Reading in Reykjavík

Series detective: Inspector Hemingway No. in series: Year of publication: 1961 Type of mystery: Murder, whodunnit, howdunnit Type of investigator: Police Setting & time: Rural England, 1960s Some themes: Story: Inspector Hemingway of the Scotland Yard is called in to investigate a mysterious murder in a small English village. Several people had reason to dislike the victim, who was an unpleasant man, a social climber who was not above using blackmail to get his way. Most of the suspects were on their way home from a tennis party when the murder took place, and Hemingway needs to establish their alibis or lack thereof before turning to finding out just how the murder was done. Review: This is a clever puzzle plot, worthy of Agatha Christie, and written in Heyer's deft style. While I had the murderer figured out after not too many chapters, I was unable to figure out the howdunnit of the plot until the Inspector began unravelling it. Rating: Another clever and interest...

This time I read two novels by the author, one each with his two series sleuths. Titles: The Hollow Man (alt. title: The Three Coffins) , The Red Widow Murders No. in series: 6, 3 Year of publication: 1935 (both) Type of mystery: locked-room mystery, whodunit, howdunit Type of investigator: amateur, retired professional Setting & time: London, 1930’s (both) Some themes: Locked rooms, poison, the French Revolution John Dickson Carr is one of the Golden Age mystery writers. He was an American, but lived in Britain for a long time and set many of his books there. He was a very prolific writer during the peak of his career, and wrote most of his books under two different names: his own, and the pseudonym Carter Dickson. He had two series detectives: Dr. Gideon Fell, a professor of lexicography about whom he wrote as Carr, and Sir Henry Merrivale, written under the Dickson name. In addition he wrote non-series books, many of them historical novels. The Hollow Man is one of Carr’...