A Work in Progress

Teaser Tuesday: Laura

Where to begin and how to choose?  I did manage to whittle down all those piles to one that is much smaller and more manageable, though I fully expect books to be shifting back and forth all summer long.  Knowing I am going to be reading mysteries is like having a bowl of ice cream after dinner every night.  Deliciously decadent.  Only books are much less fattening! 

Although I am still keeping a short stack of books next to my bed--just in case--I decided to start with a book from Feminist Press's Femmes Fatales series.  I was looking for a good romance (two books currently in progress) to read not long ago.  Why not a "noir romance"?  Have you ever heard of that term?  I hadn't.  Laura by Vera Caspary is a classic of the noir genre and was made into an Academy Award nominated film directed by Otto Preminger.  I thought it was finally time to pick up a good vintage crime novel, but not a nice cozy.  Something a little darker and edgier. 

How about a novel whose main character is a beautiful, ambitious, successful woman who isn't even really present in the story, since from the opening pages you know she's been murdered!  I've only just started reading, but Caspary has hooked me with her very elegant prose (you cannot beat really good writers from the 1940s--it seems that that era was oh so very stylish).  The narrator is Waldo Lydecker, a writer and a cynic and certainly something of a snob.  The setting is New York City and in the opening pages Lydecker is working on Laura's obituary when Mark McPherson, a young police detective comes knocking on his door.  Just judging from their dialogue I can tell this is going to be an elegant and stylish story and written in prose that is perfectly fitting. 

The story has Chandleresque overtones to it.  I'll be curious to see if Caspary falls squarely into that hardboiled school of crime writing.  Women have long been considered some of the best mystery and crime writers and just a taste of Caspary's writing and it is easy to see why.  The story begins:

"The city that Sunday morning was quiet.  Those millions of New Yorkers who, by need or preference, remain in town over a summer weekend had been crushed spiritless by humidity.  Over the island hung a fog that smelled and felt like water in which too many sodawater glasses have been washed.  Sitting at my desk, pen in hand, I treasured the sense that, among those millions, only I, Waldo Dydecker, was up and doing.  The day just past, devoted to shock and misery, had stripped me of sorrow.  Now I had gathered strength for the writing of Laura's epitaph.  My grief at her sudden and violent death found consolation in the thought that my friend, had she lived to a ripe old age, would have passed into oblivion, whereas the violence of her passing and the genius of her admirer gave her a fair chance at immortality."

This is not the first taste I have had of Caspary's writing.  Last year I read her short story "Sugar and Spice" and was suitably impressed and knew I would eventually get around to reading more of her work.  And now is the moment.  I think I might explore more of the Femmes Fatales titles (I have several on hand).  I'll be finishing Carola Dunn's Rattle His Bones.  I'm leaning towards either Fred Vargas or maybe a historical mystery by Cassandra Clark. 

And a teaser of a different sort?  How about this: I plan on splurging on this in September!  I only wish I could get my hands on it now for my summer reading!

Maigret in Holland by Georges Simenon

A week or so ago I shared a teaser from Georges Simenon's Maigret in Holland (Un Crime en Hollande translated by Geoffrey Sainsbury) and just as the TLS describes Simenon's style, so I found this wonderful and wonderfully atmospheric mystery.  It's short, straightforward, not terribly complicated plotwise yet filled with enough red herrings and potential suspects to keep readers guessing and no political or historical markers which give the story a timeless quality even though it was published in 1940.  His geographical descriptions of the coastal town of Delfzijl, however, are very inviting and part of the draw for me for this story.  And Maigret is entirely likable.  While the story may be morally ambiguous (certainly Simenon doesn't interject his own opinions), Maigret himself is quite sympathetic.  Actually he's sympathetic but he has a certain mischievous streak to him at times, too, which I find amusing.

I've not read many of Simenon's Maigret novels, but of the few I have read there always seems to be a no-nonsense approach to the writing and plotting.  Crime novels seem to be the perfect place to show a society's ills, reveal its shortcomings.  You can tell a lot about a society from the crimes that are committed and by whom.  And it's often not confined to the seedy underbelly of a city.  Sometimes the detective or crime-solver is just as flawed as the criminals.  But with Maigret you get a crime, you get a piecing together of a puzzle and a little traditional sleuthing.  Maigret, however, relies as much on his gut feeling as on his close attention to the details of the crime, his observations and sorting through the clues to make it all fit together to get a satisfying resolution.  As for Maigret's life--I can't tell you much.  He smokes a pipe, likes to indulge a bit occasionally on a good meal and a few glasses of spirits.  I know from my other reading that he is married and has a good relationship with his wife, but Simenon doesn't spend a lot of time on the personal (except perhaps to draw a picture of the suspects and their motivations).

