Give Me Death (1934) by Isabel Briggs Myers

Last year, Chosho Publishing reprinted Murder Yet to Come (1929/30) and Give Me Death (1934) by the co-creator of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, Isabel Briggs Myers, whose debut earned her a controversial $7500 cash prize in a writing contest – originally won by Ellery Queen's The Roman Hat Mystery (1929). A decision that was overturned when the organizer, New McClure's Magazine, folded and absorbed into a women's magazine called The Smart Set.

Between her first and last novel, Briggs Myers worked on a three-act stage play, "Death Calls for Margin" (1931), starring her two detective characters, Peter Jerningham and John MacAndrew. Not much can be found online about "Death Calls for Margin," except for a notice from the April 21, 1931, publication of the Swarthmore Phoenix offering a tantalizing glimpse. "Death Calls for Margin" takes place in Philadelphia "just after the stock market crash" with "two of the same characters in Mrs. Myers' book making their reappearance." Another scrap of information (PDF) reveals Myers was part of the original cast ("Author Convincing in One of Leading Roles") and a copyright notice describes it "a murder mystery in 8 acts." Possibly the play has a longer and shortened version intended for smaller venues. Would love to take a look at it!

Three years later, Briggs Myers published her second, and last, novel-length mystery novel. While obscure and practically unknown today, Give Me Death continues to be dogged by controversy and some interesting, but mixed, reactions.

Curt Evans reviewed Give Me Death, back in 2012, praising its "exceptional virtues" ("...pulling off some Christie-Carr level slight of hand...") and noting Briggs Myers was a better writer, trickier plotter and better at creating characters than S.S. van Dine – on whom she modeled her detective novels. Curt also pointed out the book has a notable failing likely to run some readers today the wrong way. This notable failing has been hanging around the book like a millstone as Stephen Pierce chimed in on the comments saying Give Me Death "is already kind of an in-joke on the Honkaku Discord, mostly just referred to as the racist book" based on a spoiler from her Wikipedia page. I thought that was too hasty a dismissal. Only for Scott to enter the comments with a book report admitting "the whodunit and reversal at end were clever," but the "over the top histrionics that trigger the events ridiculous" leaving a bad taste. Add to this a contemporary review calling Give Me Death the very best in then recent mystery fiction and became more than a little curious. Curious enough to snatch up the reprint.

Give Me Death is once again narrated by John MacAndrew, "Mac" for short, who's the personal secretary and occasional Watson to famous playwright and sometimes amateur detective, Peter Jerningham. The story finds them putting the finishing touches to the manuscript of Jerningham's latest stage play when they receive two visitors.

One of these visitors is young Stephen Darneil, of the Darneil dynasty, who looks like a corpse and came to Jerningham for help, because his father is dying with a bullet in his brain – which poses an unusual problem. Gordon Darneil, head of the Prudential Trust, has an impeccable reputation, personally and professionally. His bank "had proceeded on its conservative way unshaken by crash or panic," because it "had nothing to apologize for." There appears to have been no reason why a perfectly healthy, financially secure and morally upstanding man looking forward to the marriage of his two children suddenly decide to pick up a gun to shoot himself. Stephen believes his father shot himself and the idea frightens him, which is why asked Jerningham to either hush it up or find a different answer. However, the physical evidence irrefutably points towards suicide with the investigation quickly turning on the question what, or whom, drove him to take his own life.

They know Gordon Darneil received some kind of disturbing news or unsettling information, which completely changed his mood and ended in suicide. Gordon Darneil is not the last of his family to do the same upon learning that dark, dreadful secret.So the premise of Give Me Death has a wrinkle of originality in setting up 1930s detective novel investigating a suicide rather than a murder and "Chapter XI: The Last Motive" even has a short lecture on suicide motives – listing all the reasons from A to K. Briggs Myers honestly tried to deliver on the premise with twisty ending. Something that might have worked had it not been for everything between the opening and closing chapters.

