A Question of Tempo

"I want to seize fate by the throat."

- Ludwig van Beethoven 

Alfred A.G. Clarke is primarily remembered under his chosen alias, namely "Cyril Hare," which appeared on the cover of several works of popular detective-fiction, but the often overlooked legal career of the author functioned as an obvious repository of inspiration for those stories – having served as both a barrister and a judge.

There are nine novels and a volume of short stories, published over a span of three decades, beginning with Tenant for Death (1937), which introduced Inspector Mallett.

A second series-characters is introduced in Tragedy at Law (1942): a disillusioned barrister, named Francis Pettigrew, who prefers not to clad himself in the mantle of Sherlock Holmes. Luckily for the reader, "Cabot Cove-syndrome" wasn't a diagnosable condition in Pettigrew's days. So he does not have much sway in the matter.

There is, however, an upheaval in the personal life of Pettigrew in the opening of Hare's sixth mystery novel, When the Wind Blows (1949), having transitioned from a middle-aged bachelor to a married man and settled down to "a life of domesticity in the country" – which include being the honorary treasurer to the Markshire Orchestral Society.

It had begun fairly innocently. Pettigrew was called in as a consultant, of sort, to help settle an absurd dispute, but reluctantly became fully involved as a prelude to murder began to softly play in the background.

The first quarter of the plot consists primarily of planning, compiling and squabbling over the content of a concert programme for their annual performance at City Hall, which is done in Hare's elegant, literate style and keen eye for characterization.

You're almost lulled into believing you're actually reading a "novel of character," instead of a detective story, but for an altercation between the solo violinist, Lucy Carless, and a Polish clarinetist, Tadeusz Zbartorowski, which makes the latter bow-out and leaving them to find a last-minute replacement. A substitute is found and the concert does take place, but never reaches its final crescendo. The concert is prematurely cancelled when they stumble across the strangled remains of Lucy Carless backstage!

The task of snarling the responsible party in the death of the solo violinist is basically divided between two "teams" of detectives.

The U.S. title of When the Wind Blows

First of all, there's Detective-Inspector Trimble of the City Division of the Markshire County Constabulary, a young policeman who's "well aware that he had yet to prove himself," accompanied "by an elderly, skeptical sergeant of the old dispensation" named Tate – who are officially in charge of the investigation and they perform most of the legwork. However, Francis Pettigrew is reposed in an armchair and is reluctant "to be drawn into the inquiry," despite having "stumbled on something that had helped to uncover a crime" in the past, but finds himself cattle-probed into action by Chief-Constable MacWilliam.

I really enjoyed the interaction between those two and they're reportedly reunited in That Yew Tree's Shade (1954), but back to the book at hand.

The chapters in which the investigation is being discussed between Chief-Constable MacWilliam and Pettigrew or Trimble show the simplistic complexity of the case, because there aren't any sub-plots to distract from the main problem – which includes such perplexities as an unknown substitute clarinetist taking the place of first substitute during the concert. Who was stranded in a different town by an unknown driver in a stolen car. It's obvious someone slapped together an alibi, but how it was pulled off and by who is different question altogether.

It makes for a trim, streamlined plot with barely an ounce of fat on the story. However, When the Wind Blows suffers from a particular kind of weakness that appears to be a hereditary trait in Hare's work, which is basically grossly overestimating the intelligence of his readers – as the motivation in his books usually hinge on obscure points of law, history or literature. You basically have to be a polymath to solve those aspects of the books, but it's hard not to admire a writing who can tie-together Mozart's Prague Symphony, Charles Dicksens' David Copperfield (1850), a personal specialty of Henry VIII and a question of tempo.

So, all in all, I wouldn't place When the Wind Blows in the same league as Hare classics, such as Suicide Excepted (1939) and An English Murder (1951), but there was a definite effort made to place it there and its author sure came close in doing so.

Finally, in my review of Cold Blood (1952) by Leo Bruce, I commented on the gloomy, post-War atmosphere of the book and "D for Doom" responded as follow: "They still had rationing until 1954" and "the Labor Party wanted rationing to continue forever," which would mean the "future was going to be gray and bleak and dull."

Coincidently, I came across a couple of interesting lines in When the Wind Blows pertaining to these post-war rationings, which I had to share coming so close after reading Cold Blood.

