SARAH RAYNE – Tower of Silence. Simon & Schuster, UK, softcover, August 2003; reprint edition: Pocket, UK, July 2009.

   Something of a modern Gothic thriller, with long-buried secrets that are teasingly hinted at throughout the novel.

   Selina March has lived by herself in a “remote Scottish hamlet” since the death of her uncle and two aunts, but when she accepts a paying boarder, crime novelist Joanna Saville, her secluded life will be significantly altered.

   Saville has come to interview inmates of Moy, an asylum for the criminally insane. Moy’s most notorious resident is Mary Maskelyne, who, as an adolescent, murdered three people.

   Mary is cunning and resourceful, and when she, predictably, escapes, she sets in motion events that will precipitate buried secrets into the light where long-ago events will finally be brought to a climax and resolved.

      Bibliography [Novels] —

Tower of Silence (2003)
A Dark Dividing (2004)

Roots of Evil (2005)
Spider Light (2007)
The Death Chamber (2007)

Ghost Song (2009)
House of the Lost (2010)
What Lies Beneath (2011)

ANNELISE RYAN – Working Stiff. Kensington, paperback reprint, August 2010. Hardcover edition: September 2009.

   The first few lines may set you back on your heels a little:

   No, this isn’t the next take-off on Patricia Cornwell’s line of books, it really is a cozy, as I thought when I opened it to start reading. Telling the story in the first of a new series is Mattie Winston, former nurse and now the new deputy coroner for Sorenson, a smallish town somewhere in Wisconsin. (Not on any map I’ve found.)

   It turns out that Mattie quit her former job when she found her husband, a doctor at the same hospital, having an affair with another nurse. Make that soon to be ex-husband.

   But when that other nurse is found murdered, and the unfaithful Dr. Winston is a chief suspect, it is up to Mattie to put on her sleuthing shoes and see if she can’t clear his name. Complicating matters is that Steve Hurley, the hunky policeman in charge of the case is exactly that, hunky.

   How long does it take before you, the reader, that this a cozy, not a Cornwell look-alike? Not long at all. Soon after that first paragraph above — which tells you something in and of itself — we learn that the coroner’s name is Izzy and he’s five foot tall, while Mattie is something like six (five foot twelve, she says).

   And at the crime scene Mattie loses her panties and kicks them under a chair, she having been called on the case in the middle of night and having neglected to dress as carefully as she might have during the day.

   My opinion, as always is that more than 320 pages is also more than enough to conduct a murder investigation, even one with as many tangents as this (such as getting a fashion makeover from the beautician at a local funeral parlor).

   You’d like to think, though, that there would also be time enough to add a few clues to the puzzle, but no, while entertaining enough in other ways (we are as eager as Hurley is to learn about Mattie’s famous nipple incident, which happened not so long ago in her past), the investigation goes here and there and finally ends about the same time as the book does.

   Coming next, book two in the series: Scared Stiff (September 2010).

HARRY WHITTINGTON – Desert Stake-Out. Gold Medal s1123, paperback original; 1st printing, June 1961. Reprinted at least once by Gold Medal; plus: Avon, paperback, 1989.

   Speaking of wasting a few hours enjoyably, Harry Whittington was a cut above the average paperback hack, and Desert Stake-Out is a cut above the average Whittington.

   The story of a lone rider bent on vengeance thrown into uneasy alliance with three outlaws and a callow married couple reads like one of those marvelous Boetticher/Scott westerns of the period, and in fact, Stake-Out is dedicated to Harry Joe Brown, the producer of that series.

   Whittington doesn’t break any new ground, but he plows the old fields affectionately enough to yield a crop. Hero Blade Merrick (I guess some folks don’t care what they name their kids) is appropriately terse and hard-bitten, the outlaws are well-realized characters who engage our sympathy even while terrorizing the good folks, and if the sexy heroine and her weakling husband seem a bit pat, they at least serve their function.

   Whittington (at his best) had a way with tight writing and fast action, and he serves this up entertainingly.

MARTHA GRIMES – The Black Cat. Viking, hardcover, April 2010. Reprint paperback: Signet, February 2011.

