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John J. Malone #2
The corpse steps out
Written by the first mystery author ever to appear on the cover of Time, this is a thriller about an arson ring, an illegally transported dead body, and a great deal of alcohol.
305 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1940
31 people are currently reading
172 people want to read
About the author
Craig Rice
102 books56 followersPseudonym for Georgiana Ann Randolph Craig aka Daphne Sanders and Michael Venning.
Known for her hard-boiled mystery plots combined with screwball comedy, Georgiana 'Craig' Rice was the author of twenty-three novels, six of them posthumous, numerous short stories, and some true crime pieces. In the 1940s she rivaled Agatha Christie in sales and was featured on the cover of Time Magazine in 1946. However, over the past sixty years she has fallen into relative obscurity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Ri...
Known for her hard-boiled mystery plots combined with screwball comedy, Georgiana 'Craig' Rice was the author of twenty-three novels, six of them posthumous, numerous short stories, and some true crime pieces. In the 1940s she rivaled Agatha Christie in sales and was featured on the cover of Time Magazine in 1946. However, over the past sixty years she has fallen into relative obscurity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Ri...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews
December 15, 2022
The Corpse Steps Out
by Craig Rice
This book was first published in 1940. The story is based on radio actors and singers. Because of the era of the publication, I found a couple of phrases that would certainly be banned today. I also checked out the author and although the name is that of a man, she is really a woman using an alias.
The story really is pretty good. A fun plot where it seems everyone had found the dead body and no one reported it! Then the body disappears! Different people have different ideas of who might have done it and try to cover for said person. So many people are messing around! It's quite clever and silly. I thought it was insanity at its best! Soon another body is found! Now what? If the publisher had corrected the phrases then it would be a solid 5 star just for the zany body capers!
by Craig Rice
This book was first published in 1940. The story is based on radio actors and singers. Because of the era of the publication, I found a couple of phrases that would certainly be banned today. I also checked out the author and although the name is that of a man, she is really a woman using an alias.
The story really is pretty good. A fun plot where it seems everyone had found the dead body and no one reported it! Then the body disappears! Different people have different ideas of who might have done it and try to cover for said person. So many people are messing around! It's quite clever and silly. I thought it was insanity at its best! Soon another body is found! Now what? If the publisher had corrected the phrases then it would be a solid 5 star just for the zany body capers!
December 20, 2021
Not since the 1966 comedic thriller The Wrong Box have there been so many bodies moving around. This second in the Jake Justus/John J. Malone series is even better than the first, with more madcap exploits and a more intriguing plot. Most readers will be surprised by the ending, and the dialogue is as funny and snappy as ever.
Lastly, John J. Malone again justifies Justus’ description of the dour, disheveled, misanthropic legal eagle as “a lawyer who could get [someone] out of trouble if she’d committed a mass murder in an orphanage, with seventeen policemen for witnesses.” Don’t miss this quick, amusing read.
Lastly, John J. Malone again justifies Justus’ description of the dour, disheveled, misanthropic legal eagle as “a lawyer who could get [someone] out of trouble if she’d committed a mass murder in an orphanage, with seventeen policemen for witnesses.” Don’t miss this quick, amusing read.
August 3, 2016
"The Corpse Steps Out" is sort of a surrealistic screwball comedy-mystery with lots of clever banter between the likable and hard-drinking characters, and some clever and somewhat bizarre plotting. Stylistically it definitely has a 1940's vibe going on, very reminiscent of the Hollywood screwball comedy films of that era.
May 29, 2022
I always have so much fun with craig rice books
March 10, 2016
Part of the Jake Justus/Helene Brand/John J. Malone series.
A great example of the moribund art of the screwball mystery.
Jake Justus is a press agent. His main client, a radio star, finds a corpse. This corpse just happens to belong to her former beau, then blackmailer. The corpse disappears, the blackmail evidence is not found, and the radio star is in a real jam.
Jake calls Malone, the crooked lawyer to help, and Jake's paramour Helene, just happens to be in town as well.
Quite a caper. They just don't write them like this anymore.
A great example of the moribund art of the screwball mystery.
Jake Justus is a press agent. His main client, a radio star, finds a corpse. This corpse just happens to belong to her former beau, then blackmailer. The corpse disappears, the blackmail evidence is not found, and the radio star is in a real jam.
Jake calls Malone, the crooked lawyer to help, and Jake's paramour Helene, just happens to be in town as well.
Quite a caper. They just don't write them like this anymore.
January 1, 2019
Great fun.
Jake is a press agent for the Nelle Brown Revue (a radio program). The star of the show visits a former love between shows only to discover he is dead. Almost farcically bodies disappear and reappear. And Jake and Helene meet up again after apparently having been apart for some time. They're pretty sure they want to get married but can't seem to make the drive out to Crown Point.
