Tue 21 Aug 2007
After Jamie Sturgeon sent me the floor plan of the college that’s the center of Midnight, by the multi-author Mark Strange, I mentioned to him that I love maps and floor plans in detective novels.
In reply, he sent me this one — see below — a floor plan from The Cat and Fiddle Murders by E.B. Ronald which he recently obtained. He goes on to say, “It could be the most complicated one I have ever seen in a crime novel!”
I second the motion. I haven’t even asked him what the story’s about. I think that you could probably write your own after seeing this. I hope you can see all of the details.
[UPDATE] 08-31-07. Jamie responds:
“Al has it that The Cat and Fiddle Murders is set in New York City when it actually takes place in London. Is it possible that the American version had the setting changed? It appears that the author’s book as Ronald Barker Clue for Murder has, according to one ABE bookseller, several floor plans!”
Me again. After I posed the question to him about the setting, Al agrees that he was most likely in error and has made the correction in the latest online Addenda to the Revised Crime Fiction IV.
As for Clue for Murder, as soon as I learned about this, I immediately ordered the one cheap copy of it to be found on ABE. More than likely, I’ll report back later.
August 26th, 2007 at 1:18 am
If you love maps, how about floor plans for Nero Wolfe’s brownstone?
http://johnclaytonsr.com/Wolfe/Intro.htm
August 26th, 2007 at 10:54 am
Steve-
Oh my, yes. Thanks for the link. Those are nice. I hadn’t seen them before.
I don’t think there were any floor plans in any of the Nero Wolfe novels themselves, but if I’m wrong, I’d love to be corrected.
I have a feeling that it was Baring-Gould’s book Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street where the first attempt was made to map out the NW residence. I’ve checked the backs of the few times Wolfe appeared in the Dell mapback series, and as far as I’ve been able to tell, the “map” was invariably the scene of the crime — not surprisingly, I suppose!
— Steve
August 27th, 2007 at 12:01 am
No, no there were no floor plans in any of the books/novellas/short stories. Baring-Gould was probably the first to try to describe the house in full; Archie was occasionally haphazard. Sometimes the painting behind Wolfe’s desk was a waterfall and sometimes something else, if I remember correctly.