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Carnival of Crime: The Best Mystery Stories of Fredric Brown
In these 23 stories, Brown never rails to surprise and delight. Time after time the reader anticipates the ending only to discover that once more the author has proved too clever. Yet Brown never “cheats,” never feeds false clues, and his endings are always plausible. His imagination is by turns puckish, grim, outlandish—but forever fresh.
Brown’s stories run from the fifty-word “Mistake” to a novelette (“The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches”). In “Granny’s Birthday,” a two-page short short, with Granny supervising like a benign queen, the party goes splendidly, marred only by manslaughter and murder.
Contents:
-Town Wanted
-Little Apple Hard to Peel
-A Little White Lye
-Blue Murder
-The Djinn Murder
-Murder While You Wait
-Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket
-The Dangerous People
-The Night the World Ended
-The Voice Behind Him
-Don't Look Behind You
-Miss Darkness
-I'll Cut Your Throat Again, Kathleen
-The Laughing Butcher
-The Joke
-Cry Silence
-Cain
-The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches
-Witness in the Dark
-Granny's Birthday
-Hobbyist
-Nightmare in Yellow
-Mistake
- GenresShort StoriesFiction
336 pages, Hardcover
First published May 1, 1985
1 person is currently reading
45 people want to read
About the author
Fredric Brown
808 books355 followersFredric Brown was an American science fiction and mystery writer. He was one of the boldest early writers in genre fiction in his use of narrative experimentation. While never in the front rank of popularity in his lifetime, Brown has developed a considerable cult following in the almost half century since he last wrote. His works have been periodically reprinted and he has a worldwide fan base, most notably in the U.S. and Europe, and especially in France, where there have been several recent movie adaptations of his work. He also remains popular in Japan.
Never financially secure, Brown - like many other pulp writers - often wrote at a furious pace in order to pay bills. This accounts, at least in part, for the uneven quality of his work. A newspaperman by profession, Brown was only able to devote 14 years of his life as a full-time fiction writer. Brown was also a heavy drinker, and this at times doubtless affected his productivity. A cultured man and omnivorous reader whose interests ranged far beyond those of most pulp writers, Brown had a lifelong interest in the flute, chess, poker, and the works of Lewis Carroll. Brown married twice and was the father of two sons.
Never financially secure, Brown - like many other pulp writers - often wrote at a furious pace in order to pay bills. This accounts, at least in part, for the uneven quality of his work. A newspaperman by profession, Brown was only able to devote 14 years of his life as a full-time fiction writer. Brown was also a heavy drinker, and this at times doubtless affected his productivity. A cultured man and omnivorous reader whose interests ranged far beyond those of most pulp writers, Brown had a lifelong interest in the flute, chess, poker, and the works of Lewis Carroll. Brown married twice and was the father of two sons.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 14, 2018
The book jacket shows a rather typical Mr. Punch, perhaps somewhat older than usual, with a large chin and an even larger hooked nose, motley-clad, wearing a cap with bells. Instead of a slapstick, however, he is holding a gun. This Mr. Punch is a fine blend of the comic and the criminous; so are the stories in this book.
Carnival of Crime: The Best Mystery Stories of Fredric Brown is a collection of twenty-three stories edited by Francis M. Nevins, Jr., a well-known authority on crime fiction, and Martin H. Greenberg, noted editor of seemingly countless collections and anthologies. The introduction is by the famous mystery author Bill Pronzini.
Pronzini's introduction has valuable information and occasionally cock-eyed opinions. For example:
Objectively, however, the best of Brown's 22 criminous novels are The Screaming Mimi (1949), The Far Cry (1951), and Knock Three-One-Two (1959) - all nonseries books.
And objectively, Shakespeare's greatest play is Troilus and Cressida. Does Pronzini really not understand that "objectively" means that what is being presented is a fact, not an opinion? I don't think that any of those three, good as they are, are Brown's best mystery novels.