This is the second book in the series. So far, both have taken place in Chicago in the 1920s-30s. And it is great to ride around with them on the streets of Chicago.
Jake is a press agent for the Nelle Brown Revue (a radio program). The star of the show visits a former love between shows only to discover he is dead. Almost farcically bodies disappear and reappear. And Jake and Helene meet up again after apparently having been apart for some time. They're pretty sure they want to get married but can't seem to make the drive out to Crown Point.
This is the second book in the series. So far, both have taken place in Chicago in the 1920s-30s. And it is great to ride around with them on the streets of Chicago.
June 3, 2018
Nelle Brown is not having a good day. FIrst, she got blackmailed. Now she's walked in to find her blackmailer dead. So the popular radio host calls her agent. But when agent Jake Justus goes to the apartment, there's no body there. And that sets off a train of events that is wild and drink-filled. A lovely book from Craig Rice.
October 21, 2017
This mystery from the 1940's should be a movie with Carey Grant and Grace Kelley. It is a rollicking story of radio stars, managers, dead bodies, missing corpses, lots of drinking, more drinking, and arson. It is a short, fun read.
February 7, 2023
The second book in the Malone/Justus series of books, and one of Craig Rice’s best. The sleuthing trio is in search of the missing body of Paul March, renown playboy and blackmailer. Laughs, clues and wit abound.
October 11, 2022
A Wandering Corpse in Chicago
↓ Similar Reading Experiences ↓
1. Craig Rice’s Eight Faces At Three (John J Malone 1)
2. Vincent Starrett’s Murder On “B” Deck
3. Jonathan Latimer’s Headed For A Hearse (Chicago setting)
1940 Chicago: Radio star Nelle Brown announces to her agent, Jake Justus, that she is being blackmailed. Not long after, Jake spies Nelle leaving her blackmailer’s apartment with a dead body inside. While Nelle swears she isn’t the killer, the two lay low and wait for the papers to announce the discovery of the body. But the murder is never reported. When Jake and Nelle return to the apartment, they find the body missing without a trace. John J. Malone soon finds himself on the case, once again doing his best to prevent an innocent person from going behind bars…But, first, where has the body gone?
My first experience with Craig Rice was her debut John J. Malone novel, Eight Faces at Three. She is a brilliant writer for those who prioritize atmospheric reads so clearly set in their time and place. Rice also crafts mysteries that thrive on chaos. Characters struggle to predict each other’s actions and, in the case of The Corpse Steps Out, we have bodies disappearing and reappearing in the oddest places. I was also pleased to find in this book that Helene Brand makes another star appearance. Her dynamic with Jake is just so enjoyable, and I love their will-they-won’t-they romantic tension.
For those who want to branch out to Golden Age American detective fiction, this is a fantastically chaotic mystery with an equally ridiculous wrap up!
↓ Similar Reading Experiences ↓
1. Craig Rice’s Eight Faces At Three (John J Malone 1)
2. Vincent Starrett’s Murder On “B” Deck
3. Jonathan Latimer’s Headed For A Hearse (Chicago setting)
1940 Chicago: Radio star Nelle Brown announces to her agent, Jake Justus, that she is being blackmailed. Not long after, Jake spies Nelle leaving her blackmailer’s apartment with a dead body inside. While Nelle swears she isn’t the killer, the two lay low and wait for the papers to announce the discovery of the body. But the murder is never reported. When Jake and Nelle return to the apartment, they find the body missing without a trace. John J. Malone soon finds himself on the case, once again doing his best to prevent an innocent person from going behind bars…But, first, where has the body gone?
My first experience with Craig Rice was her debut John J. Malone novel, Eight Faces at Three. She is a brilliant writer for those who prioritize atmospheric reads so clearly set in their time and place. Rice also crafts mysteries that thrive on chaos. Characters struggle to predict each other’s actions and, in the case of The Corpse Steps Out, we have bodies disappearing and reappearing in the oddest places. I was also pleased to find in this book that Helene Brand makes another star appearance. Her dynamic with Jake is just so enjoyable, and I love their will-they-won’t-they romantic tension.
For those who want to branch out to Golden Age American detective fiction, this is a fantastically chaotic mystery with an equally ridiculous wrap up!
December 29, 2010
A book from it's time, heavily influenced by movies and theater. Lots of slang and drinking, and not a whole lot of detecting. There are several murders, but no one seems interested in figuring out who-done-it. Of course there is one guy, a lawyer, off in the wings most of the time who ends up figuring it all out.
It's more of people doing "crazy things" and usually all the wrong things, having a drink a laugh and telling the lawyer to get things fixed up.
So, while it has a few wonderful lines here and there, for me it the sum of it didn't add up to a great mystery or a great comedy.
