Browsing through the Classic Mysteries vault again the other day, I was delighted to come across this entry from about eight years ago pointing out the excellent mystery short stories written by Philip Wylie. I read some books by Wylie while growing up - not his mysteries, but some of his other works, for he was a most enjoyable writer working in many genres. His mystery short stories were collected into a volume called Ten Thousand Blunt Instruments, and my review is here (as always, somewhat edited):
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A large natural history museum can be a scary place at night, after the tourists have gone home for the day. It’s a world of eerie shadows cast by the bones of long-dead dinosaurs. And when evil stalks the hallways, looking to commit murder, it does so in the midst of quite literally Ten Thousand Blunt Instruments – which is the name of a collection of stories by Philip Wylie.
Philip Wylie was a very prolific author, writing primarily in the first half of the twentieth century. He wrote all kinds of things – poetry, essays, screenplays, newspaper columns, fiction and non-fiction. He was the co-author of When Worlds Collide, a book which became a major influence on science fiction. He also wrote another book called Gladiator which is said to have influenced the creator of Superman. And, along with all his other works, he wrote a number of very good traditional mysteries, both novels and short stories.
It is six of Philip Wylie’s shorter works which are brought together in this Crippen & Landru collection called Ten Thousand Blunt Instruments. While they are quite different, one from another, these stories written between 1931 and 1944 are all ingenious puzzles and marvelous character studies.
Consider the plots:
In “Murder at Galleon Key,” a man finds himself not only suspected of murder – but being framed for it – all in the midst of a dangerous hurricane on a small island off the Florida coast.
“In a Hole” is a delightful story about a former bank clerk who now fancies himself as a private investigator. And despite the skepticism of the police, he manages to thwart single-handedly a carefully planned major bank heist.
“It Couldn’t be Murder” follows a young artist who finds that a series of deaths in one family are really very clever – and almost untraceable – murders. He will risk his own life to prove it.
“The Paradise Canyon Mystery” is set at an upscale resort hotel. A young Olympic swimming champion – a trained engineer unable to find work in his field – takes a post as a swimming instructor and finds himself chasing a ruthless killer across the Southwestern desert.
“Death Whispers” is a chilling story about a newspaper editor, temporarily blind as the result of some eye surgery. He hears noises in the next apartment which convince him that a murder has taken place – and then finds himself trying to solve the murder and, worse, grappling with a murderer whom he cannot see.
And finally there’s the story which gives the book its title. “Ten Thousand Blunt Instruments” is set in the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. When one of the staff members is murdered, police must cope with the fact that the murder weapon could be any of the thousands of potential blunt instruments hanging on the walls, or sitting in exhibit cases, around the museum. The shadowy exhibit halls and the not-so-deserted backstage corridors of the museum provide a chilling background to this hunt for a murderer and a motive.
Six stories. Six puzzles, to be sure, for Wylie follows the traditional mystery form and provides us with clues along the way. And he provides us with absolutely memorable characters. I suspect people like the blind newspaper editor, the Olympic swimmer and the young man nearly framed for murder will stay in your memory long after you finish the stories. Wylie was an accomplished storyteller, with something of an iconoclastic outlook on society and its customs, and that comes through in this book as well. It is a thoroughly enjoyable read. Ten Thousand Blunt Instruments was edited by mystery author Bill Pronzini, who contributes an informative and lively introduction which goes into more details about Philip Wylie’s career. The volume is one of Crippen & Landru’s “Lost Classics” series, made up of collections of short stories by major writers – some regular mystery authors, others, like Philip Wylie, from the broader field of literature. [When last I checked, in December 2018, it was still in print and available from C&L - ed.]The characters, the settings and the plots combine to make this a worthwhile addition to any mystery reader’s library.
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You can listen to the complete recording of the podcast review by clicking here.
Next: The Case of the Constant Suicides, by John Dickson Carr.
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