   Superintendent Richard Jury is called in by the Thames Valley Police when a woman is found shot to death in the outdoor seating area of a pub called The Black Cat in Chesham.

   The woman is identified as Mariah Cox, a local librarian, but she was found wearing designer clothes and very expensive shoes and with her hair dyed as if she was attending a party given by the local hoi polloi being held that night.

   It’s soon discovered she was leading a double life: during the week a librarian engaged to the local florist, on the weekends, usually spent in London, a highly paid professional escort using the name Stacy Storm. Which woman was the intended victim?

   Jury discovers that one of the guests at the party was Harry Johnson, a man Jury knows but cannot prove is a murderer. Jury knows that Harry is the sort of man who might commit murder just to get under Jury’s skin. Did he commit this one?

   Meanwhile, the little girl whose aunt is working at The Black Cat claims that her black cat has been kidnapped and replaced by another black cat and wants Jury to find it.

   Then another escort, Kate Banks, is shot to death in London. Though two different guns were used, Jury is convinced the killings are connected. Then a third escort is murdered.

   It’s a satisfying and well done mystery for the fans of Grimes’ Jury series except for a couple of drawbacks. Steve Lewis said in his review of The Case Is Altered that if you don’t start by reading Grimes’ Jury series from the beginning you won’t know the background of some of the recurring characters who, again, make an appearance in this novel.

   The other drawback is that several chapters are devoted to a dog and cat communicating with each other, so be warned if that sort of thing irritates you.

JO BANNISTER – A Bleeding of Innocents. Frank Shapiro & Liz Graham #1. St. Martin’s Press, US, hardcover, 1993. Macmillan, UK, hc, 1993. Worldwide Library, paperback, 1997.

   Jo Bannister has written other mysteries, and won an EQMM prize, but this is the first of her work that I’ve read. It’s also the first in a new series.

   The police force in Castlemere, England is in disarray. A Detective Inspector has been killed and a Detective Sergeant injured in what may have been a hit and run; or may, as the Sergeant believes, been a deliberate murder engineered by a local racketeer.

   Chief Inspector Shapiro brings in an old colleague, DI Liz Graham, to temporarily replace the slain DI, and she is greeted by the shotgun murder of a retirement home nurse. At the same time, she must try to work with the injured Sergeant, a difficult person who had a close relationship with his slain boss, and who is determined to pin the death on the racketeer he suspects.

   I have a predilection for British police stories, and I’m happy to say that this is a pretty good one. It isn’t of John Harvey or Reginald Hill caliber, but it’s competently done and well written. The third person narrative is straightforward, and shifts among the three police officers.

   Characterization is not really in depth, but sharp enough that Graham and the Sergeant are brought to life decently, though Shapiro was less well developed. The plot was the weakest link, but tolerable.

   I did think that the book ran on a bit at the end after the real denouement, with perhaps a little too much talk, but that’s a minor cavil. On limited exposure, I think Bannister fits comfortably in the middle of the pack with which she’s chosen to run.

       The Shapiro & Graham “Castlemere” series —

1. A Bleeding of Innocents (1993)
2. Sins of the Heart (1994) aka Charisma (US)

3. Burning Desires (1995) aka A Taste for Burning (US)

4. No Birds Sing (1996)
5. Broken Lines (1998)
6. The Hireling’s Tale (1999)
7. Changelings (2000)

   Jo Bannister has also written four books in her Dr Clio Rees (Marsh) and Harry Marsh series; two books with Mickey Flynn; two in a series about columnist Primrose “Rosie” Holland; and nine books featuring Brodie Farrell, a woman who “finds things for a living.” She’s also written nine standalone novels, not all of which are crime related.

ELSIE N. WRIGHT – Strange Murders at Greystones. International Fiction Library, US, hardcover, 1931.

   As Holmes has warned us, it is unwise to theorize without facts. Nevertheless, I am tempted to speculate that someone, either an enemy or a practical joker, told Wright she should write a book.

   That same someone may also have suggested to International Fiction Library that it should publish a book regardless of merit. Unfortunately, the twain met.

   Of course, it’s possible the typesetter had a hand in the confusion. The many typos, particularly the missing and misplaced quotation marks, provide some confirmation of this hypothesis.