Upon visiting Pettigrew, MacWilliam remarks, "in these days of shortages and rationing, it should be considered perfectly proper for guests to bring with them morsels of tea and sugar and disgusting little packets of margarine for the benefit of their hosts." There's a report on "the fatal stockings" that "had been destined to choke the life out of Lucy Carless," but tracing their purchase proved completely impossible, because "the stocking-starved maids and matrons of Markhampton and the surrounding countryside" had "stampeded into the shop and cleared the place of the first fully-fashioned sheer, superfine nylons that had been seen in the city for many a long month."

Is it just a coincidence I came across these lines so soon after reading Cold Blood or did I always ignore this late-part of the British WWII mysteries? Anyhow, I'll probably back sooner than later with a new review and/or post.

The Last Harvest

"Oh, it's so awful. All those dreadful newspaper headlines! They seem to be positively baying after him, like bloodhounds."

- Freda Ducrow (Leo Bruce's Cold Blood, 1952)

Bruce Montgomery was a composer and conductor who scored a number of British comedies and films, such as the Carry On-series and The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966), but today he is mostly remembered as "Edmund Crispin" – author of nine mystery novels and numerous short stories.

Crispin was among the last wave of traditional, puzzle-oriented mystery writers to emerge from the Golden Era of the genre, which included such luminaries as Christianna Brand and Kelley Roos. Some have even referred to Crispin's series-characters as the Last Golden Age Detective.

The name of this character is Gervase Fen, Professor of English Language and Literature, who made his primary appearance in The Case of the Gilded Fly (1944), which was inspired by the works of his favorite mystery writer – none other than the great John Dickson Carr.

Crispin solidified Fen as genuine prodigy of the Golden Age in such classic and wonderful mystery novels as the farcical The Moving Toyshop (1946) and Swan Song (1947), which is a very Carrian locked room conundrum. The only thing I can bring against them is that I have read practically the entire series before this blog came into existence.

I would've loved to have been able to jotted down and dumped my initial, perhaps overly enthusiastic impressions of this series on here, but the only book that was left unread on my shelves was a posthumous collection of short stories. Most of them short-shorts of no more than 4 or 5 pages.

Fen Country: Twenty-Six Stories (1979) was published a year after Crispin passed away and the stories were harvested from the pages of the London Evening Standard, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine and Winter's Crime – where they originally appeared between the years 1953 and 1969. They're a jumble of series-and standalone stories with a couple of solo-cases for Inspector Humbleby.

So, let's take 'em down from the top!

"Who Killed Baker?" was written in collaboration with fellow composer Geoffrey Bush, who came up with the plot-idea, and stands as one of Crispin's most well-known and successful short stories – partially due to it having been used as padding for several anthologies. It's basically a riddle in story form and its punch line is designed to fool avid mystery readers, which is probably why I have seen it referred to as "an anti-detective story." But I enjoyed it. 

"Death and Aunt Fancy" is one of the better shorts from this collection, in which Fen quite easily solves the smothering-death of an aunt of one of his pupils based on a cryptic remark, "I don’t know why she's doing this," and a hearing aid-device. The main problem with these short-shorts is clueing, but this is not one of them! 

In "The Hunchback Cat," Fen tells a story about the Coping family and their long-standing tradition of parricide. There are only two Copings left when Fen meets them and one of them is soon found inside locked room of a medieval castle tower, but it's not an impossible crime and the final explanation is a let down. The clue of the cat was quite interesting, though. 

"The Lion's Tooth" is what an elderly nun mutters after getting whacked over the head and the daughter of wealthy businessman, Mary, is snatched from the convent. The title functions as a sort of "dying message," but Fen manages to work out its meaning and rescues the girl.

I would qualify "Gladstone's Candlestick" as a locked room mystery and has Fen proving one of his students innocent of theft of a valuable candlestick without having to "postulate any nonsense about duplicate keys," but in order to do so there’s a bit of cheating on the author's side – which is a pity.

"The Man Who Lost His Head" finds Fen involved in the theft of a drawing by Leonardo da Vinci from the study of Sir Gerald McComas and his worst fear is that the drawing is still within the family. I found this to be a rather forgettable story.

