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Stranger At Home
Give a man enough rope and he'll hang-someone! About: A book written to cash in on the success of film actor George Sanders, and ghost-written by Leigh Brackett, whom the supposed author claims never to have met. Stranger at Home is the story of Mike Vickers, back home from the dead, and trying to find out who among his family tried to get him out of the way in the first place.
140 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1946
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About the author
George Sanders
42 books21 followersSanders was a Russian-born English film and television actor, singer-songwriter, music composer, and author. His prominent English accent and bass voice often led him to be cast as sophisticated but villainous characters. His career spanned more than 40 years.
NOTE: There are multiple authors with this name.
NOTE: There are multiple authors with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
January 28, 2020
Leigh Brackett was known principally as a prolific writer of science fiction and she also wrote a number of screenplays. She worked on the screenplay for "The Big Sleep" and "Rio Bravo," among others, and at the end of her career worked on the screenplay for "The Empire Strikes Back." She ghost wrote this book in 1946 for the actor George Sanders. It's now been republished by Black Gat Books under Brackett's name.
The protagonist is a businessman named Michael Vickers. Four years earlier, Vickers disappeared in Mexico while on a fishing trip with three of his best friends. His body was never recovered and he has been presumed dead. Now, however, to the shock of virtually everyone he knows, Vickers suddenly returns on a night when his wife is throwing a party at their beach house.
When Vickers strolls nonchalantly into the party, he discovers that his wife has taken their boat out for a cruise. He makes himself at home and greets the three old friends with whom he had been in Mexico on that fateful night. He explains that someone hit him over the head and left him for dead. For a long time he lost his memory and had no idea who he was. During this period, he was effectively kidnapped and forced to work on a tramp freighter. He finally recovered his memory, made his escape, and found his way back home to California.
During his absence, all three of his "best friends," though married themselves, have been trying to make time with Vicker's very delectable wife, Angie. Vickers assumes that one of the three assaulted him in Mexico in order to have a chance with Angie. He also wonders if maybe his wife might have encouraged the attack.
Even before Vickers's wife returns to the party, one of the three men that Vickers suspects of attacking him turns up murdered, and Vickers becomes the principal subject. Is he a killer taking revenge? If so, does he have other targets in mind?
This is a very well done classic hard boiled mystery. Vickers is a very interesting protagonist, and the relationships that unfold between him, his wife, and the other survivors of the trip to Mexico are fun to watch unfold. More than seventy years after its original publication, this is still a book that fans of the hard boiled genre might want to seek out.
The protagonist is a businessman named Michael Vickers. Four years earlier, Vickers disappeared in Mexico while on a fishing trip with three of his best friends. His body was never recovered and he has been presumed dead. Now, however, to the shock of virtually everyone he knows, Vickers suddenly returns on a night when his wife is throwing a party at their beach house.
When Vickers strolls nonchalantly into the party, he discovers that his wife has taken their boat out for a cruise. He makes himself at home and greets the three old friends with whom he had been in Mexico on that fateful night. He explains that someone hit him over the head and left him for dead. For a long time he lost his memory and had no idea who he was. During this period, he was effectively kidnapped and forced to work on a tramp freighter. He finally recovered his memory, made his escape, and found his way back home to California.
During his absence, all three of his "best friends," though married themselves, have been trying to make time with Vicker's very delectable wife, Angie. Vickers assumes that one of the three assaulted him in Mexico in order to have a chance with Angie. He also wonders if maybe his wife might have encouraged the attack.
Even before Vickers's wife returns to the party, one of the three men that Vickers suspects of attacking him turns up murdered, and Vickers becomes the principal subject. Is he a killer taking revenge? If so, does he have other targets in mind?
This is a very well done classic hard boiled mystery. Vickers is a very interesting protagonist, and the relationships that unfold between him, his wife, and the other survivors of the trip to Mexico are fun to watch unfold. More than seventy years after its original publication, this is still a book that fans of the hard boiled genre might want to seek out.
January 31, 2025
George Sanders in his day was a famous actor who appeared in Rebecca (1940), Samson and Delilah (1949), All About Eve (1950), Ivanhoe (1952), Brian De Bois-Guilbert in Ivanhoe (1952), and endless other films, tv shows, and radio shows. He was also married (at different times) to Zsa Zsa Gábor and her sister Magda Gabor as well as a few other wives.
