Tue 3 Nov 2009
JAMES ANDERSON – Assault and Matrimony.
Doubleday/Crime Club, hardcover, 1981. UK edition: Frederick Muller Ltd., hc, 1980. TV movie: NBC, 1987 (with Jill Eikenberry & Michael Tucker).
On the surface, Sylvia and Edgar Chambers have a marriage that is too good to be true. In fact, it isn’t. Unknown to either, each hates the other with a passion, and it takes only a nudge to send them both completely over the edge.
The comedy of errors that quickly follows is deeply tinged in black. Each of these two basically unlikeable people tries in fierce desperation to kill the other — and any innocent bystanders who happen to be wandering by — and yet neither of them quite manages to succeed.
There is not an ounce of conscience between them. It would not be at all difficult for the easily disillusioned reader to become completely exasperated with both of them, giving up with disgust at the seemingly endless variety of their elaborately structured plots.
Fortunately, the ending is even more clever and complex, surpassing anything either of them has come up with before then. It’s a challenge, but it’s also well worth the wait.
(This review also appeared earlier in the Hartford Courant.)
[UPDATE] 11-03-09. I still have the book but not the patience to find out which of many, many boxes in the basement it could possibly be in. It’s a shame, too, as the ending (as I’ve described it) intrigues me. Do I remember it? In a word, no, I don’t. (That’s a heck of a thing, isn’t it?)
James Anderson, a British author, made a specialty in his early career of writing books whose titles begin with the letter “A” (The Alpha List, Angel of Death, Appearance of Evil, Assassin and so on).
Later on he wrote three well-regarded detective mysteries taking place in the 1930s and solved by Inspector Wilkins (e.g., The Affair of the Blood-Stained Egg-Cosy) and three Murder, She Wrote novelizations (with Jessica Fletcher).
[UPDATE #2.] 11-11-09. Thanks to Jamie Sturgeon for sending me the cover image at the top of this review. It’s from the Muller edition, not the Crime Club edition I own but which remains unseen for anyone for almost 30 years, including me.
November 3rd, 2009 at 1:34 am
Anderson’s early thrillers in the Eric Ambler tradition were good, and I liked the two send ups of the 30’s British mystery, but later books didn’t hold my interest as well.
November 3rd, 2009 at 10:35 am
I read Assault and Matrimony as a kid. Other than enjoying it, I can’t remember a thing about that book.
It was later made into a tv movie starring Michael Tucker and Jill Eikenberry, which I’ve yet to watch.
Those two send-ups were thoroughly entertaining. They reminded me a bit of Murder at Moorstone Manor, from Michael Palin’s RIPPING YARNS. Good stuff.
November 3rd, 2009 at 10:51 am
David and Dozy
There were three books in Anderson’s retro-1930s murder-in-the-manor house series. The third one was The Affair of the 39 Cufflinks, which came out in 2003, over 20 years after the previous one. I didn’t care for it as much as I did the first two, but since those two were absolutely terrific, it was going to be hard to maintain the standard anyway.
Thanks to an email from Jamie Sturgeon, who also mentioned the TV movie (with both leads having begun in the series LA Law only the year before), I’d just finished adding it to the credits when I saw that you’d reminded me of the same thing here as a comment, Dozy.
The movie isn’t available on DVD, but I looked on Amazon a minute or so ago and I was able to snap a copy up new on video tape for $2.00 plus postage.
I don’t mind video tapes. The picture quality on them is almost always fine and they seem to hold up well in terms of long term storage. Many of mine are now well over 20 years old.
November 5th, 2009 at 1:15 am
Steve
The VHS have held up much better than we were ever led to believe. I have some from 1981 that are still crisp with no dropout, and they haven’t been stored in optimal conditions either. These include some I recorded myself in slp format. I’m curious if DVD’s will keep half as well.
One caveat on the VHS though. Some of the later ones recorded on those longer tapes do not hold up. The 8 hour are fine but some of the 9 and 10 hour tapes just do not last. A few barely hold up to a third or fourth playing, especially the 10 hour tapes. I’ve had to repair and copy almost all of those to DVD.
The main problem with VHS is space. My DVD’s take up a couple of drawers and some space in a hall closet. The VHS most of the garage — that isn’t filled with books. Takes half the night to find the right VHS, a few minutes for the right DVD.
April 19th, 2010 at 5:12 pm
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