"The Two Sisters" retraces some plot-points from "Death and Aunt Fancy," but it's not a rewrite and perfectly stands by itself. A man by the name of Wyndham is an insomniac and recovering from a nervous breakdown, which is why he accepted an offer from aunt to stay at her cottage – miles away from the busy, civilized world. During one of his sleepless nights, Wyndham witnesses something disturbing outside and Fen knows exactly what kind of game is being played. A good and fun story that was reminiscent of the suspense stories by Anthony Gilbert.

"Outrage in Stepney" is a Cold War-type story and only of interest for its linguistic clue involving the German language, President Eisenhower's name ("Eisssenhoer") and some hinting references to the situation in post-World War II England ("just don't start heiling Mosley..."). Why do Cold War stories-and novels so seldom measure up to World War II mysteries in the plotting department?

However, "A Country to Sell" is a story of international intrigue from the mid-1950s, which does live up to its World War II counterparts and even chugs in a locked room mystery for good measure. Christopher Bradbury is a Washington-agent and Oxford graduate who consult Gervase Fen on a delicate, baffling problem which has had far-reaching and deadly consequences. A couple of "months of work collapsed in ruins" after "communicated instructions by phone" leaked out, which were given over a secured line that was "safe from tapping" and received in a room with the door and window "closed and fastened." You can argue that the technical aspect of the solution makes the story dated, but it was a nice surprise following in the footsteps of the previous story.

"A Case in Camera" is the first solo-appearance for Detective-Inspector Humbleby and helps his "wife's sister's husband," Superintendent Pollitt of Munsingham City CID, closing a case of murder during a breaking-and entering of a home. The photographic alibi is interesting in how it relates to the location and time-of-death of the victim, but I couldn't help thinking it was wasted on a written story – because it would've been a nifty trick for TV.

"Blood Sport" is another solo case for Detective-Inspector Humbleby and it's a forensic story touching upon a ballistic-type of problem when the police is confronted with a suspiciously barrel in a shooting death. Yeah, I barely remember this story. So, I probably wasn't too impressed by it.

"The Pencil" is a standout story in the literal sense of the word. It's a hardboiled story treading on the heels of professional killer assigned to infiltrate and neutralize the leader of rival gang, which has to be done by posing as "poisoned bait" – and not everything works out in the end as it was planned. I did not expect this type of hardboiled story from Crispin, but when they're as good as this one I can almost understand why some readers prefer the rough and tumble to the puzzle-oriented stories. Almost!

"Windhover Cottage" is a short-short story featuring Detective-Sergeant Robartes of Scotland Yard, who demolishes an alibi by stumbling to a stock-in-trade mistake amateur murderers often make when employing the use of an automobile – which made for a decent, but not outstanding, story.

I can barely remember anything about "The House by the River," except that neither Fen nor Humbleby were present. The same goes for "After Evensong" except that the murderer was caught on an inconsistency in a statement to the police, which is never a good sign for a detective story. Luckily, quality picks up again with the next couple of stories!

"Death Behind Bars" is proper short story-length and consists of a letter written by an Assistant Commissioner about "what thriller-writers describe as an impossible murder or a locked room mystery," which took place inside a prison cell and the only suspect with a motive lacked the opportunity to administer the poison. The poisoning method in combination with the background of the character, motive and identity of the murderer makes for a cleverly plotted story. I really enjoyed this one for obvious reasons!

As you'll probably deduce from the long-title, "We Know You're Busy Writing, But We Thought You Wouldn't Mind If We Just Dropped In For A Minute" is a humorous story about a crime writer whose patience is slowly eroded by constant interruptions. Crispin was as much as a satirist of detective stories as Leo Bruce, but this is the first story in this collection that really showcased that aspect of his full-length mysteries. A fun and enjoyable story!  

"Cash and Delivery" was a previously unpublished story and another one that proved to be too short and unremarkable to have anchored itself in my short-term memory, which prevents me from saying anything sensible about.

"A Shot in the Dark" reunites Fen and Humbleby as the later tells of a shooting-case in a place called Cassibury Bardwell, which "too big to be village and too small to be a town," and has Crispin's take on Agatha Christie's eternal triangle – and whether this one has a happy ending is debatable.

