Fair and Foul Play

Hello everybody; welcome back to the blog. You’re just in time for me to reveal a brand-new feature, something that (I hope) will begin to make a regular appearance on this blog: a brand-new podcast entitled Fair and Foul Play.

What is Fair and Foul Play? The way I envision it, it’ll be a series of one-on-one conversations with other bloggers, mystery fans, and anyone else I can lure to the programme. These conversations will revolve around a specific topic within the mystery genre. For example, today I’m joined by Sergio, the blogger at the excellent site Tipping My Fedora. As it happens, both Sergio and I are big fans of audio productions, although we tend to specialize in different types of productions. The idea suddenly came: why not get together and talk about mysteries in audio? Audiobooks, radio plays, adaptations, dramatizations, original stuff: the complete package.

And so you’re looking at the result below, with Part 1 of our conversation forming episode 1a of Fair and Foul Play. Part 2 won’t be uploaded for a while, for the excellent reason that (a) I haven’t edited it yet and (b) the result would be over an hour long and that would be overwhelming all at once.

Please let us know what you think of the podcast, and if you’ve any interest in appearing in the future, feel free to let me know!

Ten Little Indians: Vera Claythorne

One little Indian boy left all alone

He went and hanged himself and then there were none.

This article contains spoilers, which have not been blurred out. Do not read on if you have not read Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None.

Patrick: Vera Claythorne is the original Final Girl—women like Laurie Strode in Halloween or Sidney Prescott in Scream, who manage to survive all the way to the end of the flick after all the other cast members (often predominantly male) have been killed off. That can often lead to a one-on-one fight with the killer, but in Christie’s book, the ending has a far more psychological twist. Either way, fans of slashers have much to thank Agatha Christie for— she practically invented what would turn into the slasher genre.

But let’s tackle the character of Vera Claythorne. I vividly recall my impressions when I first read this book, finishing it during a break in Monsieur Weston’s religion class back in Grade 9— I considered Vera to be Evil Incarnate. Of all the guests invited to Indian Island, Mr. Owen judges her to be one of the ones who deserve the most mental anguish, and so she is allowed to live. Her crime is one of the most heinous on the entire island—The Voice of U. N. Owen accuses her “that on the 11^th day of August, 1935, you killed Cyril Ogilvie Hamilton.”

The Man Who Was Dr. Fell: A Close Look at G. K. Chesterton

Hello and welcome everyone to another special edition of At the Scene of the Crime! Today, I’ve asked a very special guest to join me: Chris Chan, who often goes under the moniker of “GKCfan”. Chris, thanks ever so much for joining me!

Back when I had finished reading all of Agatha Christie’s works, I flopped around from author to author trying to find new mysteries to read. Eventually, Chris suggested that I read G. K. Chesterton. (His chosen alias of GKCfan should have told me what I was getting myself into…)

And so I found a Father Brown collection (The Innocence of Father Brown) and sat down to read… I’ve been an addict ever since, and discovering Chesterton was one of the many things that propelled me into discovering the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. (So Chris can take part of the blame for creating this out-of-control literary monster.)

It thus seemed to me appropriate that we should discuss G. K. Chesterton, who is still a very popular author today. Many have read the Father Brown tales but are entirely unaware of his other efforts, such as the books Four Faultless Felons or The Club of Queer Trades. But Chesterton was more than a mystery writer, he was also an eloquent philosopher who eventually converted to Catholicism and was one of the great defenders of his faith. (And as a Catholic myself, there are many wise things Chesterton wrote that I keep in mind while living my everyday life.)

So Chris, now I’ve shared how I became acquainted with Chesterton… how did you first come about him?

***

Ten Little Indians: Captain Philip Lombard

Two little Indian boys sitting in the sun;

One got frizzled up and then there was one.

Warning: This article contains spoilers.

Curt: And Then There Were None--a novel, in which, like the play “Hamlet,” everybody dies--is singularly lacking in the typical restorative happy ending people tend to expect from their Golden Age mystery literature. 

Imperceptive readers of And Then There Were None may hold out some hope that our remaining pair of Indians, Philip Lombard and Vera Claythorne, will survive to provide the traditional happy ending, with church bells and wedded bliss just around the corner; but in fact the reason that these two are still around at all is not that they are destined  to fulfill the traditional function of providing love interest and a happy ending, but that they have been deemed the most deserving of mental torture by our sadistic mass murderer, Mr. Owen—and his assessment seems fair enough to me.  These two are the worst of the bunch.