Two crime fiction novels were published under his byline, with the hope that his fame would produce sales.
Crime on My Hands (1944) was the first. The brilliantly-crafted Stranger at home, ghostwritten by science fiction writer Leigh Brackett the second.
The story concerns one Michael Vickers, a rich Beverly Hills snob who disappeared four years earlier when on a cruise along the Mexican coast with three so-called friends, Job, Bill, and Harry. They had come back at a loss to explain what happened to Vickers and life went on.
Vickers’ story is that someone conked him on the head, saying they’d been waiting years to do him in. Four years of amnesia, putting together clues, like how his three friends were hopelessly smitten with his dark-haired wife Angie and wondering if she had tired of him and put one of them up to it.
One evening Vickers casually strolls back to find his wife throwing a crazy drunken party at the beach house. They are all too drunk to understand he’s back and he spies Angie leaving her own party in her boat. Vickers is relishing seeing her again and seeing perhaps if she is happy to see him or if her plans have now gone astray.
Nevertheless while Vickers is starting to sort out who has his back and who literally tried to kill him, dear old Harry washes ashore – or rather what was once Harry. Things are starting to get interesting as the police detective sees a possible motive and opportunity and zeroes in on Vickers. Meanwhile you have a situation where no one quite trusts each other as Vickers and Angie both consider the other suspects and Vickers doesn’t know if Angie still loves him or has made common cause with one of her suitors. After all, a lot can change in four years.
This is a well-conceived book sure to hold the reader in suspense as multi-layers of distrust and suspicion raise this well above your usual whodoneit. Brackett expertly pits the characters against each other.
Two crime fiction novels were published under his byline, with the hope that his fame would produce sales.
Crime on My Hands (1944) was the first. The brilliantly-crafted Stranger at home, ghostwritten by science fiction writer Leigh Brackett the second.
The story concerns one Michael Vickers, a rich Beverly Hills snob who disappeared four years earlier when on a cruise along the Mexican coast with three so-called friends, Job, Bill, and Harry. They had come back at a loss to explain what happened to Vickers and life went on.
Vickers’ story is that someone conked him on the head, saying they’d been waiting years to do him in. Four years of amnesia, putting together clues, like how his three friends were hopelessly smitten with his dark-haired wife Angie and wondering if she had tired of him and put one of them up to it.
One evening Vickers casually strolls back to find his wife throwing a crazy drunken party at the beach house. They are all too drunk to understand he’s back and he spies Angie leaving her own party in her boat. Vickers is relishing seeing her again and seeing perhaps if she is happy to see him or if her plans have now gone astray.
Nevertheless while Vickers is starting to sort out who has his back and who literally tried to kill him, dear old Harry washes ashore – or rather what was once Harry. Things are starting to get interesting as the police detective sees a possible motive and opportunity and zeroes in on Vickers. Meanwhile you have a situation where no one quite trusts each other as Vickers and Angie both consider the other suspects and Vickers doesn’t know if Angie still loves him or has made common cause with one of her suitors. After all, a lot can change in four years.
This is a well-conceived book sure to hold the reader in suspense as multi-layers of distrust and suspicion raise this well above your usual whodoneit. Brackett expertly pits the characters against each other.
May 17, 2015
Despite Goodreads crediting the authorship of this book to Leigh Brackett, it was published as by actor George Sanders, with Brackett as his ghost writer.
One dark night four years ago in South America, wealthy businessman Mike Vickers was beaten over the head and left for dead, probably by one of the three friends with whom he was traveling: Job, Bill and Harold. But he lived, albeit suffering a total amnesia that endured for almost the entirety of that four-year period. Now his memory has returned . . . and so has he, to his California home, arriving into the midst of an immensely drunken party hosted by his beautiful wife Angie. (The setup's not unlike that at the opening of the Veronica Lake/Alan Ladd movie The Blue Dahlia. That movie was co-scripted by Raymond Chandler. Brackett co-scripted the Bogart/Bacall version of The Big Sleep. Small world.) Mike wonders which of the three friends she might have taken up with during his absence, because all of them have long hankered for her and made little secret of that hankering. But then through the gloom he sees her rowing out alone to theirhankered anchored boat, where it seems she plans to spend the night alone.