"The Mischief Done" is one of a handful stories in this collection that's longer than 4 or 5 pages and revolves around 100,000 pounds diamond, called Reine des Odalisques, which snatched from under Humbleby's nose. You can probably put it down to the length of most of the stories here, but the plot didn't appear to justify the "length" of this rather average story.

"Merry-Go-Round" is a fun, anecdotal story told by Humbleby to Fen about Detective-Inspector Snodgrass, the Yards "expert on literary forgeries," but "far from being an amiable character" – who offended a newspaper baron and book-collector with enough money and his own printing press to take the piss out of the forgery expert. A good combination of the author's cleverness and sense of humor!

"Occupational Risk" has Gervase Fen suggesting a psychological test to fret out the person who left a body underneath a coffin in a freshly dug grave.

"Dog in the Night-Time" has another one of Fen's pupils asking the professor for help and Anne Cargill's problem pertains to yet another stolen diamond, which her late-father purchased and was probably pinched by the estate-executor or her uncle. Fen uses a Sherlockian principle to sniff out a clue and the use of dust in this story makes up for its unfair use in the candlestick story earlier in this collection.

Words of caution from the Crime-Composer

Detective-Inspector Humbleby observes in "Man Overboard" how "writers of fiction get very heated and indignant about blackmail," but the "death of a known blackmailer is a great event" for the police, because a number of unsolved cases can be tidied up "by a quick run through the deceased's papers" – sometimes even murder cases. Humbleby tells a pretty good and strong story of a nearly undiscovered, unsolved murder to illustrate his claim, but it also drove home the point of fiction writers that the only good blackmailer is a dead one. Either way, it's a good story.

"The Undraped Torse" has Gervase Fen solving the problem of a man who has problem with his face being photographed, but broke an expensive camera when a picture was being taken of his lower body. A pretty meh-story.

"Wolf!" is about the shooting of a rich, practical joker while he was on the phone with his son and there are only two suspects, both of his sons, but they are both in possession of a cast-iron alibi – which revolves around old-fashioned kind of telephone. But so does the solution. By the way, I'm sure I have read an extremely similar short story from another writer, but I can't remember where or by whom. Any help?

Well, that's all of them and I'll finish this overlong review here by saying Fen Country is the usual mixed bag of tricks, which is nearly always the case with short stories. But the good ones made it worth the journey and I'll guess this is as good an excuse as any to re-read some of the full-length Gervase Fen mysteries.

With a Hint of Gloom

"Alice soon came to the conclusion that it was a very difficult game indeed."

- Lewis Carroll ("The Queen's Croquet-Ground," from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, 1865)

"Leo Bruce" was the penname of Rupert Croft-Cooke, who authored a series of inventive, tongue-in-cheek parodies of the detective story starring a ginger mustached, beer guzzling and pub-sports loving village constable turned private-investigator – the inimitable Sgt. Beef.

Cold Blood (1952) is the seventh and last full-length case Lionel Townsend recorded for Sgt. Beef, which ended the series with a dramatic finish and a wink.

Townsend observes in the opening chapter how the Ducrow-case seemed to have changed Sgt. Beef. The "old chuckle was still heard at times," but their meddling at the "gloomy house" with its "overpowering atmosphere of watchfulness and evil" left its marks on the psyche of the sergeant – becoming more earnest and "a little bit afraid."

However, in spite of its serious coating, the story is plaided with usual humorous remarks and comedic references. When they first read about the Ducrow affair in the newspaper, Townsend remarks Beef needs "a great deal more than successful detection" to be a famous detective. He must stand out and be different. Which can be accomplished by simply resembling a crocodile every couple of pages, "like Mrs. Bradley," or "talk like a peer in an Edwardian farce" like Lord Peter Wimsey.

A similar, wonderful conversation takes place between Beef and his client, Theo Gray, who engages him to find the murderer of Cosmo Ducrow, but the sergeant wants to know why he came to him and wanting the best man for the job isn't accepted as an answer – because there are some better known and better written up detectives than Beef. 

Well, the answer is that Hercule Poirot "was engaged on another case," Albert Campion was "not interested" and a rejection from Beef would've put Gray on "on the phone to Inspector French." It's passages like these that helped Bruce in becoming a fan-favorite, because mystery geeks love reading this type of genre-related, referential-type of humor.

