REVIEWED BY DAN STUMPF:         


LAWRENCE TREAT Over the Edge

  LAWRENCE TREAT – Over the Edge. Ace Double D-51, reprint paperback, abridged edition, 1954. Published dos-à-dos with Switcheroo, by Emmett McDowell. Originally published by William Morrow & Co., hardcover, 1948.

   Over the Edge plumbs some of the same pipes as The Big Clock, to good effect. Alec Rambeau, the central character, is empaneled on a jury in a murder trial and finds that the murdered woman in the case was recently his lover — he didn’t recognize her married name.

   Nagged by guilt (he’s married) Alec pushes for conviction of her suspect/husband in a nicely-turned scene that reads like a reverse 12 Angry Men, skillfully turning the other jurors to his side and sending the accused to the Death House … only to discover later that the man is innocent.

LAWRENCE TREAT Over the Edge

   What follows is a tricky, twisting detection-dance, as Alec tries to investigate the murder and the dead woman’s relationships without revealing his own involvement. Neat enough, but the author puts yet another spin on things as we begin to question just how innocent Alec really is.

   Writing in the third person, Treat reveals/withholds just enough to keep us guessing right up to the last suspenseful chapter, which is skillful writing indeed, and the kind of thing I’ll look for more of.

   Oh. The flip side of this Ace Double is Switcheroo, by Emmett McDowell; a mystery-comedy that could be charitably described as Belabored.