lump of coal in both their stockings!
The Hit Lists:
Top 10 Favorite Reprints from Dean Street Press
Top 10 Fascinating World War II Detective Novels
Top 10 Favorite Cases from Motohiro Katou's Q.E.D. vol. 1-25
Top 10 Non-English Detective Novels That Need to Be Translated
Top 10 Works of Detective Fiction That Have Been Lost to History
Top 5 Intriguing Pieces of Impossible Crime Fiction That Vanished Into Thin Air
Top 10 Best Translations & Reprints from Locked Room International
Hare's An English Murder is one of my very favorite Christmas mysteries. Not sure just why, but it is.
ReplyDeleteI need to reread An English Murder, which is why it only got an honorable mention, but remember enjoying it.
DeleteDead Men's Morris, by Gladys Mitchell. Reprinted as Death Comes at Christmas, just as Groaning Spinney has been disgracefully retitled Murder in the Snow.
ReplyDeleteChesterton’s "Flying Stars".
Innes' There Came Both Mist and Snow.
Yeah, it would have been better if they had just giving those reprints subtitles like "A Christmas Mystery" and "A Winter Mystery." I'll place There Came Both Mist and Snow on the list for next year.
DeleteNice list. I wish that Pierre Véry book was easier to find. It is a scarce one.
ReplyDeleteI like Pulver's "Original Sin" and Carver's "The Christmas Miracle Crimes" very much. Speaking of A. Carver, I just ordered the new book in that series, "The Dry River Drownings" and look forward to its impossible crimes.
Scarce? There are 67 copies for sale on ABE!
DeleteYes - I see those, but I want the Alan Grimes English translation.
DeleteCopies of the English translation were rare, and over priced, years ago, but even that has dried up now. Time for a reprint. Glad you still got to enjoy Original Sin and expect my review of The Dry Diver Drownings later this month.
Delete