Anyhow, Beef and Townsend learn that Cosmo Ducrow was "worth half a million," which he inherited from his father, but was described as a neurotic, hermit-like recluse – who was "shy to the point of misanthropy."

Ducrow buried himself in a small, Kentish village in a gloomy-looking, Georgian house surrounded by a small, but trusted, circle of intimates. There is a younger wife, Freda, who used to be his nurse. A nephew, Rudolf, alongside with his wife and Theo Gray is a long-time, live-in friend and there's a Major Gulley – who's in charge of running the estate. The group of rounded out by the servants and one of them is a murderer.

One early morning, Cosmo's body is found near the croquet lawn with the back of his head pulverized and besides him lay a croquet mallet, which "had been used to give him three or four terrible blows." The evidence and local police favor Rudolf as the murderer, which adds a hint of doom to the already present gloom.  

Initially, Sgt. Beef barrages the facts and people in the case with his typical, blunt approach and "cryptic statements" that "only grow more obscure" upon questioning, but soon comes to the conclusion that more than his reputation is at stake on how he handles the case. 

The case comes to a conclusion on a tension-filled evening when Beef arrives drunk and too late for an appointment at the Ducrow-home, which ends in a deadly rendez-vous on the rooftop of the house and the scene will give fans of Jonathan Creek and Sherlock a serious case of déjà-vu. Well, now I know where the idea for this gambit originated.

Anyhow, what's even more interesting than the ensnarement of the murderer is the classical nature of the solution, clues and, generally, how the entire plot hang together.

Cold Blood was penned and published in the twilight years of the Golden Age, but Bruce even included a "Challenge to the Reader," which states that Townsend had "scrupulously told the reader all Beef knew" and how "the reader may like to try his hand at finding the answers to the puzzle" – without resorting to "cheating" or "reading or looking into the remaining chapters."

During the first half of Cold Blood, I suspected Bruce was, as they say in England, taking the micky out of S.S. van Dine, but he was actually tipping his bowler hat at his brethren across the pond.

So, all in all, Cold Blood is a very accomplished, classically-styled mystery that harked back to the best from the 1930-and 40s and a better send-off than some of Beef's more well-known and famous colleagues, who had "been written up better," received. Recommended! 

The Locked Room Reader II: An Overview

"The idea is there, locked inside, and all you have to do is remove the excess stone."

- Michelangelo (1475-1564)

This is going to be a filler post in commemoration of the two-hundredth post tagged as a "locked room mystery," which is a poorly contrived excuse to ramble about the impossible crime stories I previously rambled about on this blog. So it's basically the blog-post equivalent of a clip show episode. Enjoy!

In late February of 2011, I began this blog and Christianna Brand's Death of Jezebel (1948) was the first review to be tagged as a locked room mystery. The plot is as clever as it complex and deals with the onstage murder during a reenactment of a medieval pageant by a seemingly invisible assailant. It was an extremely scare and coveted collectors items for decades, but was finally brought back into circulation by Mysterious Press in 2013 – as a modern ebook. I heartily recommend it, because Death of Jezebel stands alongside Green for Danger (1944) as a fine example of Brand's craftsmanship.

The explanation for an impossible problem can be tricky, complex and sometimes result in an over complicated, unconvincing answer – which has often invited comments along the lines of "oh, that could never happen in real-life." Over the past several years, I compiled five filler-posts with real-life examples of the locked room mystery intruding upon reality. Some of them are practically pre-written cases waiting for a mystery writer to commit them to paper. You can find all five parts here: I, II, III, IV and V.

I have accumulated a number of lists over the past four years and two of the most popular blog-posts in this category are "My Favorite Locked Room Mysteries I: The Novels" and "My Favorite Locked Room Mysteries II: Short Stories and Novellas," which are constant occupants of best read blog-posts – a list that can be found on your right under the header Most Consulted Dossiers This Week.

In contrary to these best-of lists, I threw together one entitled "The Reader is Warned: A List of My Least Favorite Locked Room Mysteries." It's a shorter selection of novels that include Joseph Bowen's abysmal The Man Without a Head (1933), Randall Garrett's overrated Too Many Magicians (1967) and Gilbert Adair's The Act of Roger Murgatroyd (2006) – an atrocity comparable only to the horrors of trench-warfare from WWI.

