Thu 7 Apr 2016
Archived Mystery Review: REGINALD BRETNOR – A Killing in Swords.
Posted by Steve under Reviews[13] Comments
REGINALD BRETNOR – A Killing in Swords. Pocket, paperback original, 1978.
As far as I know, this book was never on sale in the Hartford area. I had to go all the way to Massachusetts for a copy, but even though Bretnor is pretty well-known to long-time readers of science fiction (follow the link), I’m awfully glad that that’s not the only reason I drove so far on such a hot day.
I read a lot of mysteries, as you may have noticed, but there aren’t many that are actually hard work to read. This one was, and it’s hard even to find anything good to say about it.
Doing the detective work is a San Francisco antique weapons dealer named Alastair Alexandrovitch Timuroff, which right away explains his overpowering Continental accent that only someone with a name like Zsa Zsa can get away with, and wouldn’t you know it, every last one of the suspects and all of the other main characters collect either swords, knives, guns or some other sort of lethal object.
Dead is the city’s mayor, with his pants down, evidently while he was trying to mount one of the ultra-realistic mechanical women populating the home of eccentric genius inventor Dr. Grimwood.
I’m serious. And I think Brettnor was, too. There is a question of locked doors, but maybe not, since that part of the case was never followed up. With all the secret doors and passageways infiltrating the place, it probably doesn’t really matter.
What Bretnor seems to have been aiming for is the vintage flavor of 1930s Ellery Queen or Philo Vance, but perhaps writing a mystery story is harder than people think. Bizarre events and weird characters are not what I want in a detective story. I want people who can think logically instead of careening around in idle chit-chat. I want an investigation carried on by first-hand observation and personal interrogation and not indirectly through rumors and suppositions and half-baked accusations.
I don’t want pages and pages on pseudo-Indian religions. Dirty limericks, well, OK, maybe.
Enough. What else can I say? This is a book that misfires enough to be bad without yet being bad enough for it to be read and enjoyed for its own sake. I’d suggest skipping this one.
Bibliographic Note: This was the author’s only mystery novel.
April 7th, 2016 at 1:28 pm
I hate to admit this, but I may have been wrong. I said in this review that I thought Bretnor was serious when he wrote this novel. There is no way at the moment I can know for sure, but my younger self may have completely misconstrued his intent.
Even so, humor, or the attempt thereof, may easily lead to very differing reactions. If I were to read the book again, should it ever turn up again somewhere in my collection, my opinion of the book may not be the same. On the other hand, maybe it will.
April 7th, 2016 at 3:11 pm
Bretnor was best known as a humorist in the science fiction genre, chances are he was trying for that here. He did some good shorts in EQMM, but this novel just didn’t quite cut it.
April 7th, 2016 at 4:23 pm
Thanks for the reminder. While researching Bretnor a little bit while getting this old review ready to post, I forgot to check out any possible short detective fiction writing he may have done. You’re right. He did.
From the online Crime Fiction Index:
BRETNOR, REGINALD; [legalized from Alfred Reginald Kahn] (1911-1992) (stories)
Specimen of the Week (ss) Game & Gossip Jan 12 1951
Paper Tiger (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine May 1969
The Greatest of All Webley Collectors (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Jul 1970
A Matter of Equine Ballistics (nv) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Sep 1971
The Accident Epidemic (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Dec 1977
Wonder Cure (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Mar 25 1981
The New Reality (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Sep 1984
The Murderers’ Circle (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Jul 1988
The Photography of the Dearest Defunct (ss) Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine Jul 1990 [Alastair Alexandrovitch Timuroff]
April 7th, 2016 at 4:53 pm
I suppose Bretnor’s greatest claim to fame is as the creator (under the name Grendel Briarton) of Through Time and Space with Ferdinand Feghoot, a series of short-short stories ending in elaborate puns. I remember reading them with a mixture of pain and pleasure in F&SF and other mags.
April 7th, 2016 at 4:54 pm
Memory might fail me here, but I believe “A Matter of Equine Ballistics” also featured Timuroff.
Although A KILLING IN SWORDS was no great shakes, I enjoyed it, as I have almost everything I have read by Bretnor.
April 8th, 2016 at 7:56 am
I’ve read Bretnor’s SF but that’s about it.
April 8th, 2016 at 9:40 am
Jerry, Comment #5:
I am delighted and I confess, a little surprised, to find another person who has read this book. I have a feeling that not too many people have. It just goes to show that this blog attracts all the best kind of people.
April 8th, 2016 at 2:16 pm
Jerry is right about Timuroff being in tbe “Webley Collector” story. I read SWORDS as well since I had enjoyed the Timuroff shorts, but what worked in short stories didn’t really pay off in the long form.
April 8th, 2016 at 2:56 pm
David,
It wasn’t clear from your Comment #2 that you’d actually read the book. Now that makes two others who have, and I’m doubly amazed.
April 8th, 2016 at 3:37 pm
I’m delighted to learn this was his only mystery novel. In years past I tended to specialize in writers who were prolific — which accounts for the size of my collection!
April 8th, 2016 at 9:23 pm
Now that I have run out of space, I have decided to specialize in authors who wrote no books at all.
April 15th, 2016 at 11:53 am
I will volunteer my OBRAS COMPLETAS for your stacks, then. (Well, I do have an essay in one fat, 2-volume anthology.)
Bretnor was also memorable for his Papa Schimmelhorn stories, which start so well and by the end of the series are expressions of some of the more virulent misogyny in the history of SF, a field which has also featured essays of this sort from the likes of Heinlein, who thought he was praising women, and Wylie, who knew he wasn’t.
April 15th, 2016 at 2:09 pm
I hated this one when I forced myself through it a few years ago — but then, I dislike most of Bretnor’s sf as well.