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Friday’s Forgotten Book: The American Gun Mystery by Ellery Queen
The American Gun Mystery by Ellery Queen (Frederick A. Stokes, 1933) is the sixth mystery written by cousins Manfred Bennington Lee and Frederic Dannay. The series began in 1929 with The Roman Hat Mystery and ended in 1971 with A Fine and Private Place. A...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Murder Jigsaw by Edwin and Mona Radford
Murder Jigsaw by Edwin and Mona Radford (Andrew Melrose, 1944) was the second title in their series that featured Dr. Harry Manson, who was a Chief Detective-Inspector of Scotland Yard as well as the lead scientist in Scotland Yard’s Crime Research Laboratory. It...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Murder in Stained Glass by Margaret Armstrong
Margaret Neilson Armstrong (1867–1944) was a well-known book cover designer with some 270 books to her credit, working for A.C. McClurg, Scribner’s, and other publishers. Her covers generally had a plant theme and were in the Art Noveau style. Authors for whom she...
Friday’s Forgotten Books: Blood Type by Stephen Greenleaf
Stephen Greenleaf published 14 private investigator mysteries between 1979 and 2000. Each book focuses on a social issue: Southern Cross talked about the Civil Rights movement and Strawberry Sunday is engrossed with migrant farm labor. His protagonist John Marshall...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: The Dead Can Tell by Helen Reilly
Helen Reilly (1891-1962) wrote nearly 40 mysteries between 1930 and 1962. Her primary series character was Inspector Christopher McKee of the fictional Manhattan Homicide Squad. She is credited with writing some of the earliest known police procedurals, using...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Slayground by Richard Stark
Donald Westlake (1933-2008) was an assiduous and creative author with about 100 crime fiction novels and dozens of short stories to his credit under various pen names. His fecund imagination earned him the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Innocent Bystander by Craig Rice
Georgiana Ann Randolph Craig (1908–1957) wrote a number of mysteries, short stories, and screenplays under the name Craig Rice after beginning her writing career as a journalist in 1930. She is mostly known for her comic mysteries with Jake Justus, a clueless press...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Unholy Writ by David Williams
Unholy Writ by David Williams (Williams Collins Sons, 1976) is the first of 17 mysteries published between 1976 and 1993 featuring Mark Treasure, Vice-Chairman of Grenwood Phipps & Co., merchant bankers of London, and his actress wife Molly. Treasure is clearly...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: Murder Can’t Wait by Richard Lockridge
Frances Davis Lockridge (1896-1963) and Richard Lockridge (1899-1982) were journalists known mostly for their Mr. and Mrs. North mysteries. About 70 books form the lavish Lockridge oeuvre, released between 1936 and 1980. In addition to the books about the Norths...
Friday’s Forgotten Book: The Shakespeare Murders by A.G. MacDonell
Archibald Gordon Macdonell (1895 – 1941) was a versatile writer. His most famous book was England, Their England (1933), for which he is remembered today. Its description of England between the wars, especially of a village cricket match, is considered a...