Also, Pronzini states that:
Night of the Jabberwock, while it contains some marvelous bits of business involving the works of Lewis Carroll and is a pleasant evening's reading, has an absurd plot that even Brown, with all his technical skill, could not bring off satisfactorily.
I believe that Pronzini totally misses the point. Jabberwock is indeed absurd, deliberately so; that is the point. Unlikely events pile up to a dizzying height and then, somehow, they get resolved, while still remaining unlikely. Complaining of the absurdity of Jabberwock is like complaining about the absurdity of Brown's broadly comic science fiction novel What Mad Universe.
Of the twenty-three items in Carnival of Crime, twelve had appeared in Brown's earlier collection, Mostly Murder (1953). The other eleven include four of the short-short stories that came to be called "vignettes."
One of those, "Hobbyist" (Playboy, March, 1961), is a not very satisfactory tale of a druggist who is willing to give people an undetectable poison for free. This is not quite as generous as it may sound. There are other, better, variations of this situation, such as "The Chaser" by John Collier.
Several of Brown's vignettes are titled "Nightmare in" followed by a color. The two that have always remained in my mind are the wrenching "Nightmare in Blue," which is not concerned with mystery or crime and so is not in this collection, and the grimly ironic "Nightmare in Yellow" (Dude, May, 1961).
"Mistake" (Rogue, May, 1963), originally published without a title in a feature called just "Instant Novellas" is only a single paragraph, just five sentences. It deals, albeit briefly, with regret.
"Granny's Birthday" (Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, June, 1960), while only three pages long, is an actual story, about the overwhelming (and sometimes sinister) importance of family.
Some of Brown's stories contain traditional mystery puzzles that must be solved to reveal the solution. Some of these are perfectly fair ("Blue Murder," "Miss Darkness," "Murder While You Wait"); some are trickier and require some specialized knowledge ("Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket"). "The Djinn Murder" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, January, 1944), however, is the type of story that Raymond Chandler complained about in his famous essay, "The Gentle Art of Murder":
Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, not hand-wrought dueling pistols, curare and tropical fish.
The information needed to unravel this story's mystery is ridiculously esoteric. "Professor," asks a young woman to the brilliant crime-solver, "is there anything you don't know?" Evidently there isn't. I think that this is the poorest story in this book.
"Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket" (Street and Smith Detective Story, August, 1944), originally published as "The Bucket of Gems Case," is part of a series of tales about Henry Smith, an insurance agent and investigator. Mr. Smith has, somehow, the specialized knowledge needed to figure out what happened to a missing ruby.
In "Murder While You Wait" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, July, 1944), a private detective's new assistant solves the murder of a shoe repairman. The story borrows a gimmick from a famous mystery novel but does this so cleverly that it seems acceptable.
The puzzle in "Blue Murder" (Shadow Mystery Magazine, September, 1943) is solved by a weary police officer forced to delay a vacation to investigate a murder committed with a can of paint. The paint is blue, and the name of both the victim and one of the suspects is Blue. I am not sure that the phrase "blue murder" is still commonly used. Merriam-Webster says that "scream blue murder" means "to scream, yell, or complain in a very loud or angry way."
In "Witness in the Dark" (New Detective, June 1953), a bullet fired by a blind man at the sound of an intruder is found to have traces of blood, silk, and fur. The solution to the overall mystery is clever; the blood/silk/fur explanation is not.
"The Joke" (Detective Tales, October, 1948), originally published as "If Looks Could Kill," is not a puzzle story but a rather sad horror story about the terrible consequences of a practical joke. I don't think that it is very good.
"The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches" (Mystery Book Magazine, Summer, 1950) is the longest story in the book, as well as the best. Carl Dixon is in prison, convicted of killing a conman with the conman's own gun. Dixon's fiancée Susan Bailey is standing by him. She wants to hire a private detective. Friends of hers know a police detective, Peter Cole, who can probably recommend someone. After meeting with Ms. Bailey and hearing the details of the case, Cole decides that he will look into it personally.