I think what's important in the Maigret stories is presenting a problem, in this case murder, looking at it from all angles, sorting the clues and the personalities and the motives and facts and then solving the crime.  A very basic, traditional mystery--but presented in a wholly entertaining way.  Maigret has been called to Holland from Paris to aid in the investigation of a murder.  A local man has been killed and the most obvious suspect happens to be a fellow Frenchman.  He very inconveniently found himself holding the gun which killed the man thereby putting himself under suspicion.  Curiously he had just given a lecture on the responsibility of criminals for their actions and has his own ideas of who killed the man and sets out his own ideas on who the killer is and how the crime was committed.  He's not the only potential suspect of course. 

The murdered man was a former sailor now settled down with a cultured and conventional wife.  He had a penchant for attractive young women (perhaps he settled down too soon without sowing his wild oats in full?), though only dabbling really.  He happened to have been dabbling with a local girl who is known for her flirtatiousness.  As a matter of fact a young cadet who was one of the murdered man's students is in love with her.  Then there is the murdered man's sister-in-law who has just finished her studies to become a lawyer who seems forever in a state of taciturnity, and the owner of a ship who's cap has inexplicably been discovered in the dead man's bathtub. 

No mystery worth its salt is complete without a hoard of secrets and lies.  So many suspects, so many motives and opportunities and a sprinkling of clues--love letters, a sailor's cap where it shouldn't be, a stray cigar butt and the light from a lighthouse which illuminates more than just the coastline.  Maigret is up to the challenge, however, and in true Porot-like fashion he re-creates the murder scene with all the players in place and deconstructs the crime.  The Dutch detectives are no match for Maigret's sleuthing prowess despite his 'unofficial' capacity in the case.

Since I read this as much for the setting as for the mystery, I would be remiss if I didn't share a few of the interesting cultural bits that I came across--keeping in mind of course that the book was published in 1940, so perhaps life has changed considerably in the passing years.

***

"The schnapps was drawn from a porcelain tap with brass fittings.  It was that which gave the place its pervading odor, as it did every other café in the Netherlands, and which was so very different from any café in France."

***

"The evening before, he had dinner at the table next to the professor's.  But now three places had been laid on the round table in the middle of the room.  The tablecloth was snowy white and the creases had not yet gone flat.  Moreover, three glasses had been set for each person, and that was a thing done only on grand occasions in Holland."

***

"In Holland we never drink with meals, only afterward.  In the course of the evening--that is, at large repceptions--they serve a small glass of wine with the cigars . . . Another point on which we differ from you: we never put bread on he table."

***

"It's the very embodiment of cleanliness and order."

***

I've wanted to read more Maigret for ages and this was only a brief foray into his world.  I'll be back for more.  Maigret in Holland is doing double duty for me.  It's not only the next spot to be filled in my Vintage Bingo card (three more to go to fill my row and get 'bingo'--this one is for the 'one mystery set other than the US or England slot) but is my last 'formal' book in my summer Reading the Netherlands project.  I've got a couple of books left that will spill over into the end of the year, but I'll be wrapping things up this weekend  in anticipation of other reading plans to see me through the end of the year.  Cath has kindly written a last post, which we'll be sharing tomorrow and I have a few loose ends to tie up over the weekend.  I might end up with one of those spillover books in my travel bag next week, or maybe another Maigret mystery or maybe another book to help fill in my Bingo card.  So many good choices.

Vintage Bingo Redux

So I've been trying to organize my reading piles this past weekend.  I'm midstream in so many books and reading projects, and with the year quickly speeding by, I wonder if there is still time to finish most of them and salvage earlier plans and ambitions.  I have been reading (literally am in the middle of quite a few) lots of mysteries this year, but none of them at the moment will count towards my vintage mystery reading (you can see the Bingo card here that I am working on).

I'm opting to fill the six spots down from the G as I've read two so far that will fit--Agatha Christie's The Man in the Brown Suit for a mystery with a color in the title, and Josephine Tey's The Man in the Queue with a theatrical setting.  Now it's time to think about which books will fit the rest of the slots (rather than my random reading so far).  Four books to read by the end of the year?  It sounds easy enough.  It's just the rest of the books I am reading or want to read that always throw me off.  But there is no harm in planning, right?

* * * * * *

Read one book set anywhere except the US or England.  I've picked up George Simenon's Maigret in Holland (which is being reissued this fall by Penguin with the title A Crime in Holland), which will do double duty as I finish up my Reading the Netherlands books. 

Read one locked room mystery.  I have two that would work.  I am leaning towards John Dickson Carr's The Hollow Man, which is a classic from what I understand.  Georgette Heyer's Envious Casca would also work (but I am unsure where my copy is and am not sure if I am up to digging through bins in search of it--how lazy is that).  The latter is set on a country estate during a house party and the former has a snowy setting.

Read one academic mystery.  This one is easy as I have been wanting to try another Josephine Tey mystery.  While this is not an Inspector Grant mystery I have heard many good things about Miss Pym Disposes.  It is set at a girl's physical training college.

