Fredric Brown (1906 – 1972) was an American writer of mystery, fantasy, and science fiction stories. He was especially known for his short short stories with humorous or ironic endings. For example, “Dead Letter”, which appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine July 1955 page 65 as “The Letter”. Blurb: Another detective-crime story complete on one … Continue reading Dead Letter
Mysteries
The Right Kind of House
Henry Slesar wrote many mystery and science fiction short stories that are famous for their ironic or twist endings. He also wrote prolifically for television, including becoming head writer for several soap operas like The Edge of Night that specialized in mysteries. Sadly, most of his work is long out of print. Many of his short … Continue reading The Right Kind of House
Every Day a Little Death
Now comes word of a new anthology of crime fiction inspired by the songs of Stephen Sondheim entitled Every Day a Little Death. Sounds like it’s right up my alley as I like Sondheim and I like crime fiction. But I’m so swamped with other things right now and I’m backlogged with reading material that … Continue reading Every Day a Little Death
Kapell-detective Joseph
One of the fascinating things about Joseph Haydn’s life is that parts of it are very well documented, but there are long stretches where we have very little information about the day to day, let alone the month to month, aspects of it. All the more reason to try to fill in some of those … Continue reading Kapell-detective Joseph
Ringing the Changes
Back in the 70s when I used to go to the Lebanon Community Library, I would sometimes hear the ringing of church bells as I approached the library door. But these were not ordinary church bells. The weren’t just pealing an announcement that the service was about to begin or end, nor were they in … Continue reading Ringing the Changes
The Case of the Waylaid Wolf
My traversal of the the Perry Mason TV series has continued very slowly. I’m still in season four. When I saw that the next episode was based directly on a book by Erle Stanley Gardner, I decided to read, or in this case re-read, the novel before watching the TV adaptation. I recall reading The Case … Continue reading The Case of the Waylaid Wolf
They Wanted a Ton of Money
I recently watched the Clue movie from 1985 and it turned out to be a pretty hilarious screwball comedy with a great cast including Eileen Brennan, Madeline Kahn, Christopher Lloyd, Michael McKean, Martin Mull, Lesley Ann Warren, and Colleen Camp, but it’s Tim Curry as the butler, who has twice as many lines as anyone else, … Continue reading They Wanted a Ton of Money
Evans Who?
Agatha Christie is not especially known for her humor. In her script for the play Witness for the Prosecution there are perhaps two or three lines that might draw laughter from the audience; it took Billy Wilder to add some real comic moments to that property. Her Hercule Poirot novels tend to be rather humorless except … Continue reading Evans Who?
Rian Johnson’s Homage to Columbo
Broadly speaking there are two kinds of mysteries: closed and open ones. The closed form is what most folks think of when they think of a mystery story: a murder or other crime is committed and the reader (or viewer) doesn’t find out who the culprit is until the end when the detective reveals all. … Continue reading Rian Johnson’s Homage to Columbo
The James Joyce Murder
In 2013 I found myself moving from a house in the Wissahickon neighborhood back into an apartment in Center City Philadelphia, and sadly one of the casualties of that move was the need to rid myself of most of the 2,000 plus books that I had acquired. Included in that hoard were the almost complete … Continue reading The James Joyce Murder