This is an excellent, ingenious story, one of the best sheer mystery puzzles Brown wrote. The "dancing sandwiches" of the title are a vital part of the story. There are no in-depth character portraits, although those probably would have appeared in the expanded version that Brown began but never completed. Instead, this is a very fine traditional short mystery, strongly recommended.
For the twelve remaining stories, I will reprint slightly altered versions of my earlier reviews of those stories from my review of the collection Mostly Murder:
"I'll Cut Your Throat Again, Kathleen" (Mystery Book Magazine, Winter, 1948) owes its title to the song "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen." Johnny Marlin was a band leader, who played saxophone and clarinet. Now he's in an asylum. He has gaps in his memory but he is told that he slit his wife's throat and then his own wrists. His wife recovered, but Johnny will never be able to play his instruments again. This is a fine, nasty story.
"Little Apple Hard to Peel" (Detective Tales, February, 1942) is another strong story. John Appel was a violent kid who moved to Chicago and became a full-fledged gangster. He returns to his home town. He does a horrible thing and gets a horrible response.
There are two circus or carnival-related stories in this collection. "The Laughing Butcher" (Mystery Book Magazine, Fall, 1948) takes place largely in Corbyville, a town with a number of former circus people. A man is found dead in a snow-covered field. There are two sets of footprints going into the field, with none coming out. The solution is ingenious but unlikely.
In "A Voice Behind Him" (Mystery Book Magazine, January, 1947), a carnival "human cannonball" decides to leave his wife, but something he has forgotten leads to tragedy.
Another frequent Brown theme is madness. That was an important part of the previously mentioned "I'll Cut Your Throat Again, Kathleen" and is a prominent aspect of several of the other tales here. "Don't Look Behind You" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, May, 1947) is one of Brown's best (and most acclaimed) stories.
This is something of a stunt, but a fine, successful stunt, a tour de force. The tale begins:
Just sit back and relax now. Try to enjoy this; it's going to be the last story you ever read, or nearly the last. After you finish it you can sit there and stall a while, you can find excuses to hang around your house, or your room, or your office, wherever you're reading this; but sooner or later you're going to have to get up and go out. That's where I'm waiting for you: outside. Or maybe closer than that. Maybe in this room.
The narrator is an expert printer and binder, a former counterfeiter, tortured by thugs until he has been driven mad - homicidally mad.
In "The Dangerous People," originally published as "No Sanctuary" (Dime Mystery, March, 1945), a man has escaped from the Asylum for the Criminally Insane. Two men at the railroad station waiting for a train each begin to suspect that the other is the escapee. Each thing one of them says, every action taken, seems insane to the other one. This is actually a comic story, with an especially funny conclusion.
"Cain" is another story originally published under a different title (which reveals more than it should), "Each Night He Died" (Dime Mystery, August, 1949). A man who murdered his brother awaits execution in a terrible state of panic, not realizing that that his insanity has changed things.
The main character in "The Night the World Ended" (Dime Mystery, January, 1945) is not insane, just alcoholic. And deluded. A most unpleasant newspaper editor has printed a false front page to convince the alcoholic that the world will be coming to an end in a few hours. However, things do not go according to the editor's plans. (This was filmed as an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents.)
In "Cry Silence" (Black Mask, November, 1948), a man killed his wife and a male friend of hers by locking them in a smokehouse until they died, not responding to their cries and pounding. The man said he had locked them in accidentally and had suddenly gone deaf. But had he?
"Town Wanted" (Detective Fiction Weekly, September 7, 1940) is just barely a "story." The narrator of this very short tale is a gangster, thrown out of town by his boss, who found out that the narrator was planning to take over. Now the narrator is looking for a town that he can run himself. The ideal town would be one in which the citizens didn't pay much attention to their government.
"Miss Darkness" (Avon Detective Mysteries #3, 1947) is one of the few stories by Brown that could be described as "sweet." People living in a boarding house observe that a new tenant seems never to have the light in her room turned on. The driver of the car used in a bank robbery that took place recently is said to be a young woman. Who is this mysterious tenant?