This leaves me with one slot, for which I am stumped.

Read one book that features a crime other than murder.  I am sure there are loads of them, but the catch is that any books I choose must have been written before 1960.  Mysteries usually mean murder is the crime, and nothing really comes to mind.  I'm leaning towards Bunny Lake is Missing by Evelyn Piper, which is about a child's disappearance.  It has the added advantage of being a noir thriller and tale of domestic suspense, so perhaps I'll give it a go. 

It's always good to have ideas in reserve, so suggestions for good books always welcome.  Now to sort through the rest of my reading and end of the year plans.  Obviously my plans are always pretty loose (or my reading wouldn't be all over the place like it is at the moment . . .).  What about you?  Thinking ahead, making plans, tidying up old plans?  Or not thinking about it at all and just reading at whim?  I sometimes think I 'think about books and reading' too much.  Or is that even possible?

The Man in the Queue by Josephine Tey

I like Josephine Tey's Inspector Alan Grant.  As a matter of fact I think he is worthy of inclusion into my own personal 'crushable' favorite characters hall of fame (crushable being--the sort of fictional character on whom I will admit to having a little crush).  The Man in the Queue, published in 1929, is Grant's first mystery.  Tey (really Elizabeth Mackintosh) only wrote six of them along with a small handful of standalone novels and a few plays.  The blurb on the cover of the book is "The Classic Mystery Writer" and I think I have to concur with that categorization.  This is a very traditional, well plotted, good old fashioned detective story.

Inspector Grant?  Where to begin.  He reminds me a little of P.D. James's Adam Dalgliesh--a private, cerebral person, thought rather tall, dark and handsome by some.  Inspector Grant has a good supply of devotion and duty along with brains and courage.  Four years on the Western Front and many more in the C.I.D. has led him to develop an acute sixth sense which serves him well when working on a murder case or general crime solving.  The last thing he looks like, however, is a police officer.  He's of mid-height, slight build and on the dapper side (though not of a "tailor's dummy type" Tey informs her reader).  He has a half-careless thoroughness about him and is efficient and practical.  He's brisk and always thinking and speculating on his work.  Some years before he came into a considerable legacy and easily could have retired, but he's got quite a knack for his job and no desire to give it up.  Oh, and he's a good judge of a horse.

He'll need every bit of that efficiency and thoroughness for London's latest murder.  Not only must the murderer be sussed out, but the identity of the victim isn't even known until well into the story.  It's a March evening and the long running play "Didn't You Know" is coming to an end.  The star, Ray Marcable, is taking her success to America.  She's much loved and the crowd outside the theater is thick with fans waiting to see her one last time.  The crush of people is so intense that no one even realizes that a man in the queue has been stabbed in the back.  The sheer number of people packed together has kept him upright, and it is only when the line begins to move and he slumps forward and falls does anyone realize that something dark and deadly has just occurred.

There is very little on the man's body to help identify him.  Despite so many people so close together no one seems to have seen much of anything.  The forensic evidence points to a left handed man, and definitely a man and not a woman, who yielded enough force to drive the weapon in at such close quarters.  It's determined that the murderer used a very thin, sharp stiletto to commit the murder.  And Grant is sure that the murder was planned with much ingenuity and and executed with great subtlety.  And he believes that this is a most un-English crime.  Between the way the murder was executed and the particular weapon used Grant has formed in his mind a picture of just who might have committed it.

It's by a combination of supposition and plain everyday detective work--pounding the pavement and asking questions over and over that Grant pieces together who the man murdered was, and who is likely to have been the perpetrator.  He is hot on his heels when the suspect, a step ahead of Grant, flees to Scotland where an arduous and adventurous chase ensues.  And when he tracks the suspect down Grant must reassess all the clues he's gathered and the picture he has in his mind of the murderer.  Things rarely are what they seem, and when all the clues stack up and point directly at the individual who Grant was certain did the deed, he begins to second guess himself fearing he's caught the wrong man.  Circumstances put him in the right place at the wrong time, but did he really do it?

And the picture Grant paints at the start of the story based on the murder?  A so very un-English type of crime?  Well, there are lots of red herrings and turns down streets with no outlets to create doubt and leave questions unanswered.  There are a few twists and turns but nothing shocking, just good, plain detective work by a man with admirable talents.  I'll just say that Tey has created a very human and likable character who is not without faults or shortcomings but is mostly very good at his job. 

I want to know him more.  Grant's next mystery is A Shilling for Candles which I see that Alfred Hitchcock filmed as Young and Innocent.  With only six Grant mysteries I am thinking I could easily read them in almost one go, though I will likely pick something different for my next Vintage Mystery.  For Bingo I need to read six mysteries (and fill six slots--so far I have read one book with a 'color in the title' and one 'set in the entertainment world').  I think I like Josephine Tey very much and especially her dapper detective.