Next day the body of Harold is discovered in the water; he's had his head bashed in. To Detective-Lieutenant Joe Trehearne the obvious suspect for the killing is Mike, his motive being that he discovered Angie in Harold's arms. When that hypothesis collapses (Trehearne abandons it rather too easily, my sole complaint about the book), the cop next suspects Angie herself . . .
Meanwhile, the Vickers' household assistant, Joan, whose love for Angie clearly goes beyond the bounds of mere affection, is horrified that Mike has, as it were, returned from the dead, and is doing everything within her power to incriminate him, up to and including the faking of evidence. And the two surviving members of Mike's trio of buddies are likewise politely keen to see him convicted: while Angie was completely faithful to him during his four years' absence, believing he might be alive despite others' taking for granted that he was dead, should he be disgraced in her eyes as a murderer it might be a different story.
There's some great characterization here in addition to the central figures of Mike -- seemingly based on Sanders himself -- and Angie. Trehearne is a cop who's almost too intellectual for his own good, and distrusted by some who meet him because he has "the mouth of a woman." Joan Merrill, too, the possibly lesbian factotum, is a fine creation: even as she's committing some pretty despicable acts, driven by her love for Angie and her hatred of Mike, it's easy to sympathize with her.
And the book, particularly in its first half, is stuffed with good lines. A few samples:
and
and
The book's available as an attractive paperback or ebook from Dean Street Press; bizarrely, Goodreads doesn't list this edition.
One dark night four years ago in South America, wealthy businessman Mike Vickers was beaten over the head and left for dead, probably by one of the three friends with whom he was traveling: Job, Bill and Harold. But he lived, albeit suffering a total amnesia that endured for almost the entirety of that four-year period. Now his memory has returned . . . and so has he, to his California home, arriving into the midst of an immensely drunken party hosted by his beautiful wife Angie. (The setup's not unlike that at the opening of the Veronica Lake/Alan Ladd movie The Blue Dahlia. That movie was co-scripted by Raymond Chandler. Brackett co-scripted the Bogart/Bacall version of The Big Sleep. Small world.) Mike wonders which of the three friends she might have taken up with during his absence, because all of them have long hankered for her and made little secret of that hankering. But then through the gloom he sees her rowing out alone to their
Next day the body of Harold is discovered in the water; he's had his head bashed in. To Detective-Lieutenant Joe Trehearne the obvious suspect for the killing is Mike, his motive being that he discovered Angie in Harold's arms. When that hypothesis collapses (Trehearne abandons it rather too easily, my sole complaint about the book), the cop next suspects Angie herself . . .
Meanwhile, the Vickers' household assistant, Joan, whose love for Angie clearly goes beyond the bounds of mere affection, is horrified that Mike has, as it were, returned from the dead, and is doing everything within her power to incriminate him, up to and including the faking of evidence. And the two surviving members of Mike's trio of buddies are likewise politely keen to see him convicted: while Angie was completely faithful to him during his four years' absence, believing he might be alive despite others' taking for granted that he was dead, should he be disgraced in her eyes as a murderer it might be a different story.
There's some great characterization here in addition to the central figures of Mike -- seemingly based on Sanders himself -- and Angie. Trehearne is a cop who's almost too intellectual for his own good, and distrusted by some who meet him because he has "the mouth of a woman." Joan Merrill, too, the possibly lesbian factotum, is a fine creation: even as she's committing some pretty despicable acts, driven by her love for Angie and her hatred of Mike, it's easy to sympathize with her.
And the book, particularly in its first half, is stuffed with good lines. A few samples:
Thick carpeting, indirect lighting, the floor space divided into salons presided over by handsome females with the faintly condescending air of grand duchesses come gracefully down in the world. . . . Women in fantastic hats bought perfumes and cobwebby stockings and underthings no more substantial than a breath of fog. The whole place had the subtle smell of wealth.
and
Widowhood became her.
and
The receptionist matched her voice. She was an ill-tempered and rather well-worn glamour-puss, tightly draped and with a fantastic superstructure. Trehearne was tempted to try hanging his hat on one of the points.
The book's available as an attractive paperback or ebook from Dean Street Press; bizarrely, Goodreads doesn't list this edition.