The remaining story, "A Little White Lye" (Ten Detective Aces, September, 1942) is one of the most traditional "mystery" stories in this collection. A young newlywed couple finds a splendid house at a great price. A wonderful deal, as long as they don't mind that a murder had been committed there - and that the murderer is still at large. This could be the beginning of half the romantic comedy movies of the time.
This is, on the whole, a really fine collection. My favorites include "Little Apple Hard to Peel," "A Little White Lye," "Blue Murder," "Don't Look Behind You," "Granny's Birthday," and "The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches."
A note of thanks: Much of the material about original publication of these stories as well as other information came from Jack Seabrook's invaluable book Martians and Misplaced Clues: The Life and Work of Fredric Brown.
Carnival of Crime: The Best Mystery Stories of Fredric Brown is a collection of twenty-three stories edited by Francis M. Nevins, Jr., a well-known authority on crime fiction, and Martin H. Greenberg, noted editor of seemingly countless collections and anthologies. The introduction is by the famous mystery author Bill Pronzini.
Pronzini's introduction has valuable information and occasionally cock-eyed opinions. For example:
Objectively, however, the best of Brown's 22 criminous novels are The Screaming Mimi (1949), The Far Cry (1951), and Knock Three-One-Two (1959) - all nonseries books.
And objectively, Shakespeare's greatest play is Troilus and Cressida. Does Pronzini really not understand that "objectively" means that what is being presented is a fact, not an opinion? I don't think that any of those three, good as they are, are Brown's best mystery novels.
Also, Pronzini states that:
Night of the Jabberwock, while it contains some marvelous bits of business involving the works of Lewis Carroll and is a pleasant evening's reading, has an absurd plot that even Brown, with all his technical skill, could not bring off satisfactorily.
I believe that Pronzini totally misses the point. Jabberwock is indeed absurd, deliberately so; that is the point. Unlikely events pile up to a dizzying height and then, somehow, they get resolved, while still remaining unlikely. Complaining of the absurdity of Jabberwock is like complaining about the absurdity of Brown's broadly comic science fiction novel What Mad Universe.
Of the twenty-three items in Carnival of Crime, twelve had appeared in Brown's earlier collection, Mostly Murder (1953). The other eleven include four of the short-short stories that came to be called "vignettes."
One of those, "Hobbyist" (Playboy, March, 1961), is a not very satisfactory tale of a druggist who is willing to give people an undetectable poison for free. This is not quite as generous as it may sound. There are other, better, variations of this situation, such as "The Chaser" by John Collier.
Several of Brown's vignettes are titled "Nightmare in" followed by a color. The two that have always remained in my mind are the wrenching "Nightmare in Blue," which is not concerned with mystery or crime and so is not in this collection, and the grimly ironic "Nightmare in Yellow" (Dude, May, 1961).
"Mistake" (Rogue, May, 1963), originally published without a title in a feature called just "Instant Novellas" is only a single paragraph, just five sentences. It deals, albeit briefly, with regret.
"Granny's Birthday" (Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, June, 1960), while only three pages long, is an actual story, about the overwhelming (and sometimes sinister) importance of family.
Some of Brown's stories contain traditional mystery puzzles that must be solved to reveal the solution. Some of these are perfectly fair ("Blue Murder," "Miss Darkness," "Murder While You Wait"); some are trickier and require some specialized knowledge ("Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket"). "The Djinn Murder" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, January, 1944), however, is the type of story that Raymond Chandler complained about in his famous essay, "The Gentle Art of Murder":
Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, not hand-wrought dueling pistols, curare and tropical fish.
The information needed to unravel this story's mystery is ridiculously esoteric. "Professor," asks a young woman to the brilliant crime-solver, "is there anything you don't know?" Evidently there isn't. I think that this is the poorest story in this book.
"Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket" (Street and Smith Detective Story, August, 1944), originally published as "The Bucket of Gems Case," is part of a series of tales about Henry Smith, an insurance agent and investigator. Mr. Smith has, somehow, the specialized knowledge needed to figure out what happened to a missing ruby.
In "Murder While You Wait" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, July, 1944), a private detective's new assistant solves the murder of a shoe repairman. The story borrows a gimmick from a famous mystery novel but does this so cleverly that it seems acceptable.
The puzzle in "Blue Murder" (Shadow Mystery Magazine, September, 1943) is solved by a weary police officer forced to delay a vacation to investigate a murder committed with a can of paint. The paint is blue, and the name of both the victim and one of the suspects is Blue. I am not sure that the phrase "blue murder" is still commonly used. Merriam-Webster says that "scream blue murder" means "to scream, yell, or complain in a very loud or angry way."
In "Witness in the Dark" (New Detective, June 1953), a bullet fired by a blind man at the sound of an intruder is found to have traces of blood, silk, and fur. The solution to the overall mystery is clever; the blood/silk/fur explanation is not.
"The Joke" (Detective Tales, October, 1948), originally published as "If Looks Could Kill," is not a puzzle story but a rather sad horror story about the terrible consequences of a practical joke. I don't think that it is very good.
"The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches" (Mystery Book Magazine, Summer, 1950) is the longest story in the book, as well as the best. Carl Dixon is in prison, convicted of killing a conman with the conman's own gun. Dixon's fiancée Susan Bailey is standing by him. She wants to hire a private detective. Friends of hers know a police detective, Peter Cole, who can probably recommend someone. After meeting with Ms. Bailey and hearing the details of the case, Cole decides that he will look into it personally.
This is an excellent, ingenious story, one of the best sheer mystery puzzles Brown wrote. The "dancing sandwiches" of the title are a vital part of the story. There are no in-depth character portraits, although those probably would have appeared in the expanded version that Brown began but never completed. Instead, this is a very fine traditional short mystery, strongly recommended.
For the twelve remaining stories, I will reprint slightly altered versions of my earlier reviews of those stories from my review of the collection Mostly Murder:
"I'll Cut Your Throat Again, Kathleen" (Mystery Book Magazine, Winter, 1948) owes its title to the song "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen." Johnny Marlin was a band leader, who played saxophone and clarinet. Now he's in an asylum. He has gaps in his memory but he is told that he slit his wife's throat and then his own wrists. His wife recovered, but Johnny will never be able to play his instruments again. This is a fine, nasty story.
"Little Apple Hard to Peel" (Detective Tales, February, 1942) is another strong story. John Appel was a violent kid who moved to Chicago and became a full-fledged gangster. He returns to his home town. He does a horrible thing and gets a horrible response.
There are two circus or carnival-related stories in this collection. "The Laughing Butcher" (Mystery Book Magazine, Fall, 1948) takes place largely in Corbyville, a town with a number of former circus people. A man is found dead in a snow-covered field. There are two sets of footprints going into the field, with none coming out. The solution is ingenious but unlikely.
In "A Voice Behind Him" (Mystery Book Magazine, January, 1947), a carnival "human cannonball" decides to leave his wife, but something he has forgotten leads to tragedy.
Another frequent Brown theme is madness. That was an important part of the previously mentioned "I'll Cut Your Throat Again, Kathleen" and is a prominent aspect of several of the other tales here. "Don't Look Behind You" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, May, 1947) is one of Brown's best (and most acclaimed) stories.
This is something of a stunt, but a fine, successful stunt, a tour de force. The tale begins:
Just sit back and relax now. Try to enjoy this; it's going to be the last story you ever read, or nearly the last. After you finish it you can sit there and stall a while, you can find excuses to hang around your house, or your room, or your office, wherever you're reading this; but sooner or later you're going to have to get up and go out. That's where I'm waiting for you: outside. Or maybe closer than that. Maybe in this room.
