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Nigel Strangeways #12, 13, 14
The Nicholas Blake Treasury 4 Volume Set
Writing under the pseudonym of Nicholas Blake, Poet Laureate C. Day. Lewis turned out brilliant, literate mysteries featuring the urbane, Oxford-educated amateur detective Nigel Strangeways. Readers already familiar with the tall, angular young man whose rumpled clothing and abstract air make him resemble a university lecture more than a sleuth. Volume one includes Thou Shell of Death, The Beast Must Die and the Corpse in the Snowman. Volume two includes A Question of Proof, There's Trouble Brewing and The Smiler With The Knife. Volume 3 includes Murder With Malice, Minute for Murder, Had of a Traveler. Volume four includes End of Chapter, The Widow's Cruise and The Worm of Death.
- GenresMystery
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1961
10 people want to read
About the author
Nicholas Blake
85 books72 followersNicholas Blake is the pseudonym of poet Cecil Day-Lewis C. Day Lewis, who was born in Ireland in 1904. He was the son of the Reverend Frank Cecil Day-Lewis and his wife Kathleen (nee Squires). His mother died in 1906, and he and his father moved to London, where he was brought up by his father with the help of an aunt.
He spent his holidays in Wexford and regarded himself very much as Anglo-Irish, although when the Republic of Ireland was declared in 1948 he chose British citizenship.
He was married twice, to Mary King in 1928 and to Jill Balcon in 1951, and during the 1940s he had a long love affair with novelist Rosamond Lehmann. He had four children from his two marriages, with actor Daniel Day-Lewis, documentary filmmaker and television chef Tamasin Day-Lewis and TV critic and writer Sean Day-Lewis being three of his children.
He began work as a schoolmaster, and during World War II he worked as a publications editor in the Ministry of Information. After the war he joined Chatto & Windus as a senior editor and director, and then in 1946 he began lecturing at Cambridge University. He later taught poetry at Oxford University, where he was Professor of Poetry from 1951-1956, and from 1962-1963 he was the Norton Professor at Harvard University.
But he was by then earning his living mainly from his writings, having had some poetry published in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and then in 1935 beginning his career as a thriller writer under the pseudonym of Nicholas Blake with 'A Question of Proof', which featured his amateur sleuth Nigel Strangeways, reputedly modelled on W H Auden. He continued the Strangeways series, which finally totalled 16 novels, ending with 'The Morning After Death' in 1966. He also wrote four detective novels which did not feature Strangeways.
He continued to write poetry and became Poet Laureate in 1968, a post he held until his death in 1972. He was also awarded the CBE.
He died from pancreatic cancer on 22 May 1972 at the Hertfordshire home of Kingsley Amis and Elizabeth Jane Howard, where he and his wife were staying. He is buried in Stinsford churchyard, close to the grave of one of his heroes, Thomas Hardy, something that he had arranged before his death.
He spent his holidays in Wexford and regarded himself very much as Anglo-Irish, although when the Republic of Ireland was declared in 1948 he chose British citizenship.
He was married twice, to Mary King in 1928 and to Jill Balcon in 1951, and during the 1940s he had a long love affair with novelist Rosamond Lehmann. He had four children from his two marriages, with actor Daniel Day-Lewis, documentary filmmaker and television chef Tamasin Day-Lewis and TV critic and writer Sean Day-Lewis being three of his children.
He began work as a schoolmaster, and during World War II he worked as a publications editor in the Ministry of Information. After the war he joined Chatto & Windus as a senior editor and director, and then in 1946 he began lecturing at Cambridge University. He later taught poetry at Oxford University, where he was Professor of Poetry from 1951-1956, and from 1962-1963 he was the Norton Professor at Harvard University.
But he was by then earning his living mainly from his writings, having had some poetry published in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and then in 1935 beginning his career as a thriller writer under the pseudonym of Nicholas Blake with 'A Question of Proof', which featured his amateur sleuth Nigel Strangeways, reputedly modelled on W H Auden. He continued the Strangeways series, which finally totalled 16 novels, ending with 'The Morning After Death' in 1966. He also wrote four detective novels which did not feature Strangeways.