Teaser Tuesday: A Murder is Announced

Well, I'm not entirely sure this story is going to involve a country house per se, but Agatha Christie is always good, far too much time has passed since I picked up a Miss Marple mystery, and I need to get cracking on my Vintage Mystery Bingo card (I've only read one so far).  I am reading Josephine Tey's The Man in the Queue at the moment as well, but I am nothing if not greedy when it comes to books and so am going to binge a little on mysteries right now.  So both books will count towards my Bingo.

I've been (very slowly) making my way through the Miss Marple mysteries in the order Agatha Christie published them: Murder at the Vicarage (1930), The Thirteen Problems (Short Stories--1932) which I read a few years back but cannot find a proper post on them,  The Body in the Library (1942), The Moving Finger (1943), Sleeping Murder (published in 1972 but written during WWII), A Murder is Announced (the book I am just now starting--1960) . . . and to follow: 4.50 From Paddington (1957), Greenshaw's Folly (1960), The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (1962), A Caribbean Mystery (1964), At Bertram's Hotel (1965), They Do it with Mirrors (1952), A Pocket Full of Rye (1953), Nemesis (1971), Miss Marple's Final Cases (short stories--1979).  I see that the list given on the Agatha Christie website puts the books in a different reading order, so I might have to reassess my reading plans.  (No wonder I couldn't find my link to Sleeping Murder--I've not yet read it).

Oh well.  As I've started A Murder is Announced and she has already sucked me into the story, no use switching gears at this point.  The story involves one of those mystery games played at a party where one person pretends to be murdered and the rest are suspects and try and suss out just who did it.  In this case, however, someone actually is murdered.  It's the humor that got me.  I think this is going to be a fun read.  In the opening chapters a mother and her grown son are sitting at the breakfast table reading their respective newspapers, and the mother is making a running commentary of what she's reading:

"Bull mastiff puppies," read out Mrs.  Settenham.  "I really don't know how people manage to feed big dogs nowadays--I really don't . . . H'm, Selina Lawrence is advertising for a cook again.  I could tell her it's just a waste of time advertising in these days.  She hasn't put her address, only a box number--that's quite fatal--I could have told her so--servants simply insist on knowing where they are going.  They like a good address . . . False teeth--I can't think why false teeth are so popular.  Best prices paid . . . Beautiful bulbs.  Our special selection.  They sound rather cheap . . . Here's a girl wants an Interesting post--would travel.  I daresay!  Who wouldn't?  Dachshunds . . .  I've never really cared for dachshunds myself--I don't mean because they're German, because we've got all over that--I just don't care for them, that's all.  Yes, Mrs. Finch?"

And no, Mrs. Finch can't clear the dishes yet as Edmund was still eating his breakfast! 

isn't that great?  Can't you just picture this in your mind?  And Mrs. Settenham who thinks she knows everything and knows best and is most likely the worst busybody, but she's going to be entertaining as all get out to picture in my mind as I am reading!

Just what I need right now.

And unrelated to my Tuesday teaser, though this is a mystery project . . .  Remember when I shared this detail of a needlework project that I am working on?  I have finished it.  Literally finished it.  Last night I pulled out my sewing machine (how long has it been--I almost forgot how to work it!) and it sits here ready to go into the mail.  I have taken photos and will share them when the mystery project has arrived at its destination.  My first proper needlework finish of the year, which is not shabby at all considering I not only began it from scratch, but only in the last few weeks picked up needle and thread in earnest.  Maybe I am out of my needlework rut, which would be a good thing indeed.

Short Story Sunday: More Misc.

Since finishing Angela Carter's collection of short works, I'm not quite sure which direction my short story reading is going to take.  I have lots of collections and anthologies to choose from but I can't decide which to pick up, not sure what I'm 'hungry' for.  More stories by one author?  A themed anthology?  A collection of interlinked stories?  So another weekend of randomness, while I contemplate books.  Actually I do have a particular fancy in mind and a topic that is popular right now (and has been for quite some time).  Country house stories?  Yes, there are lots of books about that.  Stories, novels and mysteries with the setting and loads of books about just about every aspect of life in a country house.  And as luck would have it I even have a book of stories that fits the theme nicely. 

I'm sure I have mentioned English Country House Murders: Classic Crime Fiction of Britain's Upper Crust, edited by Thomas Godfrey, before.  As a matter of fact I read The Unlocked Window by Ethel Lina White a few years back, which is a story in the collection.  I was set to pick up a Miss Marple mystery (perfect rainy weekend weather reading--cozy and lots of country house locales in her stories) but then remembered this collection.  As luck would have it the collection includes a story by Agatha Christie. 

"The Shadow on the Glass" was published in 1930 under the title The Mysterious Mr. Quin.  He's a little like Miss Marple as a matter of fact.  He's not a detective, but he's someone who gets called in when all seems lost and sorts the mystery out by looking for the finer details in the bigger picture.  This is a classic Agatha Christie puzzle where you think the solution is straightforward and then she throws you for a loop, and when you discover the true nature of the crime you realize all the clues were there all along had you just paid closer attention.

