Fri 19 Jun 2009
Review: ELLERY QUEEN – The Siamese Twin Mystery.
Posted by Steve under Covers , Reviews[15] Comments
ELLERY QUEEN – The Siamese Twin Mystery.
Frederick A. Stokes, hardcover, October 1933. Reprinted many times, in both hardcover and soft, including: Pocket Books #109, 1st printing, June 1941; Pocket #109, 10th printing, 1950; Pocket 6135, 12th printing, 1962; Signet T4086, 1970. (All shown.)
I don’t know how long I’ll last on this particular resolution, it not being New Year’s and all, but I’ve promised myself that if I can, I’ll go back and start re-reading some (not all) of the books I devoured while I was growing up.
This is the first one, and you can mark me as I go, although I probably won’t always be mapping and pointing the trail out along the way.
I don’t know when I read this one the first time — I didn’t even realize that you were allowed to have opinions about books and movies until I was in junior high — and I really thought about keeping records of what I read until 1970 or so.
And all I remember from the first reading of The Siamese Twin Mystery is the fire that drives Ellery and his dad, Inspector Queen, farther and farther up a mountain, flames licking at their tires most of the way.
Ellery was driving his Duesenberg, a model of car the name of which thrilled me in itself, and one so old that my spell-checker doesn’t even recognize it. The rest of the story was a blank, though. I didn’t remember a thing.
J. J. McC.’s foreword states the locale as Arrow Mountain, a peak in the Tepee range, which Google says is in Wyoming, perhaps extending as far south as Utah, but most definitely “in the heart of the ancient Indian country.”
There at the top of the mountain, with no route to safety open to them, they take refuge in (guess what) an isolated pile of a mansion in which (you guessed) a murder is about to take place, and in fact, eventually, two.
And not only is this an “isolated county manor” sort of story, but there are two dying messages involved — both in the form of torn playing cards found in the hands of each of the victims.
Bizarre circumstances, gruesome murders, eerie surroundings, this is a detective story that has it all, settingwise, even a pair of conjoined (Siamese) twins. (No surprise there.)
The actual detection, though, I thought was a trifle labored in comparison. The edition (a 3rd printing Pocket paperback from 1941) that I just finished did not even have a “Challenge to the Reader.”
Not that I have ever been up to the challenge of one of those, but for an Ellery Queen yarn, the explanation at the end made me think I might have gotten this one.
Well, the solution was clever enough, but I would have been close. Or I might have, I’m sure, if I’d thought about it. Ellery Queen’s solution are always obvious. Afterward.
There is a good legal question that arose at one point — and don’t take my bringing this up as my in any way letting slip the identity of the killer(s) — but if one of the Siamese twins had done it, how could he have been punished, without punishing the (possibly innocent) other?
This is a question I remember reading about somewhere before. Was there another tale, short story or novel, by another author perhaps, where the question also arose, or is one of the other things I remember from this mystery — besides the Duesenberg working its way up the mountain, that is?
PostScript. Got a favorite cover among this choice of five? Is there one that stands out for you and would make you want to buy the book as soon as you saw it? At cover price? There’s one for me, that’s for sure.
June 19th, 2009 at 7:01 am
This was one of my favorite books while growing up. The whole situation fascinated me. The isolation due to a forest fire seems classic mystery.
There was a TV documentary about the Dusenberg. It included a photograph of Gary Cooper standing next to his Dusenberg.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:30 am
There is a very interesting short story by Stanley Ellin where the twins plot a murder and decides to bale each other out in court by testifying against one another.The elder twin is arrested first but is acquitted when his brother testifies that he himself (younger) was the killer. Later, the younger twin is arrested and tried with the same stunt being carried out to get the acquittal. The narration of the story ends by saying that the twins didn’t get away with their stunt but as to how or why they couldn’t escape the law….
June 19th, 2009 at 10:54 am
Mike
The book’s a classic, all right, both in setting and mood, not to mention the iconic dying messages…
Arun
Thanks for bringing up the Ellin story. I’d be willing to bet that that’s the tale I remember, about Siamese twins trying to take advantage of the legal system. But it sound as though Ellery Queen got there first!
June 19th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
I would be willing to bet that for most of us the part we recall most about this is the Dusenberg (there’s a good photo of one on the back of one of Clive Cussler’s books), the forest fire, and Ellery “distracting” the doomed survivors by deconstructing the crime for them. I think I read this, Chinese Orange, and Egyptian Cross in the same week one summer when Signet reissued them with those awful photographic covers.
I always felt this was the start of the transition to the more mature Ellery that emerged in The Door Between (Julian Symons found the two Queen’s so different he decided they were brothers and the younger one took over when the older one retired to Italy).
Honestly I don’t recall much about the mystery or the solution, or even if there was a ‘Challenge to the Reader” (which even showed up in one Ellery comic book), but I recall the Duse or Deuce (as they are known) and the fire vividly. Proof perhaps that the cousins were better writers than they are sometimes given credit for.
The Siamese twins of course brings to mind the famous originals whose own end was pretty gruesome. When one of the brothers died the other either died of the putrefaction and poisons spreading through his twins body or simply the horror of being attached to a corpse. Post Mortem it was found that they could easily have been separated even with the low technology of 19th century medicine. Adding irony to injury I suppose.
Steve
Well, clearly the attractive lady in distress on the Pocket Book cover is my preference, though from a design point the first hardcover jacket is nice. I must say Ellery got a lot more action on the covers of those Pocket Book editions than he ever did in the interior.