   Perhaps the typesetter forgot to include a few of the manuscript pages, thus leading to at least this reader’s confusion.

   Anyhow, Thatcher Graham, master of Greystokes and an absolute rotter, is found dead in his library with the back of his head bashed in. Apparently, let me hasten to say; this, as well as other alleged facts presented by the author, is not definite.

   Inspector Kelley comes to investigate. Kelley, the author tells us, is a keen and intelligent detective who has worked his way up the ranks. As portrayed, however, he is an utter buffoon who solves most of his cases by beating confessions out of suspected crooks and browbeating witnesses.

   His working principle is that anyone with an alibi is probably guilty — why else have need for an alibi? — and anyone without an alibi is patently guilty.

   Arresting the fiancé of Graham’s daughter is the only wise move Kelley makes. Dumb as he is, he almost had to do it. But then Sergeant Brock, who has been left in the house for no particular reason except the author’s need, is killed, somehow, by a creature with “piercing green eyes.”

   The police are called again, they arrive, they search the grounds, they depart. What about Brock’s death? Oh, it’s mentioned a few pages later that the police are upset about Brock’s being killed, but that’s it.

   Our hero, Jack Pelton, whom Kelley still suspects even after Brock’s death, gets out of jail. Arriving at Greystones, he and his fiancee, Polly, go out to search the grounds. Polly says that the police already have done so. Jack says they didn’t know what they were looking for but he does. What is it? Neither he nor the author says; indeed, no search is made of the grounds.

   Jack does find a bloody dagger — by sitting on it. This weapon is important to two people, both of whom crave it. Why? After burning incense and checking chicken entrails, I must conclude that it is the only sharp instrument on the estate. There’s no other apparent reason for wanting it.

   Approaching the dog kennels during their non-search of the grounds, Jack and Polly spot the green-eyed creature entering the kennels. When they go in, the creature has disappeared and there are bloodstains, which leads Polly to conclude, on no other evidence, that a dog has been killed.

   Inspector Kelley comes wandering by, and they all go in to lunch, without a word being said about the creature or the dog.

      A new cook is hired. Why? Apparently the author felt she needed alleged comic relief, so she introduces a black who talks about the “debbil” and “hants” and has hysterics. What happened to the other cook? Probably only the typesetter knows.

   Searching subterranean tunnels with Polly, our hero notices that she is shaking badly. Bravely — oh, he’s brave but not bright — he gives her a revolver and walks in front of her. Later he fires that same revolver that she had not given back.

   Inspector Kelley had provided the revolver, apparently carrying two for those occasions when he might need to give one away. The next time he comes, however, and two guns are needed, he has only one.

   Kelley is also cheap, for the pistol contains but a single bullet. Our hero had examined it earlier and had no complaints, but if he’d had more than one bullet the novel might have ended too soon — that is, for the author’s and publisher’s purpose.

   He discovers the single bullet when he wisely is “trying the revolver to see if it had jammed.” Later Kelley’s revolver, most unusually, does jam.

   Wright is unstinting in her use of verbal and plot cliches. The word horror appears at least 50 times, she being unable to convey the real or imagined item. There are numerous “blood curdling” laughs, an idiot who utters “gutteral” — is the author or the typesetter toying with us here? — cries, trapdoors, a butler who acts strangely, a dotty housekeeper with a secret, concealed passages, and a genuine, unadulterated mad scientist with a 20-year grudge.

   This is Wright’s first and only mystery. Wisely she wrote no more. What could she have done for an encore?

ANN PARKER – Silver Lies. Poisoned Pen Press, hardcover, September 2003; trade paperback, April 2006.

   A first novel, and for a mystery, it’s a long one, some 420 pages, but for a work of historical fiction, the page count might be about right. It’s 1879, and Leadville is a booming small metropolis in Colorado, the inhabitants of which are afflicted with “ever-present cold, lingering homesickness, and the pangs of silver fever.”

   Inez Stannert is one of the few women in the town, co-owner of a flourishing saloon, and since the town marshal seems to be totally uninterested, she’s also the only person willing to investigate the possible murder of the town’s assayer, who’s been found trampled to death on the frigid muck of a nearby street.

