Kiss and Kill

by Ellery Queen

When his wife disappears without a trace, a desperate man turns to Chicago’s toughest PI for help in this classic hardboiled mystery. Elizabeth Tollman puts the roast in the oven, goes out to buy a loaf of bread, and never comes home. Half an hour later, her husband finds the bread outside their front door, but his wife is nowhere to be seen. Edward Tollman calls her friends, combs the streets, even pokes his head into local bars—but Elizabeth has vanished into thin air. The police can’t help him without evidence of a crime, so Tollman turns to the one man in Chicago who’s mean enough to get Barney Burgess, PI.   Burgess is strapping and tough, with an ugly mug that’s almost handsome in a Humphrey Bogart sort of way. In fact, everything about him seems straight out of a B movie—right down to his spit-shined shoes and his itchy trigger finger. Burgess is used to dealing with killers, but Tollman’s case will be the most dangerous of his career.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction

201 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

aka Barnaby Ross.
(Pseudonym of Frederic Dannay and Manfred Bennington Lee)
"Ellery Queen" was a pen name created and shared by two cousins, Frederic Dannay (1905-1982) and Manfred B. Lee (1905-1971), as well as the name of their most famous detective. Born in Brooklyn, they spent forty two years writing, editing, and anthologizing under the name, gaining a reputation as the foremost American authors of the Golden Age "fair play" mystery.

Although eventually famous on television and radio, Queen's first appearance came in 1928 when the cousins won a mystery-writing contest with the book that would eventually be published as The Roman Hat Mystery. Their character was an amateur detective who used his spare time to assist his police inspector father in solving baffling crimes. Besides writing the Queen novels, Dannay and Lee cofounded Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, one of the most influential crime publications of all time. Although Dannay outlived his cousin by nine years, he retired Queen upon Lee's death.

Several of the later "Ellery Queen" books were written by other authors, including Jack Vance, Avram Davidson, and Theodore Sturgeon.

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was the most simply "okay" Ellery Queen novel I've read - very over-the-top and definitely a bit sexist. (Or more sexist than other similar books I've read written by men in 1969.) The most striking feature is a character who is what we today would call an incel, the earliest case of one I've come across. (That I remember, anyway.)

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Quite a bit of contemporary harlequin-like romance elements.

[Pat · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not care for this book

All kinds of ridiculous dialogue. I’ve read old fashioned books before…but this was so silly. After a bunch of murders…igave up…checked reviews…finally read the end. Not worth the trip.

[Elliemae · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Bent Andreassen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read in Danish a long time ago.

[Aitor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Si obvias todo el machismo del personaje principal es una novela muy entretenida.

[Jeffrey Marks · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book started well. The wife disappeared without a trace and the police think she’s run off with someone. However, when the husband hires a PI, the plot becomes a mashup of tropes.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good pulp PI fiction.

[Evelyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining mystery involving a search for a kidnaped wife, and murder, money and mayhem resulting from the theft of money that was supposed to be used for the purchase of heroin in Mexico for resale in the United States.

[Sergio · Rating 2 out of 5]

Che romanzetto lagnoso e insopportabile, letto da studente quando qualsiasi lettura era preferibile allo studio!

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

It has been a long time since I read a book by Ellery Queen.

[Corinne E. Carpenter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lots of historical sites

It was an interesting book with plenty of surprises.
Interesting ending! I know if you like mysteries you will enjoy this one.