Firstly, there's that dark, all-consuming dreadful secret driving the Darneils to an early grave. Conceptually, the premise works with an idea, a hazardous information, which in 1934 was ahead of its time. Not what generally passes for dangerous information in crime fiction, but something like a domestic version of Roko's Basilisk. It could have made for something truly special had the secret not been so ridiculous to the point where it aged into a parody. I mean, they eventually find a letter from Gordon divulging the dreaded secret and honest to God opens with this dryly stated, unintentionally hilarious line (SPOILER/ROT13), “vg unf orra cebirq gb zr orlbaq ubcr bs dhrfgvba gung gurer vf va zl irvaf n fgenva bs Arteb oybbq.” That line caught me off guard and just cackled like a long-lost demented relative of the Darneils, holy shit! Secondly, the incredibly annoying, over the top histrionics of the Darneils to this secret, but that even turned into a parody of itself. As if the secret had activated the self-destruct mode on a bunch of Manchurian candidates. Like a Monty Python sketch! Thirdly, Jerningham doesn't shine at all as a detective here. On the contrary.

Brigg Myers tried to pull everything together by the end and there's a rather brilliant line, hidden somewhere in this mess, doubling as a tell-tale clue, but it's too little too late. Not to mention that the convoluted twisting and turnings of the plot happen so late into the proceedings, it's simply hasn't enough room nor time to make it work effectively. So everything to make a good, even original, detective story were present, but the executions of those ideas ended up being a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Give Me Death closed the book on Briggs Myers stint as a detective novelist, but would have liked to see if she could have rebounded. I noted in the review of Murder Yet to Come how it reminded me of the work of two other female Van Dinean mystery writers, namely Harriette Ashbrook and "Roger Scarlett" (Dorothy Blair and Evelyn Page), who also started out as Van Dinean imitators – e.g. Ashbrook's The Murder of Cecily Thane (1930) and Scarlett's The Beacon Hill Murders (1930). Ashbrook would go on to originate a now worn-out, but then startling new, trope in The Murder of Sigurd Sharon (1933) and Scarlett's final novel, In the First Degree (1933), severed itself from its Van Dinean roots. You can see elements of both in Give Me Death in trying to do something different within the Van Dinean detective story. Yes, it was poorly conceived, poorly done, poorly executed, aged poorly and many today would argue it was done in poor taste. I'm just curious if she could have rebounded from it and at least returned to the level of her first novel. But as it stands, I agree with Scott that Murder Yet to Come is the superior detective novel and the one for which Briggs Myers should be remembered. So don't let the not undeserved reputation of Give Me Death dissuade you from reading it.

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

Isabel Briggs Myers was an American author and psychological theorist who co-created the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), which is one of the most popular, widely-used personality tests and her most lasting claim to fame – not what she should be remembered for. In 1928, Briggs Myers entered a writing competition organized by New McClure's Magazine and Frederick A. Stokes Company. A contest that was not without controversy as the original winners were the cousins Frederic Dannay and Manfred B. Lee with their first "Ellery Queen" novel, The Roman Hat Mystery (1929), but then the magazine folded and was absorbed by a publication with a largely female readership, The Smart Set. They reversed the original decision and declared Briggs Myers' Murder Yet to Come (1929/30), which netted her a $7,500 ($137,521 in 2024) cash award and a publishing contract. Not to mention a lucrative publishing contract and serialization rights.

John Norris, of Pretty Sinister Books, wrote about "The Enigma of the New McClure's Mystery Contest" and pointed out the 1995 CAPT reprint of Murder Yet to Come had no business claiming Briggs Myers bested Queen, "the contest was judged twice by two different magazine staffs" and "essentially, the two authors both won." And, as John noted, Briggs Myers got the money, but Dannay and Lee the fame. So that begs the question: how good is Murder Yet to Come compared to its co-winner? The book that launched the American detective story better known as Ellery Queen.

Murder Yet to Come didn't spawn a long-running series and franchise, nor is it as well remembered today among mystery fans, but not an entirely unknown, forgotten detective novel either – which has been on the radar of locked room fans for years. The book is listed in Robert Adey's Locked Room Murders (1991) and John wrote an enticing review back in 2012 praising its combination of psychological elements with fair play detective work to create "an engrossing, lively and very smart mystery novel" ("...she would've given Ellery Queen and Philo Vance a run for their money"). Murder Yet to Come was not even all that scarce when it came to available copies. Just that those copies usually came with ridiculous price tags.

