Tue 7 Nov 2023
Diary Mystery Review: ELLERY QUEEN – What’s in the Dark?
Posted by Steve under Diary Reviews[2] Comments
ELLERY QUEEN – What’s in the Dark? Capt. Tim Corrigan #6. Popular Library, paperback original; 1st printing, 1968. Dale Books, paperback, 1978. Zebra, paperback, 1985.
Captain Tim Corrigan is assigned to a murder case on the night of New York City’s “Great Blackout.†The suspects are all trapped on the 21st floor with the body while Corrigan’s investigation goes on. And of course the blackout helps provide the means for establishing the killer’s guilt.
The psychology of crumbling inhibitions is emphasized, but Corrigan and his detective pal Chuck Baer still have too great a tendency to climb into bed with their suspects. That and an early emphasis on Miss Graves’ mammae make this novel [considerably] different from EQ’s more conventional mysteries.
[It’s] strictly enjoyable, though, and the reader has a fair chance to grab the essential clue on page 45. I shall look for more. [Books in the series, that is, not clues. per se.]
Rating: ***½
UPDATE: Reading this old review tonight for the first time in 55 years, it does not appear that back when wrote it I knew that the book was not written by “Ellery Queen.” It was ghost-written instead by Richard Deming, who as it turns out was the actual author of four of the overall six Tim Corrigan novels.
November 8th, 2023 at 9:19 pm
Probably the most successful of the Queen series characters not created by Dannay and Lee, the Corrigan books are paperback originals, but interesting ones, and I seem to recall Deming at least mentions Corrigan having to compensate for the eye patch a few times unlike say Steve Harrigan.
They are very much of their time with all the flaws and strengths that implies, but Deming seemed to take some actual effort with these, they had attractive covers, and for your money weren’t a bad investment for an hour or so of entertainment.
I suppose today these would be packaged as Ellery Queen with Richard Deming, the way the Cussler, Ludlum, Patterson, and many others are.
November 9th, 2023 at 12:27 pm
“Probably the most successful of the Queen series characters not created by Dannay and Lee, the Corrigan books are paperback originals…”
True enough, but other than “Ellery Queen” himself, the only other series character ghosted under the EQ byline was Mike McCall, also known as The Troubleshooter. There were three of these, and I was not impressed by the one I read.
All of the other EQ books written by others were non-series titles, with quite a range in quality.