It would appear that there was nothing like a nice juicy murder to spice up a house party during mystery fiction's Golden Age. You'll find a perfect example in a delightful mystery originally published in 1928 called The Mystery at Stowe, the first of 22 novels written by Vernon Loder, another author whose name and work has mostly slipped into undeserved obscurity. Fortunately, it's back again in a newly republished edition from the Collins Crime Club, an imprint of HarperCollins. You'll find an audio review of The Mystery at Stowe in this week's Classic Mysteries podcast, and you can listen to the complete review by clicking here.
The Mystery at Stowe is a classic English country house mystery. It begins by introducing us to the key characters – all guests of a gentleman named Mr. Barley. Several of the guests are of the type known as “bright young people,” house guests who enjoy each other’s company, go off together to engage in various sports, and so forth. There’s a married couple, Ned Tollard and his wife Margery – and here we find quite a bit of tension. Ned, who has a lot of money, wants to put up the funds for an exploratory expedition to South America headed by a young woman named Elaine Gurdon. Margery appears to be quite jealous, although both Ned and Elaine insist they have no feelings for each other.
The other guests in the house party do indulge in quite a bit of gossip and speculation about whether there is anything more to the apparent triangle. But nobody is prepared for the death of one of the characters overnight – apparently the victim of one of those mysterious barely-known-to-medical-science poisons so dear to some mystery writers of the period. As one of the characters is known to possess a blowgun and poisoned darts (doesn't everybody keep a few around the house?), the police understandably focus on that person. But there’s another detective on hand to help the police, a gentleman named Jim Carton, who thinks the official police investigators are headed in the wrong direction…and who uncovers some critical clues that lead to a remarkably surprising conclusion.
The Mystery at Stowe was released in 1929 as one of the titles in Collins's Detective Club imprint, the forerunner to the long-lasting Collins Crime Club, which has now returned to life and is resurrecting many of its Golden Age titles, complete with their original, rather lurid covers. Congratulations to HarperCollins on bringing them back.
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