April Fools

Hello good readers and welcome to a special edition of At the Scene of the Crime! Today, I’d like to welcome back Sergio, who holds the current record for most appearances on this blog (this is his third appearance). When I asked Sergio if he was interested in a crossover review to commemorate my one-year anniversary, he was enthusiastic about the idea. But what to review?

Well, to come up with an idea, I looked back at our previous two collaborations. In our first, we read and discussed George Baxt’s The Alfred Hitchcock Murder Case. I had written Baxt off as a hack after reading The Affair at Royalties, but Sergio’s enthusiastic review of A Queer Kind of Death piqued my interest, and that led to a re-evaluation of Baxt from my part. When Sergio dropped in for a second time, we discussed Julian Symons and his book Bloody Murder, holding a long debate about its merits and flaws. In both cases, Sergio helped to broaden my mystery horizons as I learned to appreciate something I’d earlier dismissed.

So how could we keep this tradition going? Well, I started thinking: Sergio has been reading and reviewing the work of Ed McBain, specifically his 87^th Precinct novels. I had never read a McBain novel before, but I distinctly remember coming across some of his novels in a box of books once. I deliberately ignored them, allowing them to be given away. Naturally, I had to atone for my sins somehow (especially due to my Catholicism). Suddenly, the idea dawned on me: I was far more familiar with Craig Rice, Sergio was the man to see about Ed McBain. What better place to begin acquainting myself with McBain than the novel he finished for Craig Rice, The April Robin Murders?

Sergio, thanks for joining me today!

Cat Among the Pigeons

Welcome once more, good readers, to a special edition of At the Scene of the Crime!

In this ongoing series of crossovers, I have managed to convince my fellow mystery bloggers, somehow or another, to join me in discussing a book/author/etc. Today’s victim is Steve, better known as The Puzzle Doctor. This rogue mathematician blogs at In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel, and has appeared on this blog before, in a crossover review of Paul Doherty’s An Ancient Evil that celebrated my reaching 100 posts.

So when we decided to team up again for another review, the first question to pop up was: what should we review? An initial suggestion was The Poison Maiden by Paul Doherty, seeing that our reaction to The Cup of Ghosts was so different. But this idea was scrapped due to the book’s length and my having midterm exams at around this time of year.

But suddenly, an idea galloped onto the scene, when I recalled that Steve here had a very—unorthodox, shall we say?— reaction to Ellery Queen’s Cat of Many Tails. It’s a book that I consider a personal favourite, and which many believe is the finest work penned by the EQ writing team. And wouldn’t you know it—one of Steve’s on-going projects is to read all of Ellery Queen’s output and review it!

So the elements were set in place for a potentially controversial review. Would I enjoy Cat of Many Tails upon a re-read? Just as (and arguably more) important, would the Doc’s opinion stay the same? There were at least three ways to find out, but the most feasible one was to simply read the book. So here we are today!

Steve, thanks so much for joining me today!

***

Ten Little Indians: William Henry Blore

Three little Indian boys walking in the Zoo;

A big bear hugged one and then there were Two.

This article contains spoilers.

“It would have been equally impossible for [Golden Age detective novelists] to have created a policeman who beat up suspects, although this was a time when American newspapers wrote about the Third Degree.  Acknowledging that such things happened, they would have thought it undesirable to write about them, because the police were the representatives of established society, and so ought not to be shown behaving badly.”

 —Julian Symons, author of Bloody Murder

“Blore...was a bad hat!”

—Sir Thomas Legge, Assistant Commissioner at Scotland Yard

Blore in 1987's Desyat Negrityat

Curt: William Henry Blore is charged by Mr. Owen with having “brought about the death of James Stephen Landor on October 10th, 1928.  William Henry Blore is a former policeman, ex-C.I.D. (he’s now running “a detective agency in Plymouth”). 

But who was James Stephen Landor?  When queried about this after Mr. Owen has made his phonograph charges against his guests, the following exchange occurs:

From a View to a Kill: A Discussion on Margaret Millar

Hello everybody and welcome to another special edition of At the Scene of the Crime!

