The Luminous Face

Pennington Wise #5

by Carolyn Wells

The death of Robert Gleason, a wealthy businessman from Seattle, at first looked like a suicide. He had called his doctor saying that he was shot, and when the doctor arrived at his New York apartment, the door was locked. After breaking down the door, his body was found lying on the floor, a revolver at his side. Yet certain facts argued against a verdict of suicide. Gleason had been shot twice, once shot to the temple, which killed him instantly, and a second shot, after he was dead, to the shoulder. How could he have made a phone call after he was already dead? A web of conflicting clues and dubious alibis baffle the police until detective Pennington Wise and his mysterious assistant Zizi are called in to solve the case.

Genres: Mystery

141 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1921

About the author

Carolyn Wells was a prolific writer for over 40 years and was especially noted for her humor, and she was a frequent contributor of nonsense verse and whimsical pieces to such little magazines as Gelett Burgess' The Lark, the Chap Book, the Yellow Book, and the Philistine.

Librarian note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Pamela Mclaren · Rating 3 out of 5]

A group of men discuss the reasons for murder and one announces that he would kill one particular man because he disliked him." Then when the man turns up dead, the others are horrified that he has said something that has put the noose around his own neck, particularly when he offers no alibi. As the police investigate they discover other possible reasons for the murder but in each and all, they find that the alibis hold.

But that only occurs until Pennington Wise and his assistant arrive on the scene and with the two of them on the case, it is quickly solved.

I like the Penny Wise portion of the book but the earlier section went on a bit too long and I disliked how all the characters seems to waffle about their alibis, why they did certain things, etc. I disliked the whole bunch! But the murder was indeed clever and well worth reading.

[Laura]

Free download available at Project Gutenberg.