Obviously, the television-and movie format of the detective story have been grossly neglected on this blog, but their under-representation is mainly due to barely watching any TV-and movie mysteries anymore. I used to watch quite a few of them, but have become increasingly frustrated with them over the years and you can't re-watch Columbo for eternity.

Nevertheless, I was able to work my way through a couple of episodes from various TV-series and the occasional mystery movie, which, to absolutely nobody's surprise, were by and large locked room mysteries. I reviewed Columbo Goes to the Guillotine (1989) that deals with two impossible scenarios: a decapitated illusionist in a locked, upper-floor apartment room and a remote-viewing trick – which the lieutenant wonderfully replicates in order to pad out the episode. So, yes, that part is padding, but good padding. I mean, it's Columbo giving a sound and logical explanation for an apparently genuine demonstration of supernatural powers, under test-conditions, at a highly secure location. What's not to love about that?

I've also reviewed a handful of episodes from Colonel March of Scotland Yard, under the post-title "Miraculous Shades of Black and White," which was a TV-series based on the short stories from John Dickson Carr's The Department of Queer Complaints (1940) – published under the byline of "Carter Dickson." I have also several reviews from the locked room-series Jonathan Creek, but they're mainly review of the poorly written, abominably plotted episodes from the final season. So I'd recommend my review of Time Waits for Norman (1998) and the best-of list posted in anticipation of the disappointment that buried the series.

Occasionally, I produce a filler-ish post that contains some particles of substance, which are rare, but they do occur from time-to-time. A case can be made this was the case with a post entitled "The Sealed Room: A Literal Stronghold," in which I touch upon the many death certificates issued to our beloved genre and an essay titled "The Locked Room: An Ancient Device of the Story-Teller, But Not Dead Yet." My conclusion is that we keep coming back because Edgar Allan Poe buried a soft, thumping organ beneath the floorboards of the locked room mystery when he invented the genre in his 1841 short story known as "The Murders in the Rue Morgue."

"Sealed Rooms and Ghoulish Laughter" is an overview of primarily short stories paying tribute or parodying my favorite mystery writer, John Dickson Carr, who's primarily known as the undisputed Master of the Locked Room Mystery – covering such classics as William Krohn's "The Impossible Murder of Dr. Satanus" and William Brittain's "The Man Who Read John Dickson Carr."

Speaking of the "Grand Master," I've read most of his best and most well-known novels and short stories, before I began to blog, which resulted in namedropping him more than posting actual reviews. It's something that needs to be fixed in the future, but I did cobble together a few, unworthy reviews of some of his classics: The Judas Window (1938), The Emperor's Snuff-Box (1942), She Died a Lady (1943), The Bride of Newgate (1950) and Fire, Burn! (1957). 

Of course, Carr is an old favorite of mine, but I made some new, excellent discoveries over the past few years.

I had been aware of Bill Pronzini in short story form, but it wasn't until 2011 I began to read his full-length novels about the "Nameless Detective," which is a series containing two of my all-time favorite locked room mysteries – Hoodwink (1981) and Scattershot (1982). They're a pair of interconnecting stories that strung together no-less than five impossible crimes and demonstrates the locked room trope can be as much at home in a contemporary, gritty environment as in the stately homes of the 1930s. Pronzini drove this point home a third time in Bones (1985), which is an exceedingly dark and brooding story with a locked room murder in the distant past and a pile of bones being revealed by an earthquake. I recommend all three of them without hesitation.

On a lighter note, over the past couple of years, Pronzini and Marcia Muller has been collaborating on a series of historical mysteries about a pair of late-1800s gumshoes, which all include one or more seemingly impossible situation. There are three titles to date: The Bughouse Affair (2013), The Spook Lights Affair (2013) and The Body Snatchers Affair (2014).

Herbert Resnicow is still one of my favorite discoveries, because he brought an entirely new perspective to the genre from his previous career as a civil engineer and constructed locked room mysteries on a completely new scale. Large, open spaces inside enormous buildings were sealed as tight as your stock-in-trade bolted bedroom or locked study. This also have rise to a couple of unique set-ups with one-of-a-kind explanations, which are especially exemplary in The Gold Deadline (1984) and The Dead Room (1987). The only downside is that he wrote so few of them!