This story involves a ghost, or rather a ghost story.  There is nothing like the promise of ghostly encounters to play on a characters' uncertainties and fears.  And it might prove, too, to be a red herring for the reader to try and sort out, too.  A weekend country house party will end in two dead and a much gossiped about woman holding the gun and getting the blame.  Literally.  What fun would a country house party be without a little jealousy and the possibility of scandal anyway?

Of those invited, two of the guests are newlyweds, one is a soldier, two couples, a General and the hosts themselves.  Is it poor planning that of the couples two of the individuals happened to be romantically involved before?  And the lady in question has a jealous streak.  She's a "dangerous woman".  She's known for causing problems, and it is in her hand that the gun will rest later in the story. 

The ghost may actually take a back seat in this story, but he's pivotal to the plotting.  He remains forever in one of the bedrooms looking out the window.  Legend has it he was the cuckolded husband whose wife's lover murdered.  No matter how many times that pane of glass has been broken and replaced it shows a discoloration where he watches the pair of lovers run away after their crime.  It is this room where the newlyweds have been placed.  Bad luck perhaps?  Even with the window boarded up?  It would seem that history has a way of repeating itself in a variety of sordid ways.

Perhaps I will continue on with this collection?  There are lots of big names included of the Golden Age of crime stories--G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham, Michael Innes as well as more contemporary notables like P.D. James and Ruth Rendell (and I might have read her story before, too . . .).  Well, check back next weekend, if you're curious.

* * * * *

This week's New Yorker story, "Box Sets", is by Roddy Doyle (whew--finally an author whose work I have read and am already familiar with).  Box sets refers to the TV shows that everyone seems to be addicted to, and the argument over which is best erupts in a pub one night.  "Mad Men" or "Breaking Bad"?  Or maybe better than all is "House of Cards"?  Since Sam has lost his job even when Ireland's economy is on the road to recovery he has all the time in the world to catch up on watching "The Killing" (Danish version, brilliant by the way).  I'm not quite sure but the story seems a pronouncement on the way we live our lives now, or the way we're forced to live them--"thirty years of box sets"--what he has to look forward to?  Unless he finds another job or finds something to better to pass his time with.  You can read this week's Q&A with the author here.

Short Story Sunday: Troubled Daughters

The suspense (not quite literally) was too much. I had to finish the last of the stories in Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives.  I've been enjoying my reading but I am ready to move on to some other short stories.  With only a handful left (a mere five), I settled myself in this weekend to a little short story reading extravaganza.  I don't want to give short shrift to anyone, so here is a little run down of the last of the stories.

So many of these authors seem to have been well-known and award winning writers yet they have disappeared from publisher backlists and bookstore shelves.  Hopefully this Weinman collection will give them a little well-deserved attention.  Charlotte Armstrong was quite prominent in the 1950s and 60s apparently.  She won an Edgar for one of her novels and several of her short stories were nominated for the award as well.  Marilyn Monroe starred in the movie Don't Bother to Knock which was based on Armstrong's novel Mischief.  In "Splintered Monday" (1966) the not entirely unexpected death of a woman prompts her sister to do a little detective work.  In a seemingly happy household there is resentment bubbling below the surface and what appears to have been simply an accident turns out to be far more sinister.

Dorothy Salisbury Davis is the lone living author in this collection of stories.  Sarah Paretsky has certainly "called" Davis's work correctly.  " . . . [she has] an awareness of how easy it is for ordinary people to do nasty  or wicked deeds . . . She lived among bootleggers, immigrants, sharecroppers, and itinerant workers in her early years, and there is a richness to her understanding of the human condition that is missing from most contemporary crime fiction."  The 1971 story "Lost Generation" is an unhappy and unnerving story.  It's a story of vigilante justice perpetrated by the very men who are meant to protect us.  It's what happens when someone speaks their mind, and their political orientation is different than that of others.  What is most chilling about it is the ending where a total innocent falls victim to their ruthlessness and I am undecided whether it was intentional or not. Every mother's nightmare.

Margaret Millar probably got tired of always being known as the wife of crime novelist Ross Macdonald.  She was a well respected and award winning mystery writer in her own right.  She wrote more than two dozen books, most of them crime stories (and I have a few on my own reading pile myself).  "The People of the Canyon" (1962) is the freakiest story in the collection.  Chilling in a way that is unexpected.  There are subtle jibes at American society, at least I saw them as such.  This is a story worth looking for (especially good in October for Carl's RIP reading event in case you want to store away the knowledge for later), so I won't give too much away.  The Bortons moved outside the city to get away from people so when new houses begin springing up, they are understandably disappointed.  Their only daughter takes a shine to their newest and nearest neighbors across the canyon--young, attractive and quite appealing to her eyes.  I will just say this--very, very, creepy.