December 25, 2022
Continuing my exploration of the works of Leigh Brackett, this is my first time reading something by her that isn’t SF – she also wrote crime and westerns. This is the former, and it’s a bit of an odd duck in that it was ghostwritten in 1946 for George Sanders, a popular British actor at the time who starred in The Falcon movies as the titular gentleman detective (he also played The Saint, for what it’s worth). For some reason, Sanders collaborated with Craig Rice to write a detective novel (Crime On My Hands), which featured Sanders as basically himself, only solving an actual murder case. I guess it was a success, because Brackett was hired to write the second one, which has since been republished under her name, so of course I had to try it.
The set-up is classic noir – Michael Vickers, presumed dead four years ago whilst in Mexico with three friends, turns up at his house unannounced during a big party. The next morning, one of the guests – Harry Bryce, who was one of the three friends with Vickers in Mexico – turns up dead. But Vickers isn’t the only one with a motive, and everyone has their own secrets, including Vickers’ wife Angie. While police detective Joe Trehearne tries to figure out who killed Bryce, Vickers tries to figure out who tried to kill him in Mexico – not least because they seems keen to finish the job now that he’s back.
The novel starts out a bit surreal, with disjointed dialogue and strange character reactions as Vickers makes his presence known to them – as if Vickers feels out of place returning home after so long (having suffered from amnesia for most of those four years). It’s only in the second half of the book that everything starts to gel, yet the first half turns out to be key to the climax. Anyway, it’s by no means a classic of the genre, but it’s pretty good for what it is, and it’s nice that Brackett is now getting recognition for it. Bonus points for Brackett declining to stick to the established formula – where the first Sanders novel was a standard first-person whodunit, Brackett delivered a gritty surreal noir thriller. Ace!
The set-up is classic noir – Michael Vickers, presumed dead four years ago whilst in Mexico with three friends, turns up at his house unannounced during a big party. The next morning, one of the guests – Harry Bryce, who was one of the three friends with Vickers in Mexico – turns up dead. But Vickers isn’t the only one with a motive, and everyone has their own secrets, including Vickers’ wife Angie. While police detective Joe Trehearne tries to figure out who killed Bryce, Vickers tries to figure out who tried to kill him in Mexico – not least because they seems keen to finish the job now that he’s back.
The novel starts out a bit surreal, with disjointed dialogue and strange character reactions as Vickers makes his presence known to them – as if Vickers feels out of place returning home after so long (having suffered from amnesia for most of those four years). It’s only in the second half of the book that everything starts to gel, yet the first half turns out to be key to the climax. Anyway, it’s by no means a classic of the genre, but it’s pretty good for what it is, and it’s nice that Brackett is now getting recognition for it. Bonus points for Brackett declining to stick to the established formula – where the first Sanders novel was a standard first-person whodunit, Brackett delivered a gritty surreal noir thriller. Ace!
August 28, 2020
Classic crime fiction that solidly captures the era in which it was written: 1946. Great characters chase an intriguing mystery, bodies mount and suspects dwindle until its suspenseful, satisfying conclusion.
January 3, 2009
Four years ago, Mike Vickers disappeared while on a boating trip with three friends. He walks into his home, a huge scar on his head, right in the middle of a party.
He'd been attacked and suffered amnesia for a few years before remembering. He knows one of those three friends tried to kill him back then, but not which one.
Before that first night was over, one of the three was dead and Vickers blamed. Now he not only has to prove he's not guilty of the murder, but which of the other two tried to kill him four years ago and why.
He'd been attacked and suffered amnesia for a few years before remembering. He knows one of those three friends tried to kill him back then, but not which one.
Before that first night was over, one of the three was dead and Vickers blamed. Now he not only has to prove he's not guilty of the murder, but which of the other two tried to kill him four years ago and why.
November 22, 2020
Ghost written by Leigh Brackett, "A book written to cash in on the success of film actor George Sanders". Ms. Brackett could write a good 'ol mystery.
June 10, 2023
Pulp fiction... from the days of genuine pulp. Nevertheless, Leigh Brackett had an amazing career as a writer.
September 29, 2023
A pretty good noir, marred by some scenes that read like soap opera. Interesting sidebar: this was originally ghost written for the actor George Sanders.
Want to read
June 9, 2025Ghostwritten by Leigh Brackett.
The Unholy Four/A Stranger Came Home (1954).
The Unholy Four/A Stranger Came Home (1954).
July 24, 2025
The second of the mostly ghostwritten mysteries by George Sanders (with an assist from Leigh Brackett) is less fun, more brutal than CRIME ON MY HANDS
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews