Wed 21 Mar 2018
Archived Review: E. C. R. LORAC – Shepherd’s Crook.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Reviews[8] Comments
E. C. R. LORAC – Shepherd’s Crook. Inspector Robert Macdonald #38. Doubleday Crime Club, US, hardcover, 1953. First published in the UK as Crook o’ Lune (Collins Crime Club, hardcover, 1953).
Inspector Macdonald of Scotland Yard is thinking of retirement, getting away from the crowded bustle of London and starting a farm, so while on leave he heads for Lancashire sheep country — and instead of rustic quiet, finds yet another mystery on his hands.
The death of an elderly housekeeper in a fire, while not intended, may be due to the work of sheep thieves, or it may be a matter of a will that dates from 1690. The pace may be slow, but the place setting is aptly described, and every word is there to be savored.
[UPDATE.] I don’t remember how Macdonald’s proposed retirement worked out in the book itself, but in the real world, he had eight additional recorded case to follow this one. His career began with The Murder on the Burrows in 1931, and came to a close with Dishonour Among Thieves aka The Last Escape in 1959.
Lorac’s books are becoming scarce. I found only one copy of the US edition on abebooks.com just now, for example, the asking price for that one being a mere $99.95. Three copies of the British edition are offered there, however, including one in fair condition for $36.06.
Although not yet this one, some of Lorac’s novels have recently been reprinted, first by by Ramble House and then more recently by British Library Crime Classics. Hopefully there will be enough interest to warrant more to come.
For as much as is known about Lorac herself, her real name Edith Caroline Rivett, (1894-1958), check out Curtis Evans’ Passing Tramp blog here: http://thepassingtramp.blogspot.com/2017/09/edith-caroline-rivett-1894-1958-aka-ecr.html
March 22nd, 2018 at 6:22 am
I’m amazed sometimes when I see the British “Golden Age” books be reprinted now as ebooks. When I think of how hard they were to find in Britain even 20 years ago, this has to be a good thing, right?
Collins had a number of Lorac and Carol Carnac books in their White Circle Crime Club paperback series, mostly in the 1950s.
March 22nd, 2018 at 4:50 pm
I’ve only read five or Lorac’s books. Favorite so far: “The Case of Colonel Marchand” (1933). Also “Death of an Author” (1935) has some good stuff in it. Am looking forward to reading some more of the reprints coming out.
So far I’ve much preferred her 1930’s books to her post-1945 ones. This could change though, as more are read.
March 22nd, 2018 at 5:01 pm
I wish I’d said more about the mystery back then when I wrote this review. I seem to have enjoyed the book but I didn’t say much if anything about the detective end of things.
March 22nd, 2018 at 5:05 pm
Jeff
You’re absolutely right that all the current fad for reprinting Golden Age mysteries is a good thing, whether British or homegrown.
Those publishers doing them must be right on the edge of making money on them. There can’t really be all that much interest in them, but I hope they keep them coming.
March 22nd, 2018 at 10:55 pm
Lorac is actually one of the better known names being reprinted, along with Farjeon, Gregg, Punshon, John G. Brandon, and many others. Between the historical revivals of the British school of fair-play mystery (also numerous) and reprints it’s a small but growing boom for readers.
March 26th, 2018 at 8:08 pm
Re her detective’s hopes of retirement — I recently read THE LAST ESCAPE, MacDonald’s last recorded case, and as I recall in that one he seems to be still not yet quite retired, though planning to do so soonish.
In it he has got to the point of purchasing a farm in the North for that eventual retirement, hiring a married couple he encountered in a previous book (which I’ve not read) to run it for him, as he can only get up there now and then. (Inevitably, though, he is on the scene when a long-dead body is found in an essentially abandoned house on an adjoining farm.)
I thought it the weakest of the four or five Loracs I’ve read so far (not much mystery to it), but I intend to keep reading her books when I can find them — which is not all that often.
March 26th, 2018 at 9:05 pm
Thanks, Denny, for the info about Macdonald’s apparently long-delayed retirement plans. Obviously just another guy who can’t quite quit a job he loves doing.
I really think more of Lorac’s work ought to be reprinted. Including the other 20 or so she wrote as Carol Carnac, many of which have never been published in this country.
March 26th, 2018 at 8:11 pm
Argghh. Strike the “whom” from my comment — a vestige of an first draft version of the sentence which I missed deleting when rewriting it. (It’s a well-known fact that allowing a “whom” to enter into any offhand post on the net is just *asking* for trouble.)