The narrator is an expert printer and binder, a former counterfeiter, tortured by thugs until he has been driven mad - homicidally mad.
In "The Dangerous People," originally published as "No Sanctuary" (Dime Mystery, March, 1945), a man has escaped from the Asylum for the Criminally Insane. Two men at the railroad station waiting for a train each begin to suspect that the other is the escapee. Each thing one of them says, every action taken, seems insane to the other one. This is actually a comic story, with an especially funny conclusion.
"Cain" is another story originally published under a different title (which reveals more than it should), "Each Night He Died" (Dime Mystery, August, 1949). A man who murdered his brother awaits execution in a terrible state of panic, not realizing that that his insanity has changed things.
The main character in "The Night the World Ended" (Dime Mystery, January, 1945) is not insane, just alcoholic. And deluded. A most unpleasant newspaper editor has printed a false front page to convince the alcoholic that the world will be coming to an end in a few hours. However, things do not go according to the editor's plans. (This was filmed as an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents.)
In "Cry Silence" (Black Mask, November, 1948), a man killed his wife and a male friend of hers by locking them in a smokehouse until they died, not responding to their cries and pounding. The man said he had locked them in accidentally and had suddenly gone deaf. But had he?
"Town Wanted" (Detective Fiction Weekly, September 7, 1940) is just barely a "story." The narrator of this very short tale is a gangster, thrown out of town by his boss, who found out that the narrator was planning to take over. Now the narrator is looking for a town that he can run himself. The ideal town would be one in which the citizens didn't pay much attention to their government.
"Miss Darkness" (Avon Detective Mysteries #3, 1947) is one of the few stories by Brown that could be described as "sweet." People living in a boarding house observe that a new tenant seems never to have the light in her room turned on. The driver of the car used in a bank robbery that took place recently is said to be a young woman. Who is this mysterious tenant?
The remaining story, "A Little White Lye" (Ten Detective Aces, September, 1942) is one of the most traditional "mystery" stories in this collection. A young newlywed couple finds a splendid house at a great price. A wonderful deal, as long as they don't mind that a murder had been committed there - and that the murderer is still at large. This could be the beginning of half the romantic comedy movies of the time.
This is, on the whole, a really fine collection. My favorites include "Little Apple Hard to Peel," "A Little White Lye," "Blue Murder," "Don't Look Behind You," "Granny's Birthday," and "The Case of the Dancing Sandwiches."
A note of thanks: Much of the material about original publication of these stories as well as other information came from Jack Seabrook's invaluable book Martians and Misplaced Clues: The Life and Work of Fredric Brown.
March 26, 2013
The first part was pretty run-of-the-mill stuff. Of course, granted I'm not too thrilled by the usual procedurals. But then he started to approach Woolrichian heights with things like "The Dangerous People" and "Nightmare In Yellow" (both made into AHP's or Thrillers or something). Also "A Voice Behind Him" very good. Maybe best of all "Cry Silence"--the definition of raspy.
November 3, 2025
Town Wanted 10/27
Little Apple Hard to Peel 10/28
A Little White Lye 10/28
Blue Murder 10/28
The Djinn Murder 10/29
Murder While You Wait 10/29
Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket 10/29
The Dangerous People 10/30
The Night the World Ended 10/30
A Voice Behind Him 10/30
Don't Look Behind You 10/31
Miss Darkness 10/31
I'll Cut Tour Throat Again, Kathleen 10/31
The Laughing Butcher 11/1
The Joke 11/1
Cry Silence 11/1
Cain 11/1
The Dancing Sandwiches 11/2
Witness in the Dark 11/3
Granny's Birthday 11/3
Hobbyist 11/3
Nightmare in Yellow 11/3
Mistake 11/3
Little Apple Hard to Peel 10/28
A Little White Lye 10/28
Blue Murder 10/28
The Djinn Murder 10/29
Murder While You Wait 10/29
Mr. Smith Kicks the Bucket 10/29
The Dangerous People 10/30
The Night the World Ended 10/30
A Voice Behind Him 10/30
Don't Look Behind You 10/31
Miss Darkness 10/31
I'll Cut Tour Throat Again, Kathleen 10/31
The Laughing Butcher 11/1
The Joke 11/1
Cry Silence 11/1
Cain 11/1
The Dancing Sandwiches 11/2
Witness in the Dark 11/3
Granny's Birthday 11/3
Hobbyist 11/3
Nightmare in Yellow 11/3
Mistake 11/3
June 25, 2013
I can't remember what tipped me off to Frederic Brown. I'd certainly never heard of him before. But I love a good mystery -- and by a good mystery I mean one that involves deduction and a clever twist, not something I don't have a chance to figure out myself. All these short works (ranging from a novelette to a 50-word short short) give you a chance to guess what's happened and get your mind rolling.
I'm also a huge fan of the pulps and Brown was a leading contributor to the cavalcades of these cheap magazines sold in the pre-television era. Even the titles of them thrill me -- Brown's work was published in a litany of dozens of titles with some combination of the words "Detective" or "Crime" or "Mystery". There's something immensely satisfying in a well-written short.
My favorite, I think, was the longest piece, though: "The Mystery of the Dancing Sandwiches". What a pleasure it was to go through with characters fleshed out just-enough, some playfulness with the storyline, and a good twist to solve the unsolvable crime. It seemed like a perfect story to adapt to screen and I'm surprised it never was. I love Donald Sobol's two-minute mysteries and Encyclopedia Brown stories, which like Frederic Brown, offer the reader a chance to feel like a real detective.
I generally like the "twist" endings of stories, whether for good or tragic ends, but if you're interested in seeing this done in a ham-fisted, ridiculously sloppy manner, check out the video for Best Coast's "Our Deal" directed by Drew Barrymore. So awful and hilarious.
I'm also a huge fan of the pulps and Brown was a leading contributor to the cavalcades of these cheap magazines sold in the pre-television era. Even the titles of them thrill me -- Brown's work was published in a litany of dozens of titles with some combination of the words "Detective" or "Crime" or "Mystery". There's something immensely satisfying in a well-written short.
My favorite, I think, was the longest piece, though: "The Mystery of the Dancing Sandwiches". What a pleasure it was to go through with characters fleshed out just-enough, some playfulness with the storyline, and a good twist to solve the unsolvable crime. It seemed like a perfect story to adapt to screen and I'm surprised it never was. I love Donald Sobol's two-minute mysteries and Encyclopedia Brown stories, which like Frederic Brown, offer the reader a chance to feel like a real detective.
I generally like the "twist" endings of stories, whether for good or tragic ends, but if you're interested in seeing this done in a ham-fisted, ridiculously sloppy manner, check out the video for Best Coast's "Our Deal" directed by Drew Barrymore. So awful and hilarious.
Want to read
March 31, 2025Read so far:
Town wanted --
*Little apple hard to peel --
*A little white lye --
Blue murder --2
*The Djinn murder --
Murder while you wait (NA)--
*Mr. Smith kicks the bucket (aka The bucket of gems case)--
The dangerous people (aka No sanctuary)--
The night the world ended --2
*A voice behind him --
Don't look behind you (aka You'll die laughing)--2
*Miss Darkness (aka Wait in the dark)--
I'll cut your throat again, Kathleen --3
*The laughing butcher --
*The joke (aka If looks could kill)--
Cry silence --2
Cain (aka Each night he died)--
*The case of the dancing sandwiches --
*Witness in the dark (aka See no murder) --
Granny's birthday --
The hobbyist (aka The assistant murderer)--
*Nightmare in yellow--
*Mistake--
***
[Stories included in Miss Darkness: The Great Short Crime Fiction of Fredric Brown]
Little boy lost --
Good night, good knight (aka Last curtain, aka Cream of the jest) --
A matter of death --
Get out of town --
Life and fire --
The shaggy dog murders (aka To slay a