   Adding to Inez’ concerns is her husband, who’s been missing for several months, but the new minister in town seems more than willing to help her forget. The legendary Bat Masterton also makes an appearance, but it’s little more than a cameo, as Inez and the Reverend J.B. Sands end up doing all of the heavy lifting.

   As a mystery, it’s adequate. It works better as a historical novel — life in this rough-and-tumble corner of the world is brought to life quite effectively in two quite opposite and surprising ways: the scenic wonder of 19th century Colorado and the wretched environment it had to have been for anyone actually trying to live there.

   The story in Silver Lies is less effective as far as the romantic elements are concerned, falling prey to some fairly stand-by cliches, and much of the author’s work is undone, paradoxically, by some better-than-average characterization that has to be retrofitted, and abruptly so, to make the rather lurid conclusion work.

   Acceptable, and maybe more so, depending on where your interests lie, but if there’s a paperback forthcoming, you might choose to put it off till then.

Note: This review has been revised slightly since it first appeared in Historical Novels Review.

       The Inez Stannert “Silver Rush Mystery” series —

1. Silver Lies (2003)
2. Iron Ties (2006)

3. Leaden Skies (2009)

“Who Killed Who?” An episode of Dragnet 1970 (Season 4, Episode 15). First air date: 29 January 1970. Jack Webb (Sergeant Joe Friday), Harry Morgan (Officer Bill Gannon), Jim B. Smith (Captain Brown), Herb Vigran (Paul Woods), Marshall Reed (Sergeant Hughes), Don Ross (Sergeant Doherty), Chuck Bowman (Jerry), Marco Lopez (Pedro Martinez, uncredited). Writer: Michael Donovan. Creator, producer, director: Jack Webb.

   Joe Friday and Bill Gannon are called downtown to a run-down three-story flophouse to investigate a multiple shooting. Before they can begin their investigation, one of the victims on a stretcher leaves Friday with a baffling dying clue — “oft one,” he says — but neither Friday, Gannon, nor Captain Brown can figure it out — not at first, anyway. The lack of any eyewitnesses further complicates the case.

   Methodically investigating the crime scene, Friday and Gannon note two dead bodies lying on the floor in front of a TV set that, like the victims, has also been shot once.

   Other clues include a number of expended 9-millimeter shells (later shown to be from a German-made Luger); a torn piece of red cloth with a shirt button clutched in one of the victim’s hands; and blood smears along the banister leading to the second floor, but which curiously end halfway up — with nary a sign of the perpetrator.

   Three dead, and very little evidence of how it went down. Later the significance of an apparently unrelated phone call to the police just before the massacre would become clear —but it’s only when Friday and Gannon discover a FOURTH body that the full story of the progress of this crime can finally be told.

   This show is just like one of those “Five Minute Mysteries” come to life. With its unusual emphasis on forensic evidence, this Dragnet episode could serve as a model for bloated crime scene investigation shows like CSI: Miami in how to compress an engrossing story into half the length. The only other Dragnet I can recall that put such emphasis on the forensics was “Homicide: Cigarette Butt.”

   One of the reporters Friday has to keep in check for the sake of his investigation is played by Herb Vigran (1910-86), who had over 300 appearances in movies and TV, usually playing annoying smart alecks, sometimes for laughs but often for hisses.

   The prime suspect in this case was played by Marco Lopez (b. 1935), who is primarily remembered for his regular role in another Jack Webb production, Emergency! (1972-78), playing a fire fighter cleverly named Marco Lopez. If memory serves, in “Who Killed Who?” he has no dialogue.

   You can see “Who Killed Who?” on Hulu here, and “Homicide: Cigarette Butt” here.

Editorial Comment:   Herb Vigran, whose face you see in the image above — did you recognize him? — was in seven episodes of this later Dragnet series, almost his longest-running gig. Most of the characters he played in his over appearances in movies and TV did not have names. The parts he played were often identified only as Salesman, Policeman, Judge, Fireman, Delivery Man, Waiter, Baggage Man, and So On. Most of his roles were speaking parts, however, and whenever you saw or heard him, you recognized him immediately.