I’m glad to announce the return of Jeffrey Marks to the blog today. If you’ll recall, Jeff joined me recently in a long discussion on Craig Rice (and I’ve since read his excellent biography, Who Was That Lady?). We both enjoyed collaborating and so we’ve been brainstorming ever since on ideas for a cheap sequel. Well, the sequel has arrived, but the topic of conversation is anything but cheap. Jeff has agreed to join me again to discuss the work of Margaret Millar—and who better to do so, since Jeff devotes an entire chapter to Millar in his book Atomic Renaissance?

I only got acquainted with Millar’s work last year, after many writers and bloggers collaborated in a conspiracy that transcended space and time to get me to read How Like an Angel. To put it briefly, I fell in love, and have since read two more of her books, which even at their lowest points did not dispel my enthusiasm. (That took some doing, mind you—The Devil Loves Me is one of those books that you forget very quickly, apart from some its funnier elements.)

My impression of Margaret Millar, before reading any of her work, had been of a pure “psychological suspense” author—someone who would write a 1000 page book set in a mental hospital, where most of the book takes place in a patient’s mind over a five-minute period before the patient kills one of the guards. But as I found out for myself, Millar was anything but that! She managed to write fairly-clued mysteries that can leave you guessing until the final sentence. Her characters are (usually) very good and her sense of humour is absolutely delightful. My favourite in Millar’s work thus far is in How Like an Angel, when Joe Quinn has a discussion with cult member Brother Crown of Thorns:

“We got to be saved from ourselves and the devil that’s in us. We all carry a devil around inside us gnawing our innards.”

“So that’s it. I thought my liver was acting up again.”

Come on, how can you not like an author with such a sense of humour?

Jeff, thanks a lot for joining me today!

Inverted Murder à la française

« Pourquoi? » répéta Chaubard, dans sa dernière lueur de conscience.

L’individu chuchota : « Je pourrais vous répondre que c’est parce que vous êtes vulgaire et parfaitement antipathique, mais ce ne serait pas exact. C’est surtout parce que vous vous appelez Chaubard, et qu’à ce titre vous devez être trouvé mort sur le pont des Arts à cinq heures du matin. »

***

“Why ?” Chaubard repeated, in his last glimmer of consciousness.

The person whispered: “I could answer you that it is because you’re vulgar and perfectly unsympathetic, but that wouldn’t be accurate. Above all, it is because your name is Chaubard, and as such, you must be found dead on the pont des Arts at five o’clock in the morning.”

— René Reouven, Souvenez-vous de Monte-Cristo (Remember Monte Cristo)

That's not Raymond Chandler...

Good morning (or afternoon, or evening—it’s all relative, really) everyone and welcome to yet another special edition of At the Scene of the Crime! Today I am joined by blogger extraordinaire Xavier Lechard, who writes At the Villa Rose.

It’s hard to believe that this blog has already been around for an entire year, and I’ve made my fair share of discoveries in that time. I’ve found out, for instance, that Raymond Chandler wasn’t the St. George who slew the dragon of Golden-Age-style plotting, despite what many critics will tell you. I’ve also found out that there is an entire world of mysteries that was hiding in plain sight: the world of the French-language mystery. We Anglophones are often led to assume that Georges Simenon was the only non-English speaking writer of mysteries out there. Folks, we are being swindled—the truth couldn’t be any more different!

This journey of mine started back in May, when I read and reviewed Le Roi du désordre (The Lord of Misrule) by Paul Halter. I had read much about this French author, and I glowered in misery when I couldn’t find any of his novels to read in the original French. But finally I managed to convince my parents that it was a perfectly reasonable idea to spend $30 on an omnibus that contained The Lord of Misrule… and the book served a dual purpose. It reminded me why I love mysteries, but it also warmed up my French and my desire to find out more about French-language mysteries.

Fast-forward to today. My bookshelf contains 22 of Halter’s novels. My Kindle has four more titles. I’ve got an entire page running on this blog, devoted to his work! But my interest in French detective fiction goes even further. I’ve suddenly got books like L’ingénieur aimait trop les chiffres (translated as The Tube) by Boileau-Narcejac on my shelf. I’ve got two omnibuses of works by S. A. Steeman. And finally, I own three omnibuses of works by René Reouven.

It is this last author I’d like to bring your attention to. Earlier this year, I read Reouven’s fabulous book Tobie or not Tobie, where he rewrote the Book of Tobit as a mystery, complete with an impossible crime! It was a triumph on every level that left me hungry for more. I made up my mind to buy something else and I ended up purchasing Souvenez-vous de Monte-Cristo (Remember Monte Cristo). The choice was a strategic one— I have always loved the Alexandre Dumas novel.

