Review: Death At Swaythling Court by J. J. Connington (1926)

by Mary

Colonel Sanderstead of the Manor awaits the arrival of his young friend Jimmy Leigh to play golf on the Manor's private course. Jimmy is a talented young mechanic and inventor with a lab in his home and recently constructed what is claimed to be a lethal ray capable of killing without leaving any mark.

The cast includes the colonel's nephew Cyril Norton, who is to marry Jimmy's sister Stella when her divorce is finalised a few weeks hence. Then there's William Hubbard. a wholesaler dealer in artificial perfume, suspected war profiteer, and ardent butterfly collector. He is also a bad 'un disliked by more than one local resident, having been overly familiar with local girls and unkind to intelligently challenged villager "Sappy" Morton.

Events begin to unfold when Jimmy dines with the colonel, who senses something is wrong, and then leaves for an appointment with Hubbard. Next morning the village is agog on hearing Hubbard stands accused of blackmail but it is too late to arrest him. He has been murdered. The plot unspools to include a burning candle in a room with its light still on, a profane parrot, an allegedly haunted shop, a rifled safe, a damaged tyre, and an item that should be there but isn't. Not to mention the involvement of the Green Devil, which local legend has it foretells someone will die.

This novel features what at first glance appears to be a simpler plot than other of Connington's works but what seems obvious at the beginning is soon turned on its head. As Colonel Standerstead remark; the dead man was not one of them but was that any reason to do away with him? Well, as it turns out a number of people had strong grievances against the dead man that in the right circumstances could lead to violence. A particularly clever twist clears a character I had ignored as a suspect so I award this debut novel a B+.

E-text: Death At Swaythling Court

Nemesis at Raynham Parva (aka Grim Vengeance) by J. J. Conningham (1929)

by Mary

Late at night Sir Clinton Driffield is on his way to visit his sister Mrs Anne Thornaby of Fern Lodge near the titular village. His headlights suddenly pick out a car with two men engaged in a vicious fight beside it. A woman with a suitcase stands nearby. The donnybrook ends when he stops and the victor drives off. So does the trounced man after the woman refuses his command to get into his car. She will not accept a lift or any sort of help from Sir Clinton and waits at the roadside until he departs.

Shocking news awaits him at Fern Lodge. Despite general expectations his niece Elsie would marry Rex Brandon she's gone off and married Argentinian Vicente Francia without telling anyone. Needless to say her mother is terribly upset but even so the couple are staying at Fern Lodge until they depart for his home country. Three friends of Elsie's who will be traveling with them are also in residence. There's Estelle Scotswood, one of her oldest friends, who will accompany the couple so Elsie will have an English companion while settling into her new home, and sisters Noreen and Linda Anstruther, a musical duo who'll stay with the newly-weds before taking up appearances arranged by Francia.

Next morning more startling news arrives. During the night a local constable had come across the wreck of one of the cars involved in the incident Sir Clinton witnessed, the driver's body lying not far off. Local farmer's son Teddy Barford stands beside it, covered in blood. Quick-tempered Teddy had threatened the dead man, who'd offered to take Teddy's sweetheart to London on the grounds she could do better for herself there, the absolute cad. Not to mention Teddy told the constable he'd settled the score he had against the dead man and had been arrested on the spot.

The narrative steadily darkens, ultimately forming a tangle including more than one person with a motive for murder. Both genders smoke a great deal -- note gentlemen always asked permission to light up! -- and a box of matches forms a pivotal turning point in an increasingly complex plot More deaths, the white slave trade, an undercover agent with the League of Nations, a seemingly unsolvable moral and ethical dilemma, a quest for revenge, and the architecture of Fern Lodge all play their parts in the mystery. I did not guess whodunnit and was amazed when the culprit was revealed. I acknowledge this fact by awarding Nemesis at Raynham Parva an A.

E-text: Nemesis at Raynham Parva

Review: Maigret at the Coroner's

by Eric

After an evening of drinking, five young servicemen and a girl drive out of town and into the countryside. Members of the party leave and return to the car, or fail to return, in various combinations. After a night of drunken comings and goings, which none of those involved agree upon when questioned, the girl is found dead on railroad tracks near the highway, having been struck by a train.

Who is responsible for the death? If anyone. Was it an accident or murder?

Georges Simenon is one of my favorite authors and over the years I've read a lot of his Inspector Maigret mysteries, dipping into them at random. Recently I've embarked on a project -- a snail-paced one -- to read all 75 Maigret novels in chronological order. I just finished the 32nd book, Maigret at the Coroner's. It's a very unusual entry in the series.

For one thing the setting isn't Paris or its environs. The countryside where the mysterious death takes place isn’t even that of France but rather the desert outside Tuscon, Arizona. Simenon wrote the book in 1949 while living in Tuscon during a ten year stay in North American which saw him moving all over the continent accompanied by a bewildering assortment of wives and mistresses.

A further peculiarity is that Maigret takes no part in unraveling the case. In an earlier book, The Madman of Bergerac, Maigret is confined to bed after being shot and depends largely on Madam Maigret to conduct interviews and search for clues but he does direct the investigation. That isn’t true here. The French detective, touring America to observe policing methods, is merely an observer during an inquest lasting several days. Rather than exploring feotid alleyways and seedy bars in the less savory neighborhoods of Paris he's stuck in a stifling Arizona courtroom.

He is not, however, a passive observer. He analyzes the conflicting testimony, observes the demeanor of witnesses and is silently frustrated when the prosecution fails to ask questions that seem obvious to him.

When court isn't in session, Maigret talks to several people connected to the girl's death. He does so informally, for his own edification, out of intellectual curiosity. Eventually he reaches what appears to be the correct conclusion in the case (is that really a spoiler?) -- the same conclusion reached by local law enforcement without any input from their foreign visitor.

So Maigret at the Coroner's is a detective novel without much detecting but for me it was just as compelling as any of the more typical books in the series. It still contains all the elements that I enjoy in a Maigret.

Authors like Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr present complex puzzles like locked rooms and exotic poisons. Simenon's puzzles are the most complicated and baffling puzzles of all -- human beings.

Maigret believes that when he comes to understand the people connected to the victim, their relationships and motivations and their environment the identity of the murderer will become clear. So instead of searching for clues in the usual sense he immerses himself in the victim's world. Simenon's descriptions of human nature and the strange and desperate predicaments it can lead people into interests me most. In this novel it is fascinating to watch Maigret piece together the various characters' stories, even though he is doing so for his own amusement. Maybe he should have a go at the mystery of the princes in the tower!

Another enticing feature of Maigret books is Simenon's brilliant but concise and never flowery descriptions of settings. Bleak, deserted streets and quays drenched in cold rain, dim lights shining from the grimy windows of dives long after midnight are themselves familiar characters. And far removed from hot, dry, mid-summer Arizona. Yet seen through the somewhat bewildered eyes of a middle aged French policeman these surroundings look as exotic as the noir byways of Paris.

I will also note that a stuffy courtroom might seem to be an uninspiring place to set a large part of a book but Simenon populates the room with interesting characters: a baliff who resembles an old testament prophet, a nursing mother, a black juror who appears more astute than the prosecutors.

Then there is the character of Maigret himself, not just his problem solving thought processes, but his human side. He is perplexed by America, chagrined that his FBI escort insists on calling him Jules, annoyed that the magistrate presides over the inquest in short sleeves rather than robes, amazed that everyone in America seems to own a car, and ashamed to admit he never learned to drive.

I wouldn't recommend reading Maigret at the Coroner's as an introduction to the series because it is unusual, but if you're a fan of Maigret put it on your list.