He continued to write poetry and became Poet Laureate in 1968, a post he held until his death in 1972. He was also awarded the CBE.
He died from pancreatic cancer on 22 May 1972 at the Hertfordshire home of Kingsley Amis and Elizabeth Jane Howard, where he and his wife were staying. He is buried in Stinsford churchyard, close to the grave of one of his heroes, Thomas Hardy, something that he had arranged before his death.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 1, 2022
End of Chapter
Review coming soon
***********************
The Widow's Cruise [finished 10/28/22]
"The only thing I have against cruise life," said Clare, yawning again, "is that it's turning us all into busybodies and gossips."
Clare Massinger is a renowned sculptor who is afraid that her ideas are getting stale. A cruise to the Greek isles, full of classical temples and ruins and beautiful scenery should be just the think to to get the creative juices flowing in new and exciting ways. She and Nigel Strangeways book a trip that sails from Athens and will take them to Delos and a number of islands in the Dodecanese, returning to the mainland by way of Crete and including excursions to Epidaurus, Mycenae, and Delphi. Also included, but not explicitly mentioned in the itinerary, is brush with ancient tragedy...in the form of murder.
Miss Ianthe Ambrose, former schoolteacher, has apparently had run-ins with several of those on the cruise--from Faith Trubody, a student whom Miss Ambrose arranged to be dismissed, and her brother Peter, who has vowed to get even with the woman, to Mr. Jeremy Street who has suffered academic humiliation from Miss Ambrose's scathing reviews in scholarly journals to her own sister who may have been goodhearted enough to treat Miss Ambrose to a cruise but who would like just a teensy bit of time to herself so she can enjoy herself...with a man or two. In addition to the irritating teacher, there are a couple of people who make it their business to try and find out as much as possible about their fellow passengers. There's Primrose Chalmers, a schoolgirl who follows folks around and writes everything down in a notebook. And there's Ivor Bentick-Jones, equally as interested in his fellow passengers' secrets, but possibly for far more nefarious reasons.
When Miss Ambrose disappears from the ship and Primrose is strangled, there's speculation about whether Miss Ambrose killed the girl and then committed suicide. The teacher had been acting oddly and seemed almost suicidal. But Nigel isn't convinced. Perhaps someone killed Miss Ambrose and tossed her overboard and maybe Primrose saw more than she should have and was killed for it. After, all the girl's notebook is missing too. The captain recognizes Strangeways and asks him to take a hand in the matter--it is hoped that Nigel will be able to discreetly investigate and be ready to hand the culprit over to the Greek authorities when they return to dock. Adroit questioning and a final, gather-all-the-suspects together scene allows Nigel to do just that.
I'm reading these Blake mysteries from a 3-in-1 Blake Treasury anthology (in reverse order, by the way). And I must say that I enjoyed this one much more than The Worm of Death. While psychology is still important here, Blake gives us a much more classic mystery set-up with plenty of clues (and red herrings) strewn about and a nice closed circle crime to investigate. Even though part of the mystery took place on one of the islands along the way, we still have a limited cast of characters, all trapped together on the cruise ship. Blake makes the most of the setting and while few of the characters are any more appealing than those in Worm, we do have the benefit of the Bishop and his wife to give us a couple of pleasant people for Nigel to interact with. Of the later Blake mysteries, this is my favorite so far. ★★★ and 1/4.
First posted on my blog My Reader's Block
*********************
The Worm of Death [finished 10/26/22]
Nigel Strangeways and Clare Massinger are invited to the home Dr. Piers Loudron on a foggy February night. They are fairly new to the Greenwich area and the dinner invitation is a chance for them to get to know some of their neighbors. It is a pretty uncomfortable meal with Loudron's children behaving as though they're still in the nursery rather than grown men and women and the doctor being sarcastic about the lot. They squabble amongst themselves and take verbal potshots at one another. His son James is also a doctor, but he lacks the confidence and presence of his well-respected father. Rebecca, the daughter of the house, is in love with Walter Barn, an artist and a man her father heartily disapproves. Howard is fairly unsuccessful business man with a costly wife who has an eye for anything in trousers. And then there's Graham, an adopted son, who apparently can do no wrong in the good doctor's eyes. Nigel and Clare aren't quite sure why they've been invited--unless there was hope that their presence would put a damper on the family tensions. But it doesn't help matters that Loudron announces to all that Nigel is something of an amateur sleuth.
