Anthony Berkeley's Gold Age Mystery MURDER IN THE BASEMENT Reprinted

 [Originally published at New York Journal of Books]

“With a set of clever twists, Berkeley finally lays out the issue of how best to see justice served, and the answers are both rueful and entertaining.”

 

For the reissue of this “crime classic” by of the Golden Age mystery authors, Anthony Berkeley, an insightful introduction from series editor (and author) Martin Edwards. Framing the 1932 novel as “the first detective novel to contain a ‘whowasdunin’ mystery,” Edwards point readers toward more than just a gallop through a British investigation—and instead into regarding how Berkely in 1932 broke new ground in how to tell a good story.

 

The tale opens with Reginald and Molly Dane, charmingly inexperienced newlyweds, exploring their very first house. When Reginald finds evidence of something bricked up under the cellar floor, the two expect a treasure chest of gold—but alas, as Chief Inspector Moresby and his me soon confirm, the buried item is a body. And from here on (barely into Chapter I), Murder in the Basement marches with the difficulties of identification before forensic science’s modern miracles, and then to the competitive darknesses behind the scene in a school called Roland House.

 

With this entry, experienced Berkeley readers will perk up and sniff the wind, since the Chief Inspector heads to the author Roger Sheringham—a clever inhabitant of other Berkeley mysteries—to ask about the school. Sheringham spent two weeks there, doing research for a novel while also observing the stresses among staff members. Could he have actually instigated the crime with what he told the staff? Sheringham admits:

 

“They’d been egging me on to talk about murder … I gave them, in fact, a sort of lecture on murder, not as a fine art but as a practical means of getting rid of an unwanted person. I talked a lot of damned rot, of course, but then I always do. I never dreamed that any one of them could be taking me seriously: but it looks very much as if one of them did.”

 

Then, in a nimble twist that we’d now call “a bit of meta,” the crime novel shifts to offering Sheringham’s own manuscript, challenging both its author and the reader to pick out who the unnamed victim must have been. For if Sheringham’s theories of crime are effective, that should be possible from an outline of the situation—right?

 

With a set of clever twists, Berkeley finally lays out the issue of how best to see justice served, and the answers are both rueful and entertaining—demonstrating again why the early 20th century, in developing crime novels and their authors, has been proclaimed a Golden Age. Whether you’d pick your crime authors of choice during the 1920s and 1930s from Dorothy Sayers, Agatha Christie, G. K. Chesterton, and John Creasey, or their American counterparts Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain, and Mary Roberts Rinehart, here is a good reason to consider adding Anthony Berkeley to your list.

 

PS: Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here. 

 

"Cursed Mansion" Mystery with Great Legal Updates, in MURDER AT BLACK OAKS by Phillip Margolin

 [Originally published at New York Journal of Books]

“This skillfully written and well-polished ‘new classic’ mystery is a perfect winter read, ideal for an armchair journey that’s a page-turner without forcing you to check the locks on the windows and doors.”

 

It’s not likely that you’ll find a new Agatha Christie mystery to read—but Phillip Margolin makes up for that with his sixth Robin Lockwood novel, Murder at Black Oaks. In fact, the author declares at the opening that this highly enjoyable and suspenseful tale is an homage to the Golden Age of mysteries, with “an impossible murder, a haunted mansion, secret passages, a werewolf curse.” And all this comes with the adroit and intelligent Robin Lockwood, a prominent defense attorney with finely honed skills that apply to accused murderers.

 

Called to Black Oaks, a monstrous rural manor that’s become a memorial to both death and English history, Robin’s warned by her staff that a werewolf curse could be involved. She’s a natural skeptic. But what crimes could be entangled with the dark myth? 

 

The man summoning her out of her urban comfort zone of Portland, OR, to the isolation of Solitude Mountain, has also been a district attorney. But for 30 years, Frank Melville’s suffered under the knowledge that his skills placed an innocent man onto Death Row. Burdened with the actual murderer’s confession but unable to act on it because of client confidentiality, he’s retreated from public life and suffered both the death of his wife and debilitating injuries that keep him in a wheelchair.

 

His request to Robin Lockwood comes from learning that the actual criminal is now dead. Can Robin find a legal way for Melville to finally reveal the truth, and perhaps get Jose Alvarez—no longer a promising young man, but a bitter one trapped in prison—justice at last? Even this question roots in tragedy and suspicion, as the fragile and aging man explains:

 

“There is a curse on anyone who lives in Black Oaks, and God visited that curse on me when he took my Katherine away and left me like this. To atone for letting Jose Alvarez rot in prison while I knew he was innocent. I’ve tried to save other innocent defendants, but even my few victories haven’t brought me peace. … I want you to do what I can’t. I want you to save Jose’s life.”

 

Lockwood and her team may be up to that part of the assignment. But when murder and added threats arrive at the mansion, in the midst of a storm that traps Robin there without phone or drivable road, surrounded by people whose motives and opportunities mesh with the new death, Robin’s in personal danger.

 

The moment the storm cuts off the roadway, of course, Agatha Christie’s country-house murder mysteries echo into this one. Margolin’s also aiming to honor Ellery Queen and John Dickson Carr in his plot, and fans of these early mysteries can ease contentedly into harness, knowing the kinds of twists that must like ahead and confident that Robin will find the right allies to bring her—and any other “good guys” on the scene—to a relieved resolution of crime past and present.