June 20th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
I read the 5th paperback. I had most of the EQ titles with this type of cover. I was in HS at the time, and a teacher had a *talk* with me about the type of books I was reading (based on these slightly sexy covers).
But the book itself was a wonder. The fire impeding outside help, the crablike figure in the hall at night. In terms of playing cards as dying clues, let’s not forget The Case of the Crumpled Knave by Boucher.
June 20th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
Reading Jeff Marks comment about the teacher who had a talk with him about the type of books he was reading because of the sexy covers, reminded me of my experience in 9th grade in 1956. It was a large class of non-readers and the teacher was clearly exasperated because it appeared that no one was interested in reading at all. She asked if anyone was reading anything on their own for enjoyment.
At first she was happy when I raised my hand but then she was struck speechless when I said I was reading Erskine Caldwell’s novels, such as GOD’S LITTLE ACRE and TOBACCO ROAD. I didn’t mention the massive amount of science fiction that I was consuming because I knew most adults did not consider SF to be literature.
What attracted to me to Erskine Caldwell was the great James Avati covers on the Signet paperbacks. He had a tremendous impact on paperback cover art and was widely imitated.
June 20th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Walker, Did you get an “A” in that class? I hope you did!
— Steve
June 21st, 2009 at 11:32 pm
I can recall in 8th grade reading Alistair MacLean’s Guns of Navarone and Paul Wellman’s The Comancheros, and the Study Hall teacher borrowing books from me.
My one brush with the cover art problem was reading Diamonds Are Forever on a school bus — the Signet one with the pink cover and the blond wearing nothing but bra and panties on the cover (Barye Phillips art). Didn’t get confiscated but the teacher suggested I read it at home.
I did end up in the Vice Principal’s office once, but only because he saw me reading Seven Days in May. He had just finished it and was dying to talk about it.
A friend who had a twin brother who wasn’t very good at reading somehow ended up in the remedial English class intended for his brother. He decided it was an easy A and didn’t say anything, but after a few weeks of reading Diver Dan the teacher caught him reading The Liquidator by John Gardner. He was promptly transferred to a more advanced class. Upset him too. He never did find out what happened to Diver Dan.
In college to avoid chemistry I took a course in astronomy, and for extra credit went to a big convention being held not too far away. While there I ducked out of a terrifically boring paper on sunspots and found a quiet Englishman in the hall with me doing the same thing. We somehow got to talking about science fiction, and he asked me who my favorite was. I told him at the time it was Fred Hoyle. I thought he seemed awfully pleased.
It wasn’t until he lectured the next day I realized it was Fred Hoyle — Fred ‘Big Bang’ — ‘Steady State” Hoyle. Of course it could have been worse. I might have said my favorite sf writer was J.G. Ballard. Still, I can’t believe I had Fred Hoyle to my self and all we talked about was Ossian’s Ride and Olaf Stapledon.
June 22nd, 2009 at 5:13 am
Lucky it was not me talking to Fred Hoyle because I would have said my favorite SF writer was J.G. Ballard. Another writer like Ross Macdonald, that I can read over and over because of the different levels of meaning and complex characterization.
June 22nd, 2009 at 5:28 pm
I’d probably say Ballard too today, but at the time I had just discovered Hoyle and hadn’t read Ballard yet.
At least when I met George Pal I had enough presence of mind to say The Time Machine was one of my favorite films of all time, and keep my mouth shut about Doc Savage. These situations are fraught with hidden dangers involving large feet and larger mouths.
July 16th, 2010 at 8:32 am
I discovered EQ the summer I turned 14, and the books totally changed my way of looking at the world: logic, find the pattern, etc. I love them still today.
“Siamese Twin,” I suspect, began as a twist on the old “detective and suspects trapped by a snowstorm” storyline: instead of snow, there’s fire! There’s no “Challenge to the Reader,” I think, because that would have interrupted the suspense and the flow of the story. It was the first of their dying message stories, too.
While it would make a good film — imagine Alexis Denisof, Wesley of “Angel,” as Ellery, and John Mahoney of “Frasier” as the Inspector — it would have to be a period piece. Nowadays a helicopter could lift the trapped people off the mountaintop.
Try “Cat of Many Tails”: it’s one of the first serial killer novels ever, and the very best of Ellery.
July 16th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Oh, and by the way, the Duesenberg, which showed up first in “Egyptian Cross,” wasn’t the ultra-luxurious SJ that was widely regarded as one of the finest cars available then, and was terrifically expensive too boot. Ellery’s was supposed to be old even in the ’30s, an ancient racing model. Anybody ever find a picture of a racing Duesenberg?
August 28th, 2012 at 5:29 pm
Sorry to come into this discussion so late…but there’s another mystery involving Siamese twins – “The Monster,” a story by Vincent Cornier (published by Crippen & Landru in their Cornier collection called “Duel of Shadows.” It’s a chilling story with a similar problem – and it’s highly recommended.
As for “The Siamese Twin Mystery,” although it has been a long time since I read it, I recall it as one of the best of the early EQ books – and, like you, I was enthralled by the use of the forest fire to build suspense and a sense of urgency.
July 6th, 2015 at 2:10 am
Regarding your question about the story,are you thinking of the Tales from the Crypt episode with the two twins and one is a nice guy and the other is evil and commits a murder because he thinks he will not get convicted but wakes up to find…..
November 20th, 2022 at 1:30 pm
[…] Siamese Twin Mystery has been reviewed, among others, by Steve Lewis at ‘Mystery File’, Steve Barge at ‘In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel’, Complete Disregard for Spoilers, […]