Forgotten Books Not Yet Read

A couple of years ago I did a post on some forgotten books I had recently bought but not yet read. Lacking any other subject for a blog post this week, I thought I would try that again. This time I am featuring recent reprints or omnibus editions of older books.

Death Brings a Storke / 
Cradled in Fear  by Anita Boutell

From the back of the book....
In not at the birth but not long after the death is Dr. Archibald "Archie" Storke, when during a pleasant breakfast one morning with his wife Janey he receives a urgent call from the housekeeper at Whiteleaves,  home of Andrew Herrick, informing him that her employer has been discovered dead in his sitting room, with a ghastly gunshot wound to his head. It is thought Herrick committed suicide, but the doctor is doubtful... A classic tale of detection, Death Brings a Storke (1938) was the first published crime novel by Anita Boutell, an American expatriate chosen by mystery fiction scholar Howard Haycraft in his book Murder for Pleasure (1941) as one if the rising stars of British manners mystery, and has now been reprinted for the first time in nearly eighty years.

In Cradled in Fear. . . After a whirlwind courtship of three weeks, young Molly Nash, mostly alone in the world, married Sheridan "Sherry" Prescott. Now she has traveled with her handsome new husband to the old family mansion at Prescott's Point, Connecticut, a gloomy Victorian edifice clinging to a forbidding cliff overlooking Long Island Sound. But what did Molly really know about Sherry, and just what grim mysteries are hidden behind the walls of the house at Prescott's Point? What Molly does not know could be the death of her. . . .

Cradled in Fear was Anita Boutell's fourth and final crime novel and her only one set in the United States.

In 2014, I reviewed one of Boutell's other two books, Death has a Past. I was thrilled to discover this double volume, with a very detailed introduction, including biographical information, by Curtis Evans. See the post at The Passing Tramp about this book and lots more information about the author.

Poor Poor Ophelia  by Carolyn Weston

Next up is the book that was the basis for the pilot episode of the TV series, The Streets of San Francisco. Poor, Poor Ophelia was the first book in a brief series by Carolyn Weston. The series featured a pair of homicide detectives but in the books they were based in Santa Monica, California. Brash Books has brought these novels back into print. 

Just about a year ago I reviewed the second book in that series, Susannah Screaming. Now I plan to read this book and then re-watch the pilot of The Streets of San Francisco. We are big fans of this show. We have watched all the episodes of the first four seasons over the past year or so.

See this detailed post at the Rap Sheet, and the review at Col's Criminal Library.



David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and 50s  Edited by Robert Polito

Last but far from least is this omnibus of novels, which includes Dark Passage, Nightfall, The Burglar, The Moon in the Gutter, and Street of No Return.

I purchased this book because I have been wanting to read Dark Passage for years... and then watch the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Every time I look for a copy, everything I find is more expensive than I want to pay. Including this volume. What I really wanted was a vintage paperback, but those were even more expensive. So I finally gave in and now I will have access to four other novels by Goodis. Books that gather several novels in one book are not my favorites because they are heavy and unwieldy to read, but I will admit that the Library of America series of books are very nicely done.

Check out these very interesting posts on this volume:
At Criminal Element
Reviewed by Martin Walker at Mystery*File

Death Has a Past: Anita Boutell

Rich Westwood at his blog Past Offences (classic crime reviews and news) has challenged readers to blog about a book or movie from 1939 during the month of July. This review of Death Has a Past is my second submission to the 1939 book challenge.

This very fitting quote from a poem titled Love's Grave by George Meredith is on the title page:

In tragic life, God wot,
No villain need be! Passions spin the plot:
We are betray'd by what is false within.

Death Has a Past by Anita Boutell is the gradually unfolding story of five women who are in effect subjugated by Claudia Hetherton, who has inherited all the wealth of the Hetherton family. Each woman either needs money that only Claudia can supply, or depends on her good will for her future happiness, or both. 

Claudia has invited them all to her home for a "women only" week, following on the tradition of her mother-in-law, Emily Hetherton. The week has been traditionally called "Emily's Week," and they go along with the tradition for one last year.

The story is bookended by two brief conversations between the story teller and a young friend. The conversations set up the outline of the story and further explain its resolution. Preceding each section, there is a fragment of a confession to a murder, so that the reader knows that someone has died, maybe Claudia, maybe another one of these women. Each piece of the story provides a hint of who could be so desperate or so hurt to be driven to commit murder. There is a twist at the end and I did not expect it.

The story is mostly limited to the six women taking part in Emily's Week; there are servants present on Claudia's estate, and two males make brief appearance. Even so the relationships and the stories of the lives of the six women gets complex. My copy included a family tree, which I referred to often. The story is clearly set (and written) in the late 1930's at a time when women could be beholden to others for their livelihood and survival. Yet at times I forgot that and was sometimes surprised by evidence that the story was written that long ago. 

This description of Claudia, as she begins to unravel, is chilling:

     Claudia sat squarely in the big winged chair than had been old Emily's. She had taken now as her right, and in tacit recognition, the others left always vacant for her use. She sat rigidly upright, her angular shoulders held stiffly from any contact of the back or sides.
     Pippa thought: She sits on it as though it were a throne.
     For an instant, the thought crossed her mind that her aunt was not quite sane. Wasn't this desire to dominate, this overbearing possessiveness of hers, just a little mad?

The author, Anita Boutell, is entirely new to me. I discovered the existence of this book at Clothes in Books, and Moira in turn had seen a review at Martin Edward's blog, Do You Write Under Your Own Name? I have looked and looked and found only snippets here and there about this author. One interesting fact about the original hardcover edition (not the copy I have) is that the dustjacket art was by Philip Youngman Carter, husband of Margery Allingham.

She published these mysteries:

• Tell Death to Wait
• Cradled in Fear
• Death Brings a Storke 

My copy of this book is a hardcover edition published by Books, Inc. in 1944. Unfamiliar with this publisher and curious about why there would be a new hardcover edition five years after the original publication, I did some research. I found an article about a series of mystery reprints called Midnite Mysteries at Mystery*File. The back cover featured on that page is very similar to the one on my copy of this book.

 -----------------------------

Publisher: Books, Inc., 1944 (orig. pub. Michael Joseph: London, 1939)

Length:     245 pages

Format:     hardcover

Series:      n/a

Setting:     UK

Genre:      Mystery