Fortunately, Chosho Publishing reprinted a paperback edition of the book last March. Their edition makes for a perfectly serviceable reading copy, but the presentation looks cheap and bush league. Not just the wonky "come" in the title on the front cover. The back cover and spine were left entirely black, which makes it a bit overpriced for what's nothing more than a cheap looking reprint edition. However, Murder Yet to Come is one of the connoisseur's items on my specialized locked room wishlist and ended up parting with twenty euros like a fleeced mark in a con game. Well played, Chosho Publishing. You went straight for my Achilles heel, but you can only do that once and I dare you to attempt it again with any of the other items on the big list. You'll find that the second time arou... hold on a second... they also reprinted Clyde B. Clason's The Fifth Tumbler (1936)?!? All right, well, let's move on then.

Murder Yet to Come, originally serialized in The Smart Set from August 1929 to January 1930, belongs to the Van Dine-Queen School ("...a lively taste for S.S. van Dine"). Coincidentally, the story has a passing resemblance to Van Dine's The Scarab Murder Case (1930), but, considering their publishing history, it's unlikely one influenced the other as Van Dine's novel was serialized in The American Magazine around the same time Murder Yet to Come appeared in The Smart Set.

The story's narrator is John MacAndrew, "Mac" for short, who's the secretary and friend to a famous playwright, Peter Jerningham, known for critical acclaimed plays like "Butter Side Down," "Storm" and "Challenge" – something critics never heard about was his sideline as an amateur detective. Most notably, those three terrifying days and nights at Cairnstone House as Jerningham tried to find a solution to the seemingly impossible murder of Malachi Trent.

Murder Yet to Come begins on the evening of Armistice Day, 1928, when Jerningham is
meeting up with his old comrade-in-arms, ex-Sergeant Carl Nilsson, who's currently a top homicide detective of the Philadelphia police. While the three men are having a meal on the road, they overhear an agitated the phone call ("but where are you sending her? ... But why? ... but..."). The man in question is Heldon Ryker, a business associate of the former copper king, Malachi Trent, who recognizes the playwright and knows of Jerningham's "professional interest in queer situations." So asks him and his friend for help, because what he needs are "two or three stout fellows" to "rescue a lady in distress," Linda Marshall. The 17-year-old niece, ward and captive of the dastardly ex-copper king who has never been allowed to set a step outside the gates of Cairnstone House. Ryker intended to marry and take her away, but Trent has put a stop to it. And promised Ryker he would never see Linda again.

I should note here that Malachi Trent is not your petty, garden variety domestic despot who make everyone around them dance like puppets from their purse strings. Malachi Trent is different. If there was a rogue's gallery of most deserved murder victim in Golden Age detective fiction, Trent would be in it sandwiched between Mary Gregor and Quentin Trowte. A nice touch to his despicable evilness is appearing in Mac's fever dream as shoots pass him in the void and shouting with "a cackling laugh that he had leave from the devil to go back to earth and finish a particularly choice bit of evil he had left half done."

So the four white knights go off to the Trent's castle to rescue the princess, but, when the party arrive on the doorstep of Cairnstone House, they hear a crash. And a woman screaming. They batter down the front door to find the library door on the left in a similar state as the front door and three people inside the library. A dazed, confused Linda Marshall and an equally confused David Trent. The young grandson of old Malachi Trent. On the floor, next to a step ladder surrounded by old books and the wreckage of a tall grandfather clock, lay the body of Malachi Trent. Apparently, Trent had tried to get too many books from the top shelf, lost his balance and fell backwards – taking the grandfather clock down with him. A fairly simple, uncomplicated case of accidental death, but Jerningham demonstrates Trent was cleverly murdered. And the whole scene was staged. That creates an interesting and tricky locked room situation.

Linda was the only other person inside the library. She had hidden herself behind a curtain and fallen asleep on the window seat, while David Trent was sitting outside and swears nobody entered or left the library. He kicked down the library door when he heard Linda screaming, which was bolted from the inside. The second door everyone presumed was unlocked turns out to have been nailed shut for some time. Only other person in the room at the time of the crash was Linda. She was hidden behind a curtain and fallen asleep on the bay window seat, while David Trent was sitting outside and swears nobody else came in or out. So things look very grave for Linda and they decide to enter into a conspiracy, of sorts, passing the death off as an accident while investigating the murder privately. All done to protect Linda. There are other things and people to consider than just the curious locked room puzzle.