"Do you have noble ideas about justice and retribution and all that? Do you see yourself as a hound of heaven tracking down the wrongdoer?"
Later that night, long after the dinner party, Loudron disappears from his home. The next morning Rebecca and Walter come to Nigel to ask for his advice. But other than a search of the house and grounds (already done) and contacting the police (also done), Nigel has nothing to suggest. A little over a week later Loudron's body is found in the Thames. But he wasn't drowned...his wrists were slit. Was it suicide? If so, why was he in the river? If not, who killed him? And did the same person dump his body?
It's been a while since a read a Nigel Strangeways mystery. And it's been an even longer while since I read this one. I remembered exactly nothing about it. Not that it would have mattered if I did, because there's very little mystery about who did it. Despite Inspector Wright's point of view:
"We're getting nowhere. Nowhere at all. A lovely set of motives. Lots of lovely opportunity. Some cockeyed alibis. But hardly one solid fact to build on. Even their lies--and they've told enough, between them--seem to cancel one another out."
Wright's a trifle pessimistic. If, as Strangeways does, you pay any attention at all to psychology then you have to know who did it. Sure, all of the suspects have psychological hangups. That's an effort to muddy the waters and make the reader think there's some sort of choice about who did it. But, supposing the number of motives and personalities does distract you--there's really only one logical reason for the second murder. Especially after the reader recognizes the important psychological motive. And, knowing how Strangeways operates, the reader should be thinking about the psychology.
And--speaking of personalities. We've really got a prize set here. Not a likeable character amongst the suspects. I kindof wanted to root for one of the Loudron children, but they made it pretty darn hard to do so. And Strangeways isn't even all that attractive here--what with eyeballing old prostitutes and flirting along with the unashamed vamp. The best character is Clare, but we don't see nearly enough of her. I love how she saves the day for Nigel at the end. But overall, the book just didn't do it for me. The mystery is rather squalid and culprit is pretty cold-blooded. You can tell that we're not in the Golden Age anymore, Toto. ★★ and 3/4.
Reviewed on my blog My Reader's Block.
Review coming soon
***********************
The Widow's Cruise [finished 10/28/22]
"The only thing I have against cruise life," said Clare, yawning again, "is that it's turning us all into busybodies and gossips."
Clare Massinger is a renowned sculptor who is afraid that her ideas are getting stale. A cruise to the Greek isles, full of classical temples and ruins and beautiful scenery should be just the think to to get the creative juices flowing in new and exciting ways. She and Nigel Strangeways book a trip that sails from Athens and will take them to Delos and a number of islands in the Dodecanese, returning to the mainland by way of Crete and including excursions to Epidaurus, Mycenae, and Delphi. Also included, but not explicitly mentioned in the itinerary, is brush with ancient tragedy...in the form of murder.
Miss Ianthe Ambrose, former schoolteacher, has apparently had run-ins with several of those on the cruise--from Faith Trubody, a student whom Miss Ambrose arranged to be dismissed, and her brother Peter, who has vowed to get even with the woman, to Mr. Jeremy Street who has suffered academic humiliation from Miss Ambrose's scathing reviews in scholarly journals to her own sister who may have been goodhearted enough to treat Miss Ambrose to a cruise but who would like just a teensy bit of time to herself so she can enjoy herself...with a man or two. In addition to the irritating teacher, there are a couple of people who make it their business to try and find out as much as possible about their fellow passengers. There's Primrose Chalmers, a schoolgirl who follows folks around and writes everything down in a notebook. And there's Ivor Bentick-Jones, equally as interested in his fellow passengers' secrets, but possibly for far more nefarious reasons.
When Miss Ambrose disappears from the ship and Primrose is strangled, there's speculation about whether Miss Ambrose killed the girl and then committed suicide. The teacher had been acting oddly and seemed almost suicidal. But Nigel isn't convinced. Perhaps someone killed Miss Ambrose and tossed her overboard and maybe Primrose saw more than she should have and was killed for it. After, all the girl's notebook is missing too. The captain recognizes Strangeways and asks him to take a hand in the matter--it is hoped that Nigel will be able to discreetly investigate and be ready to hand the culprit over to the Greek authorities when they return to dock. Adroit questioning and a final, gather-all-the-suspects together scene allows Nigel to do just that.