Miriam Deford sounds like such an interesting woman.  She wrote not only mysteries, but science fiction and fantasy as well as true crime.  How she ever found the time to do everything else is beyond me.  She was heavily into campaigning for women's rights--most notably for disseminating information about birth control.  Interestingly she did research into paranormal activity, was one of the first female insurance claims adjusters, and was active in civil rights organizations such as the ACLU.  Her novels often (unsurprisingly) dealt with the themes of alienation and changing sexual roles.  In "Mortmain" (1944) a nurse caring for a wealthy, ill, older man offers her a temptation that she can't quite resist.  This is a case of you had better be careful of what you wish for.  The ending comes with a twist that I didn't quite seem coming.

The last story is by Celia Fremlin who was in domestic service for a while as well as was involved in Britain's Mass Observation Project polling ordinary people about their lives during the war years.  Her experiences gave her the impetus to begin writing.  Her first published novel won an Edgar and she went on to publish fifteen more suspense novels.  In "A Case of Maximum Need" (1977) elderly Miss Emmeline Fosdyke would rather take her chances than have a phone installed in her home.  She suffers from a number of health issues and none can be cured.  Her welfare worker doesn't understand her hesitation and forces the phone upon her even with Miss Fosdyke's remonstrations.  "NO, NO telephone, thank you.  It's too dangerous."  If she can't be cured it is no matter whether a doctor can come to her aid or not.  And besides she has her reasons for wanting to keep the phone as far away as possible.  Perhaps it's peace she wants.  It's three months before the phone rings.  On the other end someone is only breathing in the line.  Just what Miss Fosdyke wanted to avoid.  The welfare worker should have listened!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the stories in this collection.  Certainly some stories clicked better with me than others, but I can't thing of a single misstep amongst them.  If you like your crime on the vintage side, and with a domestic slant, do check this one out.  I know I will be exploring the work of many of the authors I've read!

* * * * *

How has Yiyun Li escaped my notice?  "A Sheltered Woman" is this week's New Yorker short story set in the Bay Area about a Chinese immigrant who is a baby nurse.  She stays with her nursing mothers only one month in order to get them started on a healthy regime and not to become too attached herself.  Easy perhaps since she is not a mother?  But what happens when neither parent is especially interested in the baby?  Li grew up in Beijing but has lived in the US since 1996.  She has published two story collections and several novels--her most recent came out last month, Kinder than Solitude.  Another new author to add to my ever growing list.  You can read a Q&A with Li here.

Short Story Sunday: The Stranger in the Car

Elisabeth Sanxay Holding's "The Stranger in the Car" published in 1949 in The American magazine, this week's short story installment is another really excellent read.  At just over 70 pages it is the longest story in Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives and she uses each and every page to fully develop her characters, the plot and the unravelling of the 'mystery' which is central to the story.  Nothing is wasted here and there are a few surprises including the ending, which I am still thinking about and wondering if it is not quite as straightforward as I first thought.  I kept thinking that this would make a great movie and was sure it must have been filmed, but apparently not.  But Holding's work has been adapted to the big screen.

I've already put in a library request for her novel, The Blank Wall, which Persephone Books reissued some years back.  It was made into a movie in 1949 under the title The Reckless Moment and then once again in 2001 as The Deep End.  Holding, a diplomat's wife, began by writing romances but switched to suspense stories after the stock market crashed in 1929.  Another case of a woman writer needing to help pay bills and make ends meet.  And a successful and lauded one at that.  Raymond Chandler was a fan.

"For my money she's the top suspense writer of them all.  She doesn't pour it one and make you feel irritated.  Her characters are wonderful; and she has a sort of inner calm which I find very attractive."

Do you get the feeling from that quote that Chandler must have gotten easily irritated by other writers?  Now I wonder What I am missing out on.  She wrote nineteen suspense novels.  Weinman calls her work "subtle, psychologically nuanced portraits of women making sense of troubled marriages, conflicted relationships with children, or intrigue thrown up by the larger world."  Now that I've read the story and am rereading Weinman's introduction to it, it sheds a little more light on things and I think there is more to the story than meets the eye. 

The story is narrated by the father of a young woman who may or may not have been involved in the murder of a man.  Carrol Charleroy is a business man who is used to being in charge and keeping things well under control.  His wife Helen has been ill with the flu and is recuperating in the hospital.  Almost all his decisions are informed by this and he hesitates at each step knowing he does not want her bothered or burdened by whatever shocking events have taken place.  One night as he waits up for his daughter Julia, he hears her stumble up the stairs.  When he checks on her he notices a red mark on the bridge of her nose.  And then the next morning she appears with a black eye.  The previous night the bruise had not had a chance to form.  Obviously something potentially awful and certainly disgraceful happened.

