Among the many novels written by "Ellery Queen," my favorites have long been the first few books created by Frederick Dannay and Manfred Lee, the two cousins who, between them, created Ellery Queen. Among those early novels, one of the most complex puzzle plots designed to tease and tantalize the reader belongs to The Chinese Orange Mystery, first published in 1934. It is best described by the book's introduction as "The Crime That Was Backwards," for that was how it appeared to the investigators: it took place within a locked and bolted room, and, when the door was broken down and the room entered, everything in the room - including the clothes the victim was wearing - had been turned backwards. The Chinese Orange Mystery is the subject of this week's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and you can listen to the complete review by clicking here.
In The Chinese Orange Mystery, a man arrives at the office of publisher Donald Kirk, on the 22nd floor of the Chancellor Hotel in New York City, asking to see him. Kirk is out, and the man is shown into Kirk’s office to wait. When Donald Kirk arrives at his office, an hour or so later, he has his friend Ellery Queen (the fictional detective,as opposed to the pen name of the author) with him. Kirk isn’t expecting a visitor, but he tries to open the door into his office, where the mysterious person is waiting. He can’t – that door is bolted (and the only other entrance to the room is visible continuously from the desk of a hotel official, who has seen nobody enter or leave that room). But when Kirk and Ellery break into the room, they find the visitor dead – killed by a blow from a poker. And the room itself is chaotic, with furniture reversed and moved – and somebody (presumably the murderer) has put the victim’s clothes on the body – backwards. And, by the way, nobody can (or will) identify the victim – nor is he carrying any sort of identification.
Is Ellery's father, New York City homicide Inspector Queen, right in saying it's simply sheer madness? Ellery doesn’t think so. And as he pursues various theories, and a large number of excellent red herrings, he continues to try to find a pattern, some clue that will turn that chaotic scene into some kind of recognizable and meaningful pattern. And if you're a reader who enjoys matching wits with the author, there's a "Challenge to the Reader," near the end of the book, where the reader is invited to consider all the evidence - as Ellery does - and solve the case before Ellery Queen. I can never do it. Can you? I think you’ll find it fascinating. The Chinese Orange Mystery is back in print (and in e-book formats as well) from Otto Penzler’s American Mystery Classics series, and it should be readily available.
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