LONG AND SHORT CRIMES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 26, Issue 653, 11 January 1952, Page 10

LONG AND SHORT CRIMES

THE LONG DIVORCE, by Edmund Crispin. English price, 9/6. THE SECRET SEARCH, by E. R. Punshon. English price, 9/6. CENTRE COURT MURDER, by Bernard Newman. Enflish price, 10/6. THE QUEEN’S AWARDS, fourth series, edited by Ellery Queen. English price, 10/6. THE EVENING STANDARD. DETECTIVE BOOK, | second series, English price, 6/6. (All published by Victor Gollancz.) A POLICE inspector’ making sudden 4 and suecessful love to the local woman doctor one morning, taking her that afternoon to inspect a murdered corpse, and then being compelled to regard her as chief suspect-this is a situation. not only exceptionally’ piquant, but, in my experience at any rate, novel in crime fiction. The attractiveness of these two is one reason why I place this tale first among the three long stories. Others are the skill with which Gervase Fen, the don-detective from Oxford, unravels the mystery, the distinction of the writing, and the general air of verisimilitude that pervades the: picture of English rural society. Edmund Crispin is one of. the most gifted and reliable of more ‘recent additions to the "corps de bullet,’ and this is up to his standard. In the first half of The Secret Search, that practised writer E. R. Punshon creates a mystery which grips with intangible fingers, revealing pointers here and there in a fog of uncertainty and a suggestion of ,the supernormal. After the build-up the denouement is rather

flat, but the story is well constructed and well written, with the official police as the’ solvers The first. arid GF Ra) ae & Bernard Newman’s long and complicated story is England’s hope for the women’s singles at Wimbledon, who dies suddenly while playing in the semi-finals against the woman known to the real world as "Gorgeous Gussie." The introduetion of a living person seems to me to be in questionable taste, and so does a sentence on the dust cover: "Gorgeous Gussie made a mistake when she paraded in lace panties." This may lead some to believe that Miss Moran is mixed up in the tangle, whereas she ‘does nothing more than ‘play tennis and fades out completely after the tragedy. Bernard Newman’s Russian aristocratprivate detective follows a long long trail with great skill, but I find the sexual abnormality that is one of the hinges of the plot repulsive and unnecessary, and the whole story a good deal less than convincing, I can strongly recommend the new series of Ellery Queen’s awards in international competition. This time entries come from 42 States in the American Union "and all six continents." The writers represented in the 16. stories chosen ‘from: the 31 pri swinners in--clude Georges, Simenon, ‘of France, at. the top of his form; Nicholas Blake and. Edmund Crispin, of England; and Helen McCloy, of America. There is wide

variety of subject and form, and some really high quality. I have never read a more genuine tragic short crime story than Miriam Allen deFord’s "Beyond the Sea of Death," where villainy plays on weak character just as it might do in real life. As one expects, Ellery Queen’s introduction is informative and stimulating. Circumstances make the Evening Standard collection tamer than the American, The range of selection is narrower, and the fact that the stories were written for a newspaper sets something of a pattern. However, a. volume of 32 detective stories by 27 British authors, including such favourites as Michael Innes, Freeman Wills Croft, Cyril Hare, Gladys Mitchell, and E. C. R. Lorac, at a relatively low price, is exceptionally good value, and it may suit some moods better than the more

exotic American.

A.

M.