 

This skillfully written and well-polished “new classic” mystery is a perfect winter read, ideal for an armchair journey that’s a page-turner without forcing you to check the locks on the windows and doors. No need to have read others in this series beforehand—Margolin’s neat brushing in of details gives plenty of grounding. But of course, you may want to collect the entire series, to get you through the rest of the darker season ahead.

 

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here. 

Tis the Season for Classic Detection Stories, in A SURPRISE FOR CHRISTMAS AND OTHER CHRISTMAS MYSTERIES

Martin  Edwards has a marvelous mystery series of his own, featuring Rachel Savernake, set in the Golden Age. A perfect transformation has turned him into the editor of several collections of detective stories brought out by British Library Crime Classics (Poisoned Pen Press, a Sourcebooks imprint). 

A SURPRISE FOR CHRISTMAS, released last week, is the fourth anthology in this series of "classic crime stories with a wintry theme" -- or, as Edwards also calls them, "detective stories in the classic vein." Scanning the author names for the dozen tales gave me shivers: among them Ngaio Marsh, G.K. Chesterton, Carter Dickson, Ernest Dudley, and Margery Allingham. Some of their stories may be almost unknown, even to those who have read the full-length crime novels from this pantheon of writers. As a Chesterton fanatic, I know I'd read "The Hole in the Wall," but so long ago that I'd forgotten the critical twist until I was several pages in. Cyril Hare's "A Surprise for Christmas" is morbidly funny; "Give Me a Ring" from Anthony Gilbert, one of the longer stories in the collection, has a sweet air of old-fashioned threat, from the days before risk and danger had to be garbed in gore or psychosis.

Adding to the delight of this collection are short forwards to the stories, recapping each author's presence in the Golden Age and noted sleuths. But often the stories presented come from outside the commonly known work of these authors. For example, the one from Ngaio Marsh does not feature Roderick Alleyn — but for "Death on the Air," which was published just three years later than Alleyn's first exposure in print, Marsh presents a classic "closed-circle detective story of the period," says the story's introduction. 

The tales also vary enormously in length, adding to the feel of opening a range of holiday gifts. With, of course, the advantage of no torn paper or ribbons to clear away afterward.

There is perhaps one drawback to A SURPRISE FOR CHRISTMAS: Any passionate reader of the authors collected here will need to purchase two copies ... one to savor as the days grow shorter, and one to give to the very best of friends.

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

"Rachel Savernake Golden Age Mystery" MORTMAIN HALL, Martin Edwards

The "Golden Age" mysteries from the 1920s and 1930s elevate a sense of style, although which style depended on which continent the authors called home. A striking number of women's names are among the top writers of that period, a good reminder that feminism was neither new nor fragile at that point. Agatha Christie, Josephine Tey, Dorothy Sayers, and Margery Allingham were among the British authors (along with Phillip MacDonald, G. K. Chesterton, Freeman Wills Crofts, and more). The American authors included John Dickson Carr, Ellery Queen, and Erle Stanley Gardner, and some like Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and James M. Cain introduced what's still known as hard-boiled style.

So by placing his Rachel Savernake series of mysteries as "Golden Age," Martin Edwards gives himself a lot to live up to! Book 1 of the series, Gallows Court, was a bold start.

In MORTMAIN HALL, "nice guy" British news reporter Jacob Flint is still struggling to develop front-page stories for his London paper. What seems like an accidental connection with a spectator from the courtroom becomes ominous, though, when he learns that Mrs. Dobell has a serious chip on her shoulder about Judge Savernake, father of the woman Jacob most admires (and, truth be told, fears). Mrs. Dobell continues:

"I believe you are acquainted with the late judge's daughter." The woman's sharp chin lifted. "Rachel Savernake."

He stared. How did Mrs Dobell know of his connection with Rachel?

He cleared his throat. "That's right."

She relaxed into a mischievous smile. "Next time you speak to Miss Savernake, please tell her to get in touch with me at the Circe Club. I should like to talk to her about murder."

With Rachel's somewhat cryptic hints to propel his research, Jacob quickly discovers that the odd and rather threatening Mrs Dobell has re-created herself from a victim into an expert, an author on murder and murderers. "Her single-mindedness reminded him of Rachel. But what had inspired such devotion to the study of crime and the machinery of law and justice?"

Edwards weaves a clever mystery that reaches its peak in a country-house scene, classic for the Golden Age genre. His twists and red herrings are neatly placed. He provides a parallel story in the behind-the-scenes machinations of Rachel and her "servants," who are always at least a mile ahead of the often clueless (but kind) Jacob. Rachel Savernake's back-story in crucial to understanding her maneuvers, and is not completely revealed here, so readers will enjoy MORTMAIN HALL more if they've read Gallows Court; it would be wise to purchase the two books at once if you're new to this series.

It seems likely that Edwards will continue to rise as an author, and if his path includes more of the edgy nastiness of Rachel Savernake, the books will be worth savoring as an arc of development of both characters and author. [The Poisoned Pen Press imprint of Sourcebooks is the publisher.]

PS: Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.