I have a perfectly good reason (ahem, excuse) for why I'm deviating from the reading plan. You see, this is what happened: I had every intention of reading other things at the beginning of January. But then I read this on the plane trip back over the holidays. And then I went to Half Price Books on New Year's Day and found something else I'd like to read. In fact, the other book was from an author whose works had been tempting me on Amazon, but I just couldn't make the decision to spend the money. And here was the very book I wanted, at a fraction of the price. And how could I not sit down and start reading it right away, when I'd been waiting for so long...?
Well, that's the next review. As for this book, I actually forgot entirely about having read it. But it was pretty good, as far as Marsh mysteries go, so I'll include a review. This is one of the stories that I read after having already seen the film version some time back. There were, not surprisingly, a number of alterations between book and film, but I didn't find any of them to be egregious. For one, the character of Agatha Troy makes an appearance in the film (neatly taking the place of another character whose absence really isn't noticed); since the filmmakers seemed interested in exploring the developing romance between Troy and Alleyn in all of the films they made, this isn't surprising. And I was almost disappointed that she wasn't in the book. Additionally, one of the characters in the film version is German, instead of the Russian character in the book. Not sure why this happened, but there were some complications of the Russian character in the book that might have been a bit too much for the filmmakers to work logically into the movie. I appreciate that.
So what happens here, to leave a man lying dead? Well, all the characters (far too many to name, if you want my opinion) are invited to a weekend house party, and the host plans the events around a murder game: names are drawn; someone is designated the murderer and must "kill" another guest; the mystery must be solved before everyone leaves at the end of the weekend. Apparently, it's only fun if someone doesn't actually die. But someone does. And it's quite cleverly done. The lights go out in the evening -- which is the pre-determined signal for the murderer to make his move -- and the guests wait for the murder to happen. The gong sounds -- another designated signal -- and everyone emerges to see who the victim is. Of course, they don't expect a real murder, but sure enough there's a body, stabbed with an antique dagger, at the foot of the stairs.
The host is a man of some substance, so Alleyn is called in to bring a measure of discretion to the case. And really, it's all just too much. People show up for a weekend of murder, and they get exactly what they want, even if it isn't truly what they want. Alleyn sorts through the individuals and their alibis, and true to form he has to solve the mystery by using a little sleight of hand. I should point out that if I hadn't seen the film version I might have been a little confused by how Alleyn handles this. (Marsh, for all her good qualities, is a terrible writer of direction and spatial explanations.) But the murderer remains the same in both versions, and the motive is also the same.
The one real gripe about this is hardly worth mentioning, but since this is my blog I'll mention it. As befitted the fashion of the day, Marsh describes any non-English characters with all of the expected (negative) stereotypes. That is to say, the Russian characters all prove to be unreliable and leering with menace. Because, ya know, all Russians are that way. And even when the Russians are exonerated, they're still somehow untrustworthy. Because, ya know, they're not English. *Sigh* This is par for the course in novels of the day, in which many writers reduced the complexities of non-English cultures to a few silly stereotypes. (Naturally, this wasn't limited to Russians.) To Marsh's credit, she manages to utilize these stereotypes as red herrings in the story, but not to her credit she still manages to give the impression that she believes the stereotypes are largely true. Oh, well. I guess we can't rewrite the errors of the past, as long as we can learn from them.
Looking past the occasionally head-scratching silliness of stereotypes, this was a pretty enjoyable read. It was, as I've mentioned a couple of times, already familiar to me through a film, but that didn't reduce its fun in book form. I wouldn't say this is my favorite Marsh book, but it was certainly worth the time and made for a nice read on the plane.
Year of publication: 1934
Number of pages: 214
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