MIGNON G. EBERHART – The Pattern. Doubleday Doran & Co., hardcover, 1937. Bestseller Mystery B55, digest-sized paperback, 1944. Also reprinted as Pattern of Murder, Popular Library #167, paperback, 1948. (Later Popular Library editions reverted to the original title.)

   In Mignon Eberhart’s The Pattern, a nasty wife who will not consent to a divorce is murdered at a lake resort outside Chicago, making life very difficult for our hero and heroine, the now widower and the sweet young thing he should have married.

   The Pattern is one of my favorite Eberhart’s, in part because the author dials down the emotional anxiety meter a bit, allowing the reader to just enjoy the story and think about whodunit.

   The lake setting is a little different for Eberhart (no ancestral mansions) and is well conveyed. Also there is more perspective on other characters, not just that of a constantly fretting heroine getting beaten down by the police and by her reliably bitchy women “friends.”

   As in the slightly earlier Fair Warning (1936) and Danger in the Dark (1937), Eberhart makes some attempt to provide both clues and an actual demonstration of a deductive process on the part of the detective (Jacob Wait, who makes his next-to-last of three appearances here). There is also some nice shuddery creepiness concerning poisonous spiders that have an unsettling propensity to get into cabins.

      A good job by a consummate genre professional.

Editorial Comment:  Also by Mignon G. Eberhart and previously reviewed by Curt on this blog: The Glass Slipper.

KATE ELLIS – The Merchant’s House. Piatkus, UK, hardcover, 1998. St. Martin’s, US, hardcover, 1999.

Genre:   Police procedural. Leading character:  Sgt. Wesley Peterson; 1st in series. Setting:   England.

First Sentence:   The child flung his tricycle aside and toddled, laughing, toward the basking cat.

    A university graduate in archeology and the first black police officer in Tradmouth, DS Wesley Peterson begins his first day at work with a murder. The body of a young woman has been found off a cliff path, the damage to her face rendering her unrecognizable.

   Wesley’s university friend, Neill, is heading a team of archeologists on the site of a 17th century merchant’s house in town when the skeleton of a child is found. A fellow officer is dealing with the mother of a missing toddler who is adamant her son is still alive in spite of a lack of clues.

   Can a clue from the past solve a crime in the present?

   To find a book which is a skillful combination of archeology and police procedure is definitely in my “happy-reader” zone. Ms. Ellis does just that and much more. Although the locations are fictional, I was ready to pack my back and go. Those who are familiar would know the differences, but for those who don’t, the locations are visual and real.

   Not only is there a nice introduction to Wesley, but to all the book’s major characters. One thing particularly refreshing is that the police officers all like one another and work as a team. There is an odd man out, but you don’t feel he’ll be there long. It’s not just the primary characters Ms. Ellis brings to life, but the secondary characters as well. I never had to question who a character was or why there were there.

   It can be a tricky business, bringing together four plot lines, but it works. The information from the 17th century is provided in diary excerpts as chapter headings, while fascinating, does not intrude on the present-day investigations.

   The dig at the merchant’s house plays to Wesley’s background and as an escape from issues at home. The kidnapping is largely the responsibility of another team, and the murdered girl is Wesley’s primary investigation. Yet Ms. Ellis cleverly designates Wesley as the hub which brings together the various spokes of the wheel in a way I didn’t predict until it was revealed.

   The Merchant’s House is a very good police procedural in which the plot unfolds not by flash, but bit-by-bit, following the clues. It is filled with great characters, dialogue, humour, and a plot that kept me reading. Happily there are many more books ahead in this series.

Rating:   Very Good.

       The Wesley Peterson series —

1. The Merchant’s House (1998)
2. The Armada Boy (1999)

3. An Unhallowed Grave (1999)
4. The Funeral Boat (2000)
5. The Bone Garden (2001)
6. A Painted Doom (2002)
7. The Skeleton Room (2003)

8. The Plague Maiden (2004)
9. A Cursed Inheritance (2005)
10. The Marriage Hearse (2006)
11. The Shining Skull (2007)
12. The Blood Pit (2008)

13. A Perfect Death (2009)
14. The Flesh Tailor (2010)
15. The Jackal Man (2011)

Editorial Comment:   LJ, your last sentence seems to be rather an understatement!