This Halloween weekend in Dallas, mystery readers and writers are gathering for the 50th anniversary celebration of Bouchercon, the world mystery convention. As an adjunct to Bouchercon's already packed schedule, there will be a banquet Friday night organized and held by the Wolfe Pack, the organization of fans dedicated to the exploits of the world's largest private detective, Nero Wolfe, and his right-hand assistant, Archie Goodwin. The 33 novels and 39 novellas (by the Wolfe Pack's count) written by Rex Stout about Wolfe and Archie have engendered a fierce loyalty among those fans. I'm often asked to pick a good book for readers who may be new to the author and his most popular characters. For a lot of reasons, I'm rather partial to Plot It Yourself, a book which I reviewed on the Classic Mysteries podcast several years ago. The text of that review may explain some of the reasons why I count myself among those fans. As always, slight editing has been preformed:
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If there is one word that all authors – and their publishers – would prefer not to hear, it is “plagiarism.” An accusation of plagiarism against an author – a claim that one author stole an idea or work from another writer – is serious business; at the very least, it can be a major stain on an author or publisher’s reputation. And sometimes, it can lead to something else, too. Here’s a case where it led to murder – when the publishers and writers turned for help to Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin. It happens in Plot it Yourself, by Rex Stout.
Rex Stout was a very good writer, and his characters, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, are among my favorite fictional detectives. But it is certainly true – as a number of my friends and fellow Wolfe devotees have observed – that there are some of the books where our primary interest is in the antics of Wolfe and Archie – more so than in the plot, which may seem ordinary or even far-fetched.
Not so, I would argue, in the case of Plot it Yourself, which was published in 1954. Ironically, perhaps, for a book with that title, it is Stout’s plot that fascinates us here, for it works, at least for me, on several levels.
The book begins with a group of publishers and writers jointly coming to see Nero Wolfe. It is unusual, they point out, for these two normally somewhat antagonistic groups to band together, but they feel they need to do so now against a common enemy.
It seems that, over the space of a few years, there have been five major claims of plagiarism made against very successful authors (including a dramatist) and their publishers. The claims have been paid – in one case, which went to a trial, the jury awarded damages to the plaintiff; the other claims were all settled out of court. And, although there seems to be no link among the plaintiffs, the method of claiming – and allegedly proving – the plagiarism has been the same in all the cases. Now, a sixth claim has been made, and the publishers and authors turn for help to Nero Wolfe: can he get to the bottom of these charges – baseless charges, the committee members insist – and make them stop?
Despite misgivings, Wolfe agrees to take the case. The first several chapters of the book contain a marvelous description of how he proves to his own – and his clients’ – satisfaction that all the claims of plagiarism must have been written by the same person.
But then something terrible happens: one of the people who had charged that their work had been plagiarized is murdered, apparently to keep that person from cooperating with Wolfe’s investigation. Wolfe blames himself for not taking more precautions; the committee of writers and publishers also blame themselves for possibly having set the events in motion that led to the murder.
But it is not the only murder. There will be more – until Wolfe is so enraged that he takes a vow: he will eat no meat and drink no beer – his favorite beverage – until he has caught the murderer. And, he says, when he has caught that murderer, he will also have uncovered the person behind the plagiarism scheme.
As I say, this is one of Stout’s better plots. And at a couple of points, Archie even specifically challenges the reader to examine the facts and come to the same conclusions that Wolfe reached in the case. It all ends, of course, with one of those patented office confrontations where Wolfe has gathered the suspects together in order to force a confession from the guilty person.
All of this is thoroughly delightful. The characters are interesting, the details of the plagiarism scam and how it was worked – and detected – are among the best parts of the novel. I’d rate Plot it Yourself very highly among Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe stories, and I recommend it to you. If you want a printed copy, I’m afraid you’ll have to look to your favorite source for used – let’s call them pre-read – books, but it is also available electronically in an inexpensive edition for the Amazon Kindle.
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You can listen to the complete audio review by clicking here.
Next: Death on the High C's, by Robert Barnard.
[Editor's note: Sorry for the delay in posting this, but Bouchercon intervened. And the banquet was delicious. }
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