Two years ago, Malachi Trent went on a trip into the Upper Assam on the edge of the Eastern Himalayas and had financed the theft "an extraordinary ruby," known as the Wrath of Kali, from the Temple of Kali the Destroyer – barely escaping with his life and a bunch of trophies. Like the precious ruby, poison arrows, a statuette of the goddess and a Hindu servant, Ram Singh. Not to mention the bedeviled, acid-tongued housekeeper, Mrs. Ketchum, who in past times would likely have been burned at the stake. So we have a very killable victim found dead in a locked library, a young woman in peril, a cursed gemstone from temple and sinister servants. On the surface, it appears as if Murder Yet to Come is a good ten to twenty years out of date as the plot sounds like something straight out of an early, 1920s mystery novel (e.g. G.E. Locke's The Red Cavalier, 1922), but the Van Dinean treatment freshened up these old, time-worn tropes from the turn-of-the-century. Nor are their presence used for cheap, cop-out explanations. Although I had my doubts at one point in the story.

Linda's behavior and mental state comes under closer scrutiny, when the unwelcome plot device of hypnosis rears its ugly head. I always cringe every time hypnosis comes up in a detective story, because it's something that belongs on the pages of a lurid, third-rate pulp thriller. Not in a proper detective novel. When it turns up and used in earnest, it rarely fails to cheapen or completely ruin the story. Fair is fair, Murder Yet to Come is the exception that proves the rule. Briggs Myers inserted and handled the hypnosis sub-plot with consummate skill not often found in a debuting mystery writer. She even used hypnosis to prove hypnosis played no role in murder and exploited by Jerningham to trick the murderer. The scene from the "Chapter XVII: The Scream in the Night" is simply very well done for a scene that could have actually been plucked from the pages of a cheap, third-rate pulp magazine. I'm not easily convinced nor pleased when a mystery, particularly a locked room mystery, tries to sell me on secret passages, booby traps or hypnosis. Briggs Myers and Murder Yet to Come pulled it off.

I should note here that Briggs Myers obviously patterned Murder Yet to Come after Van Dine's Philo Vance series, especially the detection parts, but the book is much more reminiscent and prescience of the female members of the Van Dine-Queen School – like Harriette Ashbrook and "Roger Scarlett" (Dorothy Blair and Evelyn Page). Murder Yet to Come stands a little closer to novels like Scarlett's Murder Among the Angells (1932) or Ashbrook's The Murder of Sigurd Sharon (1933) than Van Dine's The Scarab Murder Case. That and there's more of Spike Tracy about Peter Jerningham than Philo Vance or Ellery Queen. Jerningham is a fun, engaging detective with a sense of humor who explicitly engaged Mac to take his daily duties off his hands by taking those duties out back somewhere and "wring their necks." Not a bad detective either!

The only slight blemish is the passage of time and that Murder Yet to Come is ultimately a very straightforward, surprisingly uncomplicated detective novel. The plot is a cleverly designed, competently put together and fairly clued, but time dulled its ending and barely poses a challenge to the obsessive knowledgeable impossible crime addicts fans of the 2020s. Not the murderer's identity, motive or locked room-trick. However, you can't hold it against Briggs Myers that she didn't foresee nearly a century later a bunch of pesky, know-it-all fan boys would be picking these venerable works apart and added a layer of meta-misdirection. I couldn't help but see through the grand design early on in the story, but as said before, a clever, soundly and fairly clued design. Nothing to the detriment of my enjoyment.

Briggs Myers already knew what she was doing on her first try and would have liked to have seen at least half a dozen Jerningham mysteries, but her career got derailed after her second novel, Give Me Death (1934), was poorly received. The plot sounds fascinating, an epidemic of suicides among the members of a distinguished Southern family, but out-of-print for nine decades and used copies rare or expensive.

After only writing two mysteries, Briggs Myers abandoned the genre and that's certainly our lost. Murder Yet to Come was only her prodigious first stab at the detective story and who knows what she would have gone on to write over the next two, three or four decades. She might not have given Van Dine or Queen a run for their money, but going by Murder Yet to Come, she would at least have given them some stiff competition. A debut with unfilled promise that still comes heartily recommended to every fan of Golden Age mysteries.