René Reouven discussing Sherlock Holmes.

But time is a cruel mistress, and I hadn’t read any more Reouven since December. When I was planning these crossover reviews, I suddenly realised that the best possible thing to do was to invite Xavier for a cross-blog review! As a native French speaker, Xavier has known about the French mystery landscape for years, while I am just starting to discover it. His knowledge far eclipses mine—and hey, he’s a fan of René Reouven! So the idea was pitched, and Xavier agreed to come here today. As luck would have it, he hadn’t yet read this book, so we would both read it for the first time…

I apologize for the extremely long introduction, but I am very excited to reacquaint myself with Reouven and to welcome Xavier to this blog! Xavier, the floor is yours!

An Air That Kills

Hello, readers, and welcome back to another special crossover-edition of At the Scene of the Crime! It was not long ago that I participated in a podcast hosted by Bill of Traditional Mysteries, where the topic of discussion was Sherlock Holmes. At one point, fellow blogger John Norris brought up the book The Breath of God, a novel by Guy Adams starring none other than Sherlock Holmes. I wasn’t in the room when the book was initially mentioned (there was a doorbell), but I later mentioned it and commented that it seemed far more like a supernatural novel. Any sane person would stay away, right?

Well, that ought to give you some insight into my character, because a great idea struck me: John had mentioned owning the book and I remembered picking it up at my local independent bookstore. The book sounded a lot like a supernatural novel, but was it really an ingenious impossible crime mystery in disguise? There was only one way to find out, and I managed to convince John (with a minimum of Chinese Water Torture) to join me for the ride. My one-year anniversary was coming up and besides, I like to support the local store when I can. So back to the store I marched at the first opportunity (that Tuesday, as it happens) and I walked out with The Breath of God in my bag.

So what was this book? A supernatural story that pilfers Holmes to sell more copies? An impossible crime with supernatural overtones? A mystery into which supernatural elements are integrated? There was a positive-sounding quote from Christopher Fowler on the cover, and yet that didn’t set me quite at ease… There was only one way to find out what I had gotten myself into…

John, thanks a lot for joining me today!

***

Ten Little Indians: Dr. Edward Armstrong

Four little Indian boys going out to sea;

A red herring swallowed one and then there were three.

Warning: This article contains spoilers.

Dr. Armstrong in Desyat Negrityat

Curt: I don’t know whether I’m alone, but I’ve always felt sort of sorry for Dr. Armstrong. 

Sure, he’s pompous and conventional (Justice Wargrave at one point contemptuously thinks of Armstrong: “These doctors are all the same—they think in clichés.  A thoroughly commonplace mind.”).  And he likes his money and his standing in society.  But these are characteristics of many of us, to some degree or another.

Yet of course the reason Edward George Armstrong was invited to meet his death on Indian Island was not for any minor character flaw or quirk he might possess, but for his having “caused the death of Louisa Mary Clees.”

A Most Mysterious Suicide-- Maybe...

Hello everybody and welcome to this brand-new, special edition of At the Scene of the Crime! Today, I’m very pleased to participate in the first cross-blog review of the one-year anniversary celebrations. And what better co-blogger than Les Blatt of the prolific Classic Mysteries podcast?

But what to review? Les usually tackles classic mysteries that are either in print or easily obtained, so that ruled out books like the ever-so-obscure (I wonder if that’s because it’s fictional) novel by George Van Hooligan, The Case of the Murderous Monk.

But wait! Thanks to Faber & Faber, several novels by Cyril Hare have been brought back into print! This seemed like a perfect choice. Cyril Hare is such a respected mystery author and was a member of the prestigious Detection Club— plus he had experience as a judge, which lends a touch of authenticity to his work. And after some thinking, we settled on Suicide Excepted as a good book to read together!

Thanks a lot for joining me today, Les!

…

Les?

Oh, that’s right. I nearly forgot. As I’ve said before, Les’ reviews are in podcast form. That means there’s only one way to do this review properly, and that’s to go invade the Classic Mysteries podcast!

You can listen to the podcast review here.

Les’ post on this review can be found here.

Ten Little Indians: Justice Lawrence Wargrave

Five little Indian boys going in for law;

One got in Chancery and then there were four.

