El asesinato de Cecily Thane

Spike Tracy #1

by Harriette Ashbrook, Natalia Zarco (Translator)

A Spike Tracy Mystery

Spike’s involvement came about by chance. Phillip (Spike) Tracy, something of a playboy, was being lectured at by his brother the D.A. who had just bailed him out of jail again, when news of the murder came in. With nothing better to do, Spike had decided to tag along as his brother investigates only to discover that he has both a taste and a talent for amateur sleuthing. Spike had vaguely known the victim, the well-off wife of a jewelry seller, who, after a night dancing with a paid escort, is found dead in her boudoir. The question is not so much who killed Cecily Thane as will Spike be able to solve the case before his knack for flippant comments so annoys his brother that he is barred from the case?

Genres: Mystery

204 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1930

Reviews

[Eric]

Harriette Cora Ashbrook (1898-1946) was an American journalist who worked as Publicity Director for Coward-McCann Publishers and also wrote as Susannah Shane. Under her own name seven novels featuring playboy detective Spike Tracy were published as follows:- 
The Murder of Cicely Thane (1930)
The Murder of Stephen Kester (1931)
The Murder of Sigurd Sharon (1933)
A Most Immoral Murder (1935)
Murder Makes Murder (1937)
Murder Comes Back (1940)
The Purple Onion Mystery (1941) (AKA Murder on Friday)
As Susannah Shane, she produced:-
Lady in Lilac (1941)
Lady in Danger (1942)
Lady in a Wedding Dress (1943)
Lady in a Million (1943)
The Baby in the Ash Can (1944)
Diamonds in the Dumplings (1946)

Her work never seems to have been highly rated, but recently (September 2019), Black Heath Editions has republished all of the Tracy novels.

The first is a fairly conventional but wittily and pacily-written story of the murder of the wife of a New York jeweller. The solution turns on a neatly contrived alibi. As Tracy says:-

“Well, Inspector, if you would be a more assiduous reader of detective stories you would realize that it is always the person with the iron-clad alibi who is the guilty one—the person who apparently couldn’t possibly have been there to do the dirty work."

Highly recommended. 3.5 stars. I intend to read more.

[Susan]

Spike Tracy, the playboy kid brother of the district attorney, interests himself in the mysterious murder of a wealthy jeweler's wife, and finds a new vocation of sorts. The first impression the police get is that Cecily Thane was alone in her brownstone house on the Upper West Side with the man she pays to take her dancing and to nightclubs. But thanks to Spike, they soon learn that there were others who came and went in the house that evening. But most of them seem to have perfect alibis, including Thane himself. Spike also wonders why the body was moved after the shooting. There's something very innocent and naive about this, and some other 1930's mysteries, although the denouncement here--it's the first in a series, I believe--is a bit wordy.

[MH]

3,5-4 🌟

[Caro]

leyéndola y teniendo en cuenta que fue publicada en 1930, es una novela muy correcta, un protagonista muy simpático e intuitivo y un crimen por resolver a la manera de la época, sin aspavientos, pruebas forenses, giros imprevistos. Muy entretenida y amable.

[Rosana Adler]

Dos estrellas. De 0 a 10: 4,5.

Demasiado sencilla. No aporta nada nuevo ni diferente.

El protagonista es simpático.

Entretenida, sin más.

[M.N. Mera]

Una buena novela ambientada en los años 40 tipo Agatha Christy. Es un libro de 1930 que por primera vez tiene traducción al español.

[Rios]

Una novela de misterio clásica y simpática, cuyo protagonista resulta atrayente y simpático, su objetivo es entretener sin más complicaciones y lo consigue.