It's more of people doing "crazy things" and usually all the wrong things, having a drink a laugh and telling the lawyer to get things fixed up.
So, while it has a few wonderful lines here and there, for me it the sum of it didn't add up to a great mystery or a great comedy.
September 23, 2014
Press agent Jake Justus is also managing the career of popular radio singer Nelle Brown, and that's a full-time job. Nelle's sponsor insists that she be squeaky clean, but she has a taste for bad boys, and one of them is trying to blackmail her. Fortunately, Jake has the help of beautiful socialite Helene Brand, whom he hopes to marry, and streetwise lawyer John Malone, who knows where the bodies are buried--a necessary skill, since the bodies in this caper keep disappearing.
October 4, 2024
The cover that accompanies my review is NOT the cover of my original novel. The cover shown on this page is absolutely horrendous!
The book opens with a woman making her way around someone's apartment, searching for something. The chapter ends with her finally checking the pockets of the body on her floor.
The story then moves to talent agent Jake Justus whose client Nelle Brown, a young starlet on the rise on radio, is related to the dead body. The pair discover the body, but leave it momentarily, and upon returning it's gone. Brown reveals that the dead man had compromising love letters that could doom her career. Justus contacts lawyer J.J. Malone, who's always got a drink or is pouring the next one. The three go looking for the body and come upon more corpses and clues until the murderer's reveal.
This was a very easy mystery to solve after the first few chapters, but I enjoyed reading the book nonetheless. It's an easy read with plenty of clues, characters, and fun lines.
The book opens with a woman making her way around someone's apartment, searching for something. The chapter ends with her finally checking the pockets of the body on her floor.
The story then moves to talent agent Jake Justus whose client Nelle Brown, a young starlet on the rise on radio, is related to the dead body. The pair discover the body, but leave it momentarily, and upon returning it's gone. Brown reveals that the dead man had compromising love letters that could doom her career. Justus contacts lawyer J.J. Malone, who's always got a drink or is pouring the next one. The three go looking for the body and come upon more corpses and clues until the murderer's reveal.
This was a very easy mystery to solve after the first few chapters, but I enjoyed reading the book nonetheless. It's an easy read with plenty of clues, characters, and fun lines.
July 31, 2025
Jake Justus is the press agent for radio singer, Nellie Brown. Not an easy lady to deal with.
When Nellie finds her ex-lover murdered in his apartment, Jake is the man she calls. She tells him about going to the apartment and finding the man dead with a bullet in his head. Jake goes to the apartment to verify Nellie’s story, and it is true. He leaves the apartment as is, but goes back the next morning and finds the body is missing and the apartment has been cleaned. Where is the body and who moved it?
Next up is a Mr. Givvus, who is found sitting on a park bench, reading the paper — a bullet through his head. What is this about?
There is also the matter of Nellie Brown and some letters that could cost her her career. Seems they were a little too lovey-dovey. Someone has gotten hold of them and is trying to blackmail her.
Multiple murders and blackmail mixed in a stew of alcohol with a good dash of humour. Dodging police, yet staying in contact with them to find out what they know and who the police suspect. Fast moving and a fun read, set in the 1940s.
When Nellie finds her ex-lover murdered in his apartment, Jake is the man she calls. She tells him about going to the apartment and finding the man dead with a bullet in his head. Jake goes to the apartment to verify Nellie’s story, and it is true. He leaves the apartment as is, but goes back the next morning and finds the body is missing and the apartment has been cleaned. Where is the body and who moved it?
Next up is a Mr. Givvus, who is found sitting on a park bench, reading the paper — a bullet through his head. What is this about?
There is also the matter of Nellie Brown and some letters that could cost her her career. Seems they were a little too lovey-dovey. Someone has gotten hold of them and is trying to blackmail her.
Multiple murders and blackmail mixed in a stew of alcohol with a good dash of humour. Dodging police, yet staying in contact with them to find out what they know and who the police suspect. Fast moving and a fun read, set in the 1940s.
March 5, 2024
A Fun And Lively Old-Fashioned Whodunit
The second of Craig Rice’s John J. Malone mysteries, this is a fast-paced and sometimes LOL book with entertaining characters. The mystery itself isn’t especially clever or hard to figure out, but the writing is so amusing that it doesn’t really matter. There are a few things reflective of the time in which it was written that a modern reader may find offensive, but not enough to dismiss the book as a whole. If you enjoy a light, quick, easygoing mystery, this is a great choice. (And while it isn’t necessary to have read the first book in the series, Eight Faces At Three, to enjoy this one, it does help set up the dynamic between the main characters that Rice continues in this book.)
