FENN McGREW [Julia McGrew & Caroline J. Fenn] —
        ●   Taste of Death. Rinehart & Co., hardcover, 1953. No paperback edition.
        ●   Made for Murder. Rinehart & Co., hardcover, 1954. No paperback edition.

   Some readers have objections to nice characters, to whom they are introduced by the author, getting murdered. They may, for all I know, object to other congenial characters being suspects. Such readers should avoid Taste of Death.

   The Elmvale Academy, a girls’ school in Columbus, Ohio, is rehearsing Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Directing is Priscilla Drew, or she was, up to the time she decided to make on the stage the spot where Caesar is stabbed.

   It is there that someone, probably not a Roman, plunges a knife into her. Strange, this, for she was apparently either well liked or loved by nearly all the students and most of her co-workers.

   A good puzzle here, as Police Lieutenant Charles Hillary has to deal with the lack-witted and not-very-nice Mary Elizabeth Allen, better known as M.E.A. Culpa, and the school’s brilliant delinquent. His falling in love doesn’t help his investigation. Not fair play, but the engaging characters make up for that lack.

   In Made for Murder, McGrew has presented readers with, this time, an entire cast of likable suspects. Fortunately, the victim, if she is indeed a victim, is a positive gain to the world through her loss, if I make myself clear.

   The doyenne of the Meredith family is old Mrs. Meredith, an extremely unpleasant woman whose main pleasure in life is spreading that unpleasantness around, sharing particularly with her family. Thus, there is considerable relief and joy when she dies of a stroke in a dentist’s chair.

   Since the death took place in Columbus, Charles Hillary is called in, but the post-mortem shows nothing amiss. When rumors become rampant in the town where the Merediths live, however, and a busybody presents the general suspicions to the district attorney, an investigation ensues.

   Perhaps one or two of the Merediths by birth and by marriage are a bit too good to be true. Still, this is a story worth reading of a family of nice people struggling against the suspicions of a hostile town-and-gown community.

Bibliographic Comments:   There is one other mystery novel in the “Fenn McGrew” canon, Murder by Mail (Rinehart, 1951), also a case for Charles Hillary. One online bookseller describes it thusly: “A bibliomystery involving campus murder and a bookful of letters involving correspondence between Ohio and Ontario, Canada.”

   Even though the novels take place in Columbus OH, all three McGrew books can be found in a list of Canadian crime fiction. This suggests that one or both of the two authors behind the combined pen name were Canadian. (In all honesty it’s also quite possible the only connection they had to Canada is the rather hazy one stated in the paragraph above.)