Wargrave in 1987's Desyat Negrityat

Patrick: Mr. Justice Wargrave is very much a respected pillar of society. As a retired judge, during his career he has condemned many men to death. From such a position, murder would be quite easy and 100% legal. And that is what Mr. Owen accuses Wargrave of having done, allegedly abusing his power as a judge and sending a man by the name of Edward Seton to his death.

Thus far in the article series “Ten Little Indians”, we have covered a remarkable amount of the victims of And Then There Were None. To paraphrase Curt, now I know how Mr. Owen felt! But at about this time, starting with this character, analyzing characters without spoilers becomes insanely tricky. So tricky, in fact, that I haven’t the slightest intention of trying to do so. This article contains shameless amounts of spoilers— please read Agatha Christie’s novel if you haven’t already done so. The reader is warned.

Ten Little Indians: Emily Brent

Six little Indian boys playing with a hive;

A bumblebee stung one and then there were five.

Miss Emily Brent in the 1987 adaptation Desyat Negrityat

Patrick: I am a Catholic and my faith is important to me— wait, don’t turn that dial! Religion plays a major part in my reasons for disliking the character of Emily Brent. Miss Brent was likely not a Catholic—the odds are that, like Agatha Christie, she was Anglican. (Why do I say this? Well, we’re in 1930s England. I have a feeling she wasn’t Baptist.) And yet Miss Brent manages to get her faith so completely and entirely wrong. Emily Brent embodies everything people dislike about religion— she loves her Bible and quotes from it as though she were shellin’ peas. When Mr. Owen’s voice accuses her of bringing about the death of one Beatrice Taylor, she says nothing until everyone falls silent, waiting for her to speak out.

Ten Little Indians: Mr. Rogers

Seven little Indian boys chopping up sticks;
One chopped himself in halves and then there were Six.

Mr Thomas Rogers in Desyat Negrityat

Curt: I've always thought the most memorable thing about the butler Thomas Rogers in And Then There Were None is the way he is taken out: struck in the head with the wood chopper. More than any of the deaths that had taken place in the book up to this point, this one is scary, particularly when considered in the light of those ghoulish words ("one chopped himself in halves") from the supposed children's rhyme.

Notice how Rogers meets his death while performing a menial task for the others survivors (for the moment). Even after three deaths--all murders, including that of his wife--and the obvious fact that there's a maniac killer running loose on the island, English social order in this microcosm does not falter. On the contrary, Rogers goes about performing his anointed tasks like the perfect servant that he is ("Will you take cold tongue or cold ham, madam").*

Ten Little Indians: General Macarthur

Warning: The following article contains spoilers regarding Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None

Eight little Indian boys traveling in Devon;

One said he’d stay there and then there were seven.

General Macarthur in 1987's Desyat Negrityat

Patrick: General John Gordon Macarthur is a very respectable military man, the kind of person you’d be able to find in the Bellona Club. I remember liking this character most of all when I first read this book. Out of all the suspects, this is the man who seemed to suffer the most.

Macarthur’s crime was a simple one. The voice of U. N. Owen accuses him that “on the 4^th of January, 1917, you deliberately sent your wife’s lover, Arthur Richmond, to his death.” Macarthur cries out that the accusation is preposterous, and later feebly (and unconvincingly) attempts exonerating himself:

“Best really to leave this sort of thing unanswered. However, I feel I ought to say—no truth—no truth whatever in what he said about—er—young Arthur Richmond. Richmond was one of my officers. I sent him on a reconnaissance. He was killed. Natural course of events in war time. Wish to say resent very much—slur on my wife. Best woman in the world. Absolutely—Caesar’s wife!”

When he sits down, Christie informs us that “the effort to speak had cost him a good deal.”

Ten Little Indians: Mrs. [Ethel] Rogers

Warning: This article may contain spoilers about the book And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie.

Nine little Indian boys sat up very late;

One overslept himself and then there were Eight

“It’s awful, but I never really look at them properly, do you?”

—Virginia Revel on “governesses and companions and people one sits opposite to on trains” in Agatha Christie’s The Secret of Chimneys (1925)

The Rogers in 1987's Desyat Negrityat

Curt: Without doubt to my mind, Christie triumphantly portrays at least one companion, Miss Gilchrist, in After the Funeral (1953).  As for governesses, there is Vera Claythorne herself, of the novel under discussion, And Then There Were None (1939).  Surely Miss Claythorne is one of Christie's greatest creations. 