The second of Craig Rice’s John J. Malone mysteries, this is a fast-paced and sometimes LOL book with entertaining characters. The mystery itself isn’t especially clever or hard to figure out, but the writing is so amusing that it doesn’t really matter. There are a few things reflective of the time in which it was written that a modern reader may find offensive, but not enough to dismiss the book as a whole. If you enjoy a light, quick, easygoing mystery, this is a great choice. (And while it isn’t necessary to have read the first book in the series, Eight Faces At Three, to enjoy this one, it does help set up the dynamic between the main characters that Rice continues in this book.)
August 2, 2022
Craig Rice was a remarkable popular author in her time (featured on a Time magazine cover), but I hadn't heard about her until recently. I'm always interested in crime writers who include humor in their mystery novels without going full cozy. This is a fun read, something akin to the "Thin Man" movies in its depiction of crime and good times amongst showbiz folk and high society in the 1940s. The partying and drinking get a bit wearing, but overall it still holds up pretty well. If "the Dorothy Parker of detective fiction" sounds intriguing to you, you should probably check it out.
April 19, 2023
Learned about this writer while reading Noir City. My interest was piqued since I'd recently watched "The Falcon's Brother" and Eddie said she'd written the script. This novel read like a script with little description and a lot of talking. It wasn't laugh-out-loud funny but definitely a dark comedy with our protagonists blithely applying their own interpretation of right and wrong. And the amount of drinking would have put Nick Charles under the table.
February 25, 2017
Reminded me of the era of screwball-comedy movies, though it revolves around a radio star. Snappy dialogue and bright witty women of the 1930s pepper the pages. More fun than mystery, with disappearing corpses and romantic sleuths. The pre-WWII Chicago Gold Coast setting was equally fun to envision.
September 4, 2018
I continue to super dig our main characters in this series and the jazzy Chicago setting. And in this one, the mystery is centered on a radio show (although a music one, not a drama), which should be total catnip for me. But I found it a bit slow and sort of run-of-the-mill. It's not one I'll revisit, but will continue on with the series.
February 2, 2019
This s the second in a series of mysteries starring some very quirky characters who paint a fascinating picture of the world of the thirties. These characters are privileged or they could not get away with their antics, but the author's imagination and humor make them fun to spend some time with as you discover how much life has changed in a relatively short time.
June 17, 2019
I really didn't know what to expect when I started reading this book but holy shit I loved that so much. I've never read a good old fashioned who-dun-it before but I really need to pick them up more often. The writing was really great, simple, but the dialogue was really punchy. It's been a while since an author's writing style excited me so much.
October 10, 2019
Great cast of characters. I read a hardback copy published in 1945, with brittle, yellowed pages. Loved the authentic 1940-ish atmosphere, such as live radio broadcasting. The characters are always needing a drink, and running off to the corner drug store for rye or gin. I did figure out who dunnit well before the end.
November 9, 2021
It was an entertaining read except for two things. They were drinking every time they went somewhere, and even when they weren't. Also, the author kept using the other's name whenever someone was speaking to him or her. That got very annoying. On the whole tho, I enjoyed the banter between the characters, and I couldn't predict who the murderer was.
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August 9, 2022I saw the answer a mile away, but I really don't care. Reading this book is like watching a screwball comedy from the 30s. Witty banter, romantic subplot, and booze all around.
A quick, fun read that would be good for those who like The Thin Man with a little more sex and--believe it or not--a little more booze. I think my liver is in shock just from reading it.
A quick, fun read that would be good for those who like The Thin Man with a little more sex and--believe it or not--a little more booze. I think my liver is in shock just from reading it.
September 13, 2023
The mystery in The Corpse Steps Out is like being caught in an avalanche. It starts out small and slow, then gets faster and faster, gathering more in its path, growing in size and speed, and all the while, the characters are trying to stay above and ahead of the flow, until it all comes crashing to a stunning conclusion. It's one heck of a ride.
February 9, 2023
Written in 1940, this is a madcap murder mystery/comedy with lots of action going on simultaneously. It is clever although dated, and worthy of a read. I listened to the audiobook which was expertly narrated by Johnny Heller, in a style true to the era.
July 9, 2023
An entirely entertaining, often laugh-out loud funny, old time mystery/detective story.
the ultimate culprit is guessable, and I'm not sure this solution makes perfect sense. But who cares? It's a rollicking good time. Highly recommended
And the audio book is very well-read.
the ultimate culprit is guessable, and I'm not sure this solution makes perfect sense. But who cares? It's a rollicking good time. Highly recommended
And the audio book is very well-read.
November 5, 2018
Way too convoluted for my tastes.
November 24, 2019
Great fun and really amazing.
December 4, 2022
A fun listen, an interesting cast, and an engaging plot. Narrators are terrific. (Circa 1940 A.D.) The WWII generation did it all and had it all going for them! Bless the memory of them all.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews