google-site-verification: googlef64103236b9f4855.html Philly Reader: July 2019

Saturday, July 27, 2019

Three Women in Black by Helen Reilly

Naomi Shane was impatiently waiting for her divorce from her cruel husband Doctor Gilbert Shane. She had spent part of this time with Pamela Crewe who was the fiance of Michael Bonnard,  the son of well to do socialite Irene Bonnard. During that time, Naomi fell in love with Michael. She told no one including Michael because she did not want to upset her friend Pamela. Then Naomi found out that she was expected to attend a fund raising event hosted by Irene, and her husband, Gilbert would be there and would be performing magic tricks to help raise money. When Naomi encountered Gilbert, he told her that he was no longer willing to give her a divorce, and that he intended to send her to a sanitorium until she came to her senses. Gilbert also had photographs of Naomi and Michael together. Naomi was panicked, and afraid of Gilbert, and she could see no reason at all why Gilbert had changed his mind about the divorce.

Then the fund raising performance began, and Gilbert was on the stage alone doing his tricks when he was stabbed in the back and died. The stage lighting for the tricks was set in such a way that anyone wearing black could not be seem. Gilbert had been wearing a white suit, but his assistant was dressed in black. Anyone wearing the assistant's costume could have killed him. Naomi knew that Gilbert had put the envelopes with the photographs into the pocket of his suit jacket. When she got a moment alone with his body, she removed the envelope from his pocket, and found it to be empty.

Inspector McKee was given the case, and he set about interviewing the people present during the magic show. One he could not interview was Gerard Ferris, Naomi's lawyer, who seemed to have completely disappeared. Naomi had been staying with the Bonnards, but she felt that she should return to the apartment she and Gilbert had been living in. Possible here, she could find the photographs. Instead she found another dead body. Inspector McKee would succeed in finding the murderer in this rather tangled plot.

The book was published in 1941 by Helen Reilly.  She was a prolific writer who emphasized police procedure in her books, and was an early writer to do so. Her characters are well off financially and she does mention how all of the women dress. Although this book has a young woman in distress as a main character, the book is not really a had-I-but-know novel. There is some romance but it is not overwhelming. I found the book to be interesting, and I really liked the rather surrealistic cover of this Dell Mapback.


Saturday, July 20, 2019

Dr. Sam Johnson, Detector by Lillian de la Torre


Lillian de la Torre wrote a series of short stories which featured detection by British lexicographer, Dr. Sam Johnson. These stories were, of course, recorded by his biographer, James Boswell. These stories would have taken place during the later years of the 1700's. de la Torre published the stories in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. The first collection of nine of these stories was published as Dr. Sam: Johnson, Detector in 1946. These stories would be part of the very early development of the historical mystery story and the mystery story in which a famous person acts as a detective which are still being written today.

In these stories, Dr. Sam Johnson tackles a variety of crimes. In the story of the "Flying Highwayman", Johnson and Boswell join the blind magistrate Sir John Fielding and together they catch an elusive highwayman. Dr. Johnson proves that a woman who claims to have second sight really doesn't. Lord Monboddo finds a wild boy who has been living in the woods on nuts and berries. Dr. Sam Johnson proves that he is no such thing.  In "Prince Charlie's Ruby" they meet bonnie prince Charlie. In "The Stolen Christmas" box they find a Christmas gift which had been stolen and make a young woman very happy. In the story "The Great Seal of England" Johnson and Boswell recover the great seal which has been stolen from the Lord Chancellor. de la Torre ends the book with a description of how she combined history and fiction with each story.



Wednesday, July 17, 2019

Murdock's Acid Test by George Harmon Coxe

Kent Murdoch and his wife were visiting the island of Barotique while he was taking time off from his job as a newpaper photographer.They were guests of Sir Stanley Bannister, a retired Colonial Service official who had purchased the island after his retirement. They had been invited by Margaret Grant who was Sir Stanley's daughter. The island had a large house for Sir Stanley and his wife, and six smaller cottages for visitors.

Kent and his wife were soon to find that their fellow guests were some really annoying people. There was Carl Anderson and wife flo. Carl was hiding out after carrying out a kidnapping five years before. With them was Joe Endicott, who was wanted for shooting a policeman. Essentially he was acting as Anderson's body guard, and was pretending to be Flo's brother. There were good looking Nigel Porter and his wife Lucy. It was believed that Nigel abused Lucy. Bruce Porter, Nigel's brother, was also there. Hubert Coleman and his wife Nina were in one of the cottages. He was jealous about Nina, and she was afraid on him. Kay Joslin, the niece of Bruce, was there and was in love with Ralph Coleman, the son of Hubert. There were also the Macphersons, a father and daughter, who were East Indians. Sir Stanley didn't like then because he felt that they had rented their cottage under false pretenses. Only whites should have the name Macpherson.


Murdock's visit started off with a bang when Nigel Porter was shot dead in his cottage. When Murdock arrived there he saw Lucy kneeling over the body with a gun in her hand. Sir Stanley Bannister asked Murdock to take over the investigation of the case which he declined pleading a lack of experience. Eventually Murdock accepted, and carefully interview all those on the island. Another death occurred, and Murdock continued his investigations until the solution of the case was found.

This book was published in 1936 and was the second mystery to feature Kent Murdoch. This is not really my favorite kind of mystery novel, and I may be too critical because of this. Murdoch interviews everybody so much that I found the story got rather tedious. The men are tough guys or are weak and wimpy. The women in the story really do not do much and are judged on how attractive they are. They are taken away from the crime scene because it may too much for their womanly eyes. In other words, I do not recommend this book

Monday, July 8, 2019

My Late Wives by Carter Dickson

Roger Bewlay appeared to be a serial killer. He had married Angela Phipps, and a short time later, she disappeared. Two years later, he married Elizabeth Mosnar who later disappeared. Then he took up residence with Andree Cooper who had little money so they did not marry. She also disappeared. Bewley took different name for each of the women he was attached to so he was know as Roger Bewlay, Roger Bowdoin, and Richard Barclay. Chief Inspector Masters was in charge of the investigation but he never found Bewlay and he never found the women either. The police could not investigate any farther if there were no bodies. Then Mister R. Benedict and his wife moved to Torquay. One month later, R. Benedict left Torquay, and Mrs. Benedict disappeared. This time there was a witness who saw R. Benedict and his wife. Miss Lyons was a typist who had done some letters for Benedict, and he had paid her with a bad 10 shilling note. When she returned in the evening to get a good one, she saw the dead body of Mrs. Benedict on the couch through the window. Miss Lyons turned away and left. She told all this to Chief Inspector Masters who thought they would immediately find Roger Bewlay, but after ten years, the police still had not done so.

Now after 10 years, a new approach is taken to this story. Dennis Foster, a young lawyer, goes to see a play and to see his friend, the director, Beryl West. This play was due to close shortly, and the star of the play, the handsome actor Bruce Ransom, was planning to take a month off for rest and relaxation. However, Ransom had received a copy of a new play which seems to present a fictional version of the Roger Bewlay murders. Ransom would not reveal the name of the author. Beryl says that the ending is just not believable, and she does not want to present it. Ransom comes up with the idea of using his month off to go to a small village, pretend to be Roger Bewlay, and make love to a young woman. Beryl and Dennis tell this idea to Chief Inspector Masters and Sir Henry Merrivale. At first, Masters is opposed, but Sir Henry Merrivale says he will not help with the Bewley case unless Masters agrees to Ransom's imposture.

So now it really does get complicated. There are those who believe that Bruce Ransom is carrying out his plan to pretend to be Roger Bewlay, and there are those who believe that Bruce Ransom really is Roger Bewlay and has written the play himself. A dead body shows up and is carefully hidden in a place where people will look at it and not see it. Then there will be a rather dramatic ending which will really tell you who the real Roger Bewlay is.

This book was written in 1946 which makes it one of the later John Dickson Carr books.

Monday, July 1, 2019

Prescription for Murder by Hannah Lees

Caroline Faine, director of nursing at City Hospital, lay seriously ill from her diabetes. The best doctors in the hospital were at her bed side. They had done the best that they could do, but it seemed impossible to control her blood sugar level. When a new type of insulin was given, the blood sugar would go down, but then it would go up again. Finally nothing seemed to work,  and Caroline Faine died in a diabetic coma. All of the hospital staff was quite upset by this death.

Young intern, Cyrus Harvey was quite perturbed by this case. He acquired a bottle of the insulin which was last given to her. He tasted, it and it had no taste. He took it to the hospital laboratory for tests. The bottle they tested proved to be insulin, but Cyrus found that the bottle that he had given for the test had been removed and another had been substituted in its place. Cyrus went to Dr. Elliott, the director of the hospital, with his suspicions about Caroline's death, but the director would not listen to him. Cyrus also had suspicions about Dr. Willoughby, his chief at the hospital and a doctor whom Cyrus really admired.

Cyrus tells his suspicions to Sally Pepper, who is the Social-Service investigator for the hospital, and rather good looking. Together they carry out an investigation of Caroline Faine's death. As they came closer to the truth, there was even an attack on Sally's life. They arrive at the identity of the murderer through their own investigation. No police in this book. The reader may find the ending of the book rather controversial.

Overall I found this to be a very interesting book. Hannah Lees is the pseudonym for Elizabeth Head Fetter. She lived in Philadelphia and was the wife of a doctor. She wrote articles on health, and was a freelance writer. She taught writing at Bryn Mawr College, and she wrote five mystery novels. This book was published in 1941.