Yet generally speaking, in my view, the depiction of servants and other lower-class characters is not one of Christie’s strong points as a writer.  Concerning maids and girl shop assistants I remember mostly a succession of rather dim Alices and Gladyses and Ednas (“Edna sniffed” is the ostensibly humorous refrain in Mrs. McGinty’s Dead, 1952, when Poirot questions the seriously sub-intelligent, adenoidal girl concerning a matter related to a murder).  We learn a little bit of the inner life—such as it is--of the very silly maid Gladys in A Pocket Full of Rye (1953), but it’s more pathetic than rounded.

Ten Little Indians: Anthony Marston

Ten little Indians went out to dine;

One choked his little self and then there were nine.

Marston in a 1987 Russian adaptation

Patrick: When Anthony Marston first appears on the dock at Sticklehaven, Christie tells us he “looked, not a man, but a young god, a Hero God out of some Northern Saga … something more than mortal.” And ironically, Marston is the first character to kick the bucket.

But the brief glimpses we get of Marston’s character make me feel fortunate we didn’t get to see much more of him. I’ve always hated this character. I vividly recall a sharp feeling of distaste surrounding his character when I first read this book.

Morderstwo odbędzie się…

Bishop: What do you think when you see a beautiful woman?

Father Mateusz: I thank God for making me a man.

Bishop: And when you see an unattractive woman?

Father Mateusz: I thank Him for making me a priest.

—Ojciec Mateusz (Father Mateusz), Season 1 Episode 3

I was raised in an entirely Polish family, and in fact, the Polish language was the first I learned. My parents thought it really important to instil in me traditional Polish values, the Catholic faith, and a knowledge of the Polish language and culture. It was one of the reasons I was sent to Polish School every Saturday for years—some kids got to sleep in and watch cartoons on Saturday mornings; I had to go to school.

But thanks to all this, I’ve gotten to know the Polish language like a native speaker, and as it turns out, it was a good thing to learn. Today, at Detection by Moonlight, penned by fellow blogger TomCat, I’ve volunteered my services and written aguest blog about the detective story in Poland: why it’s taken so long to flourish and what gems can be found there. I’ve made some hopefully-enticing allusions to books that should be reviewed over here, hopefully in the coming weeks. Please take a moment to look at TomCat’s blog and discover the world of Polish detective stories.

Should this count as a crossover review? Well, since I've crossed space and time and taken over TomCat's blog, I'll go ahead and say yes. Plus, this gives me a page to place in my "Criminal Record" to account for the work.

And what does my post title mean? It's actually the Polish title for A Murder is Announced by Agatha Christie, but it translates out to "A Murder Will Take Place..."

The 43% (Alcohol) Solution: An Appreciation of Craig Rice

Mayor: Drebin, I don't want any more trouble like you had last year on the South Side. Understand? That's my policy.
Frank: Yes. Well, when I see 5 weirdos dressed in togas stabbing a guy in the middle of the park in full view of 100 people, I shoot the bastards. That's my policy.
Mayor: That was a Shakespeare-In-The-Park production of Julius Caesar, you moron!!! You killed 5 actors!!!

-The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!

Welcome, readers, to another special edition of At the Scene of the Crime! I’ve really been spoiling you all with these articles of late, where I (somehow) manage to persuade a fellow partner in crime to collaborate on an article, be it a book review, a general discussion, or a fusion of the two. I didn’t have to resort to blackmail or Mike Hammer techniques this time, but I did manage to persuade Jeffrey Marks to join me today. In case you didn’t know, Jeff is the author of an excellent biography of Anthony Boucher, a personal hero of mine. I reviewed the book earlier in this blog—in fact, it was the first non-fiction book I reviewed. Also, Jeff is the author of Who Was That Lady?, the official biography of mystery author Craig Rice. And that is why we’re here today, to have a discussion about Rice.

I’m not up-to-date with biographical details (yet), so I can’t tell you where Craig Rice was born, who her parents were, and what her favourite colour was. But I can tell you this much: she was the author of some of the funniest mysteries I’ve ever read, and managed to be the first female mystery author to appear on the cover of Time magazine— which is quite an accomplishment, n’est-ce pas? Unfortunately, her life was far too short, dying before her 50^th birthday in 1957.

Jeff, thanks a lot for agreeing to join me today!