Finally, as far as new discoveries are concerned, I should mention historian and prolific writer of historical mysteries, namely Paul Doherty, of whom I learned through In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel – and have been hooked ever since. I particularly enjoyed the cheekily plotted The Spies of Sobeck (2008) and The Mysterium (2010), which had a very Carrian atmosphere with two seemingly impossible crimes.

On the international market, John Pugmire has been doing yeoman's work in gathering locked room novels from across the globe and translate them for an English-speaking reading audience. The catalogue of Pugmire's independent publishing-house has a swelling list of Paul Halter novels, but also contains the Carrian homage L'enigme du Monte Verita (The Riddle of Monte Verita, 2007) by Jean-Paul Török and Yukito Ayatsuji's Jakkakukan no satsujin (The Decagon House Murders, 1987) – which, technically, isn’t a locked room mystery. But that shouldn't spoil the fun. 

To my own surprise, I also found a handful of locked room mysteries from my own backyard and some of them were very decent: Willy Corsari's De voetstappen op de trap (Footsteps on the Stairs, 1937), Cor Docter's Koude vrouw in Kralingen (Cold Woman in Kralingen, 1970) and M.P.O. Books' Een afgesloten huis (A Sealed House, 2013). You can find more about Dutch-language locked room stories on this page, but it’s in dire need of an update.

Well, I'm halfway through a third wall of text, which really tells nothing more than I already did in the individual blog-posts I linked to. So this post is really proving itself a waste of time, but I might as well finish it now and run down some of the novels reviewed on here – because they make up the bulk of the locked room label.

Roman McDougald's The Blushing Monkey (1953) and Helen McCloy's Mr. Splitfoot (1968) belong to a rare strain of miracle crimes, because the problems being tackled within their respective pages revolve around unlocked rooms. However, they're still locked room mysteries, but you have to read for yourself how they managed to pull that off. It goes almost without saying that McCloy's book is absolutely brilliant.

Plot-wise, Zelda Popkin's Dead Man's Gift (1941) and Beverley Nichols' The Moonflower (1955) have one only one thing in common: the ending of both novels reveal one of the deaths to have been an impossible murder all-along. I liked both of them, but the former was definitely superior to the latter. However, they're both worth your time.

In the depart of rare, lesser-known, but excellent, locked room mysteries I would definitely recommend Anthony Wynne's The Silver Scale Mystery (1931), W. Shepard Pleasants' The Stingaree Murders (1932) and Theodore Roscoe's Murder on the Way (1935).

However, its not just full-length, locked room novels I have read and reviewed, but also the occasional short story and short story collections. I should begin with mentioning The Curious Cases of Cyriack Skinner Grey (2009) by Arthur Porges, which almost entirely consist of impossible problems solved by a wheelchair-bound scientist. They're pretty good and amusing stories that deserve to be better known.

Earlier this year, I wrote a seven-part review of a nine-hundred-page anthology, The Black Lizard Big Book of Locked Room Mysteries (2014), which could all be read by clicking here. I didn't cover every single story in that mammoth anthology, because I had read a significant portion of them before, but I think seven separate posts is reviewing doing some justice to nearly thousand pages worth of impossible crime material.

I guess I'll end this dictionary definition of filler by pointing to the review of one of my all-time favorite short stories, "Eternally Yours" by H. Edward Hunsburgen, which was reprinted in The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes and Impossible Mysteries (2006) alongside one of my least favorite stories – "Death and the Rope Trick" by John Basye Price. It's somewhat baffling both shared pages in the same anthology, but it shows an interesting contrast in quality.

Well, I'll end this overlong overview here and apologize for wasting your time, because it really turned out to be nothing more than pointing towards old reviews and blog-posts, but, hopefully, there was something of interest in it. 

I'll try follow up yesterday's review of The Death Angel (1936) by Clyde B. Clason with a regular and proper review as soon as possible.

Death's Sober Lamplighter

"Deep in the forest hideaway,

the outlaws made their getaway.

From the sheriff and his men..."

- Opening theme from The Great Adventures of Robin Hood (1990-92)

Clyde B. Clason was arguably one of the brighter, more gifted pupils from the Van Dine-Queen School of Detection, who wrote ten novels between 1936 and 1941, which starred a genial, mild-mannered professor of history as the series character – namely Theocritus Lucius Westborough.