I'm reading these Blake mysteries from a 3-in-1 Blake Treasury anthology (in reverse order, by the way). And I must say that I enjoyed this one much more than The Worm of Death. While psychology is still important here, Blake gives us a much more classic mystery set-up with plenty of clues (and red herrings) strewn about and a nice closed circle crime to investigate. Even though part of the mystery took place on one of the islands along the way, we still have a limited cast of characters, all trapped together on the cruise ship. Blake makes the most of the setting and while few of the characters are any more appealing than those in Worm, we do have the benefit of the Bishop and his wife to give us a couple of pleasant people for Nigel to interact with. Of the later Blake mysteries, this is my favorite so far. ★★★ and 1/4.
First posted on my blog My Reader's Block
*********************
The Worm of Death [finished 10/26/22]
Nigel Strangeways and Clare Massinger are invited to the home Dr. Piers Loudron on a foggy February night. They are fairly new to the Greenwich area and the dinner invitation is a chance for them to get to know some of their neighbors. It is a pretty uncomfortable meal with Loudron's children behaving as though they're still in the nursery rather than grown men and women and the doctor being sarcastic about the lot. They squabble amongst themselves and take verbal potshots at one another. His son James is also a doctor, but he lacks the confidence and presence of his well-respected father. Rebecca, the daughter of the house, is in love with Walter Barn, an artist and a man her father heartily disapproves. Howard is fairly unsuccessful business man with a costly wife who has an eye for anything in trousers. And then there's Graham, an adopted son, who apparently can do no wrong in the good doctor's eyes. Nigel and Clare aren't quite sure why they've been invited--unless there was hope that their presence would put a damper on the family tensions. But it doesn't help matters that Loudron announces to all that Nigel is something of an amateur sleuth.
"Do you have noble ideas about justice and retribution and all that? Do you see yourself as a hound of heaven tracking down the wrongdoer?"
Later that night, long after the dinner party, Loudron disappears from his home. The next morning Rebecca and Walter come to Nigel to ask for his advice. But other than a search of the house and grounds (already done) and contacting the police (also done), Nigel has nothing to suggest. A little over a week later Loudron's body is found in the Thames. But he wasn't drowned...his wrists were slit. Was it suicide? If so, why was he in the river? If not, who killed him? And did the same person dump his body?
It's been a while since a read a Nigel Strangeways mystery. And it's been an even longer while since I read this one. I remembered exactly nothing about it. Not that it would have mattered if I did, because there's very little mystery about who did it. Despite Inspector Wright's point of view:
"We're getting nowhere. Nowhere at all. A lovely set of motives. Lots of lovely opportunity. Some cockeyed alibis. But hardly one solid fact to build on. Even their lies--and they've told enough, between them--seem to cancel one another out."
Wright's a trifle pessimistic. If, as Strangeways does, you pay any attention at all to psychology then you have to know who did it. Sure, all of the suspects have psychological hangups. That's an effort to muddy the waters and make the reader think there's some sort of choice about who did it. But, supposing the number of motives and personalities does distract you--there's really only one logical reason for the second murder. Especially after the reader recognizes the important psychological motive. And, knowing how Strangeways operates, the reader should be thinking about the psychology.
And--speaking of personalities. We've really got a prize set here. Not a likeable character amongst the suspects. I kindof wanted to root for one of the Loudron children, but they made it pretty darn hard to do so. And Strangeways isn't even all that attractive here--what with eyeballing old prostitutes and flirting along with the unashamed vamp. The best character is Clare, but we don't see nearly enough of her. I love how she saves the day for Nigel at the end. But overall, the book just didn't do it for me. The mystery is rather squalid and culprit is pretty cold-blooded. You can tell that we're not in the Golden Age anymore, Toto. ★★ and 3/4.
Reviewed on my blog My Reader's Block.
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November 22, 2020"End of Chapter" - 3.5*, read in Feb. 2020
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