Sat 25 Sep 2010
Reviewed by William F. Deeck: D. B. OLSEN – Cats Don’t Smile.
Posted by Steve under Bibliographies, Lists & Checklists , Characters , Reviews[3] Comments
William F. Deeck
D. B. OLSEN [aka DOLORES HITCHENS] – Cats Don’t Smile. Doubleday Doran/Crime Club, hardcover, 1945. Later published in Two Complete Detective Books #36, pulp magazine, January 1946 (with She Fell Among Actors, by James Warren).
Rachel and Jennifer Murdock, whose exploits — if Jennifer can be said to engage in exploits — Olsen has chronicled before and after this novel, go to Sacramento, Calif., to house-sit for Cousin Julia, who for reasons she doesn’t explain must leave the house and does not want her roomers unsupervised.
Miss Rachel embroils herself in the roomers’ affairs and those of the next-door neighbors. Before she can meddle much, one of the roomers is murdered.
For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOL’s are preferred. For my part, I have always thought Jane Marple was the perfect type. Not for her the burglary at dead of night or skulking in gardens eluding who knows what.
Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder. However, I had difficulty in accepting the solution, for reasons which I won’t go into since it would reveal the murderer’s identity.
Warning: Cat lovers may be upset by one of the incidents in the novel.
The Rachel & Jennifer Murdock series —
The Cat Saw Murder. 1939. [Doubleday Crime Club for all but one.]
The Alarm of the Black Cat, 1942.
Cat’s Claw. 1943.
Catspaw for Murder. 1943.
The Cat Wears a Noose. 1944.
Cats Don’t Smile. 1945.
Cats Don’t Need Coffins, 1946.
Cats Have Tall Shadows. Ziff-Davis, 1948
The Cat Wears a Mask. 1949.
Death Wears Cat’s Eyes. 1950.
The Cat and Capricorn. 1951.
The Cat Walk, 1953.
Death Walks on Cat Feet. 1956.
September 25th, 2010 at 9:36 pm
I liked Hitchens much better writing under her own name and with Bert, her husband. F.O.B. MURDER was a stand out. Never got into D.B. Olsen.
September 25th, 2010 at 10:08 pm
And everyone thought “cat mysteries” were a recent fad.
I’ve read one of these, but I don’t remember which. It was OK, but you’re certainly right about Hitchens’ books being much more to our liking (yours and mine) when she was writing about Hitchens.
[…]
Make that three of us. From the Ziff-Davis Fingerprint Mystery page
https://mysteryfile.com/ZiffDavis/Fingerprint.html
“She did her best work as Dolores Hitchens, producing several very good suspense novels and two excellent private eye novels featuring a character named Sader. One of these, SLEEP WITH SLANDER, Bill [Pronzini] considers the best traditional male private eye mystery by a woman, just edging out Leigh Brackett’s NO GOOD FROM A CORPSE.”
September 26th, 2010 at 6:04 pm
And to think how the critics used to carp about the North’s cats. Though I guess everything old really is new again. And of course there was the Gordons D.C. Randall aka Undercover Cat.
Never did figure out the cat as detective thing. I have to direct mine to their supper dish every night.