The books are penned in a literate, old-fashioned style without coming across as pretentious and are stamped with all the hallmarks of the Van Dine-Queen School.

First of all, there's an intelligent, well-educated amateur assisting the official police and they operate on a basis of mutual respect. Secondly, the cases often take place on the upper crust of society, where private collectors dwell, or have an industrial background – which provided Clason with more than enough material to put some meat on the bones of his plots to flavor them. 

The Man from Tibet (1938) and Dragon's Cave (1939) are notable examples of stories revolving around dead collectors and artifact-stuffed private "museums," while Blind Drifts (1937) and Poison Jasmine (1940) are interesting specimens of the industrial mystery novel. The latter is, in fact, excellent!

However, The Death Angel (1936) is a departure from rooms harboring privately owned collections and worlds of cutthroat commerce in favor of an English-style country house mystery.

Westborough has come to the estate of a personal friend, Arnold Bancroft, situated in southern Wisconsin and the place is aptly called "Rumpelstiltzken," because the dark woods surrounding the place reminds one "of a German fairy tale."

The plan of Westborough, author of a "ponderous eight-hundred-page tome" on Emperor Trajan, was a spot of relaxation as a guest of his friend, but the region is being disrupted by several events – such as an escaped convict roaming the area and local authorities being tied up in a grim, slowly escalating milk strike. What's about to happen at the estate are soon added to that list.

Bancroft has received several strange, threatening notes and shows one of them to Westborough. It has a few lines of "block capitals" that were "lettered in crayon" saying Bancroft has been cautioned and should now "beware my sting," which was signed "The Firefly." This note of warning is quickly followed by Bancroft's disappearance and the sound of a gunshot emanating from Bowen's Rock, which has a trail of bloody evidence suggesting someone got shot and was chugged into the river below. However, Bancroft isn't the only person who's missing from the house party. So who got shot and why?

Sheriff Art Bell is engaged with "crazy farmers" who "have burned two trucks," spilled "milk over the road from hell to breakfast" and even attempted "to blow up the bridge on the state highway" – showing French truck drivers how to do a strike properly.

The sheriff is short on manpower, resources and time, but is aware Westborough is the "fellow who straightened out those killings at Hotel Equable" and deputizes the professor to carry on the investigation in his absence. Occasionally popping back into the story when there are new developments.

Westborough has his fair share of clues and plot-threads to sift through, which include a bloody handprint, a missing motorboat, a purloined bow and arrows and a stolen saucepan – as well as sorting out alibis in combination with possible motives. This murder-without-a-body investigation absorbs a good half of the book, before other plot-threads begin to manifest itself.

The missing bow and arrows are used in an attempted murder by "a legendary, chimerical figure," a masked archer, "who had vanished in the forest like a phantom" and the firefly is leaving notes again.

But the best part of the plot commences when Westborough begins to extrapolate on the lightening bugs and poisonous mushrooms, which are the main ingredients of a double murder back at the estate – a crime in which the "odds” were “1,542 to 1 against" the victims "receiving all the poisonous mushrooms through chance and chance alone."

I've been arguing with myself if the overwhelming odds, in combination with the logical explanation, makes it qualify as an impossible crime novel, but I can't sway myself one way or the other.

The Death Angel could just as easily be labeled a (semi-) impossible crime as well as a calculated, but botched, attempt at a perfect murder. I decided to tag it as a "locked room mystery" just for the hell of it.

Well, either way, it's was a clever, involved method providing the book with unusual ending concerning the revelation of the murderer and nicely dovetailed with the previous plot-threads – out of which this one arose naturally. Even though, Clason felt compelled to warn his readers that "such complications" arising from multiple, interwoven plots "seem beyond all bounds of credulity." I really thought it fitted nicely together as well as drawing my attention away from the murderer and was completely out of my depth in explaining the odds, which can be as fun as hitting the bulls-eye.

So, yes, I quite enjoyed The Death Angel and just noticed there are only two left in the series to read, which kind of blows. If you haven't had read Clason yet, I'd recommend picking up the previously mentioned The Man from Tibet or Poison Jasmine.