Julia is a girl of "inflexible pride and composure" assured of herself and in control.  But she cannot remember what happened the night before.  She went out with a family relative and his wife but came back with a man who is their friend.  A man who she recollects only vaguely.  She knows she left with him and that she somehow made it back home but whatever occurred between these two events is a complete blank.  Whatever happened, it can't get back to her mother.  It's decided that Miss Ewing, who taught the children piano and is a trusted and close family friend, will accompany Julia to the country where she can rest while her bruises fade.

There is something fishy going on. The reader knows it and so does Mr. Charleroy.  Nothing is spoken aloud but events quickly steamroll one after another.  First the body of a man appears and who is perhaps the same man who was with Julia the night before.  A detective begins asking difficult questions.  A wallet is discovered.  And another man claiming to know Julia, but who she refuses to see, shows up.  There is something possibly sinister and slightly seedy going on.  And such pains are taken to keep it all quiet, to not worry Helen.  But in the face of such sordidness Helen amazingly calm and collected that the reader wonders just who is really in control.

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"The Largesse of the Sea Maiden" by Denis Johnson is this week's New Yorker story (March 3 issue).  The story is episodic in nature; it reads almost as though it is broken into chapters.  Apparently Johnson (this is my first taste of his work by the way) has spent seven or eight years working on the story.  And he calls this one 'fast' story.  It seems he lets them percolate for many years between first inspiration and final draft.  You can read the Q&A with him here.  I love this line and it resonated with me:

"This morning I was assailed by such sadness at the velocity of life--the distance I've travelled from my own youth, the persistance of the old regrests, the new regrets, the ability of failure to freshen itself in novel forms--that I almost crashed the car."

Okay, all but that last bit resonated with me.  (I don't own a car to crash!).  I can so understand that velocity of life thing--I am going through that myself at the moment.  There is some wonderful subtle humor here, and I love the way he tells his story(ies).  The narrator is a man who has passed middle age and sort of reflects on his life--well, sort of.  It's more than just a slice of life sort of story, yet he tells about different people and experiences.  The tone is sort of melancholic--I liked it.  Definitely a story to read slowly.  He has won all sorts of awards including the National Book Award, so yet another author to go on my list of authors to explore and read more of.  He has a book coming out in the fall.

It’s called "The Laughing Monsters," and it’s due out from Farrar, Straus & Giroux next fall, if somebody would only finish writing it. It’s set in Sierra Leone, Congo, and Uganda. I believe it falls into the category of "literary thriller."

Hah--got a kick out of that answer.  I'll look for it!  He has a knack for good titles.

Short Story Sunday: The Purple Shroud

If you let yourself be carried away with Joyce Harrington's "The Purple Shroud" it could be a chilling story indeed.  I can't decide which pushed it over the edge for me when it comes to atmosphere--the ending or the cold calculatedness of the main character (most likely a mix of the two), who in this case is Mrs. Arlene Moon, artist and wife of an habitual philanderer.

Yet another new to me author, Joyce Harrington won an Edgar Award in 1973 for "The Purple Shroud" which also happened to be her very first short story, which she published in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine the previous year.   Harrington had a variety of jobs before turning to writing full time.  She was an actress, a wife and mother, she worked for a photography magazine and later worked in public relations.  During her career as a writer she was quite prolific publishing many short stories in several mystery magazines like EQMM.  She also wrote three novels though none appear to be in print any longer. 

"Retirement, along with greater fame as a short story writer, may be why Harrington's fiction work hasn't received the attention it deserves.  She was primarily concerned with human behavior and the motives for sliding into nefarious deeds, with twists that disturbed in their quiet intensity.  It's no wonder "The Purple Shroud" fared so well upon publication: its depiction of a toxic marriage and how a subjugated woman finds her way out still resonates today."

And that sums up beautifully how this week's story works out without giving away any plot twists.  I won't give any of them away either.  I will say, though, that the weaving Mrs. Moon so furiously had been working on in the beginning of the story was something of a curiosity to those she knew.  When asked what it was she was weaving, she jokingly replied a shroud.  Okay, maybe really it's just for draperies.  It reminded me, however, of the shroud Penelope ceaselessly weaves when Ulysses is away.

Weaving her purple shroud, an unusual color for Mrs. Moon, is how she passes the time when away at a summer artists' colony where her husband George teaches painting.  A competent artist, he excels at teaching where he molds and bullies his students into producing their best work.  She herself teaches craft therapy at a home for the aged.  And the summer artists colony is both work and relaxation for the two.  Well, certainly for George anyway.  

I won't go into just what George gets into on his summer holidays, or Arlene for that matter, so as not to ruin the story for you.  But Harrington offers some wonderful imagery in the story.  Like the spider in the room where Mrs. Moon works--she on her weaving and the spider on its web.  And there are occasional moments of black humor, too.

If Vera Caspary's "Sugar and Spice" is my favorite story so far in this collection, Joyce Harrington's comes in a close second.  Next up a story by Elisabeth Sanxay Holding, who was heralded by Raymond Chandler.  I've been looking forward to trying her work.

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This week's New Yorker story (Feb. 17 & 24 issue) is "Come Together" by Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgaard (translated by Don Bartlett--who by the way has translated quite a lot of Scandinavian crime fiction).  We were all children once, so why does childhood feel like such a distant land--so long ago and in my own mind almost entirely forgotten?  Knausgaard's story is wonderfully evocative.  Maybe I enjoyed it so much, even though we are separated by language, culture and sex--he writes about the period I was growing up, too, and I can see a lot of reality in the telling of it.  The story is a moment in time of an adolescent boy dealing with the pains of growing up and falling in "love" for the first time.

Apparently Knausgaard has written a series of six books, autobiographical in nature though fictionalized, under the blanket title My Struggle.  "Come Together" (Recognize the song title?  Music is very important in the story) is adapted from the third book in the cycle My Struggle: Boyhood, which is forthcoming.  Much like the Harrington story, this is one of my favorites so far from the New Yorker.  I liked it so much that I have already ordered (can't find it in any local libraries) the first book, My Struggle: Book One. 

There is an interesting Q&A with the author here.  As this is a double issue this week, I'll have a chance to do a little catching up with other reading until the next issue comes out March 3. 

Short Story Sunday: Everybody Needs a Mink

After the last couple of weeks of more lengthy short stories--especially the Caspary with its wonderful character and plot development, this week's short short story was over almost before I had a chance to make myself at home!  I've finally had a taste of Dorothy B. Hughes's work with her 1965 story "Everybody Needs a Mink".  It's not explicitly written and I had to skim again as there was never a shocking denouement or a sense of foreboding.  It's so subtly presented, I think I missed that moment where the epiphany arrives.  I'd say Dorothy Hughes, at least in this case, is all about understatement.

Dorothy B. Hughes is most decidedly on my reading radar and I have added several of her noir novels to my reading stacks.  I hope to get to one or more of them sooner than later and she will fit in quite nicely with my vintage mystery reading.  As a matter of fact I think I am going to line her up next after Josephine Tey (so had better get a move on with The Man in the Queue!).  Interestingly she began her career as a journalist and had published a book of poetry before turning to crime fiction.  Weinman notes that "the crime genre gave Hughes her true voice, one mixing a terse, hard-bitten style with a deep understanding of her flawed protagonists, who struggle to stay true to themselves as larger criminal forces threaten to overwhelm them."

Hughes wrote the bulk of her novels in the decade between 1940 and 1950 with a last novel in 1963.  Later she wrote shorter fiction and and did a lot of reviewing of crime novels.  Apparently (and maybe I'm glad of the fact), this particular short story is something of a departure from the style of her best known novels. 

If there is a flaw in Meggy Tashman it's that she lives outside her means.  Meggy--"that soignee young socialite of Larksville-nearly-on-the-Hudson".  I understand that only too well, though I have no desire for a mink coat.  Meggy is married with children.  She knows how to dress well and knows her own mind when it comes to clothes--the right cut and color and the right accessories.  And everything must be "good". 

On a buying trip to Randolphs in NYC for children's school clothes she decides to take a turn around the Fur Salon.  She spots the perfect mink--not only beautiful but practical, too. 

"Something to sling over the faded blues and Tash's old short on the dash from the vacuum cleaner to the supermarket.  Mink was so durable.  A lifetime investment.  So rich, so utter, utterly rich."

She really does have expensive tastes!  And it looks good on her too.  So good that a man in a salon asks her to model a coat--she being just the right size.  When she puts it on, it's as if the coat were made for her and she is like a teenager in her excitement.  It's all a game to her until she is told, after the man has left, that he has bought the coat for her and it is going to be delivered to her home.  She thinks it's a good gag all the way home--not expecting that anything will come of the encounter. 

But Monday morning there it is, monogrammed and everything.  "She didn't put it on.  It was like a firecracker waiting to explode."  Now the question is why?  Why would this man buy a total stranger a mink coat?  Money laundering?  A tax write-off?  She was waiting for the moment when the man comes back for his mink.  Nothing is free, right?  And so am I.  I expect it's meant to be left up to the reader's imagination.  Hughes drops a few hints along the way, but all in all this is a pretty tame short story--as thrillers go that is.  

I was sort of expecting more from Hughes and this story, but I think I won't be disappointed in her novels.  Next up is a story by Joyce Harrington.

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This week's New Yorker story (February 10 issue) is by Zadie Smith and it is currently 'in progress'--am reading it today.  I'll be back soon to tell you about it.  A cursory look and I have to admit I think this weekend's short story reading is all around disappointing (that meaning that the subject matter of Zadie Smith's story isn't all that appealing to me, but I expect it to be entirely well executed), but I am keeping an open mind.