Emma Redington Lee Thayer (1874-1973) was an American author who published 61 mystery novels under the name Lee Thayer, beginning with The Mystery of the Thirteenth Floor (1919) and ending with Dusty Death (1966). All but one feature the private investigator Peter Clancy and his valet Wiggar, who bears a striking resemblance to his earlier and more famous colleague Bunter. Thayer was also an artist who produced designs for book illustrations, bindings, and dust jackets.
Her style has been compared to Anna Katherine Green and to S. S. Van Dine, although I found the continual foreshadowing reminiscent of Mary Roberts Rinehart. Those who have studied her work find nothing in particular to recommend it, yet someone saw enough value in her books to publish 61 of them. See articles on the Golden Age Detection wiki, http://gadetection.pbworks.com/w/page/7931625/Thayer%2C%20Lee, and on Mystery File, https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=7756.
In Five Bullets (Dodd, Mead & Co., 1944), Peter Clancy #39, our hero has become part of the war movement. Think Albert Campion in Traitor’s Purse (1941). Set in February 1942, when the U.S. was still reeling from the attack on Pearl Harbor, Clancy is in Florida to investigate something that is never named. He encounters a friend from New York who is staying with her impoverished widowed friend as a paying guest. Shades of the inept Maureen Summerhayes in Mrs. McGinty’s Dead (1952). The only child and son of the widowed friend is accused of murder and Clancy decides to get involved.
Isaac Anderson, mystery reviewer at the New York Times, was lukewarm in his assessment of the book, which reads as follows:
“No innocent man is going to be convicted of murder while Peter Clancy is on the job. And if Clancy needs any help, there is always Wiggar, his faithful valet, chauffeur and general factotum. Clancy, it appears, is now with the FBI and is in Florida on a mission the nature of which may easily be guessed. When young Douglas Gaspard is accused of having murdered his fellow-student, Teddy Rockwell, Clancy agrees to investigate. Perhaps he suspects that this murder may be connected with the affair upon which he is engaged, and so it turns out. There are Nazis in the offing, and you know what happens when they are up to their old tricks. Yes, there is plenty of excitement, cluttered up with perhaps a little too much romance, but then there are those who like that sort of thing in their detective stories.” (New York Times, October 8, 1944)
Clearly Anderson does not number among those who enjoy romance in their mysteries.
Thayer does offer some positive elements. There’s some gun juggling worthy of Perry Mason here and the identity of the proposed victim is far from clearcut. While a student was shot, a German refugee professor was standing nearby and could as easily have been the putative target, making intent and motive nicely obscure. While Thayer’s writing tends to be functional rather than stylish, she has an eye for nature and is positively poetic in its description.
What I can say is appalling is the portrayal of Afro-Americans. The book is very much of its time and place. The dialogue especially is painful to read. I am sure this significant flaw has a great deal to do with the reason Thayer has fallen into oblivion.
The culprit is predictable in this wartime mystery so it may not a reliable indicator of Thayer’s plotting abilities. Still I found it absorbing enough to read in a few hours and to note some strengths along with one major liability.
I expect Thayer would be considered a midlist author today with no critical interest in her books while generating enough sales to keep a publisher. I cannot help wonder though how any author who published 60+ books has been forgotten so completely. The volume of her work alone should have kept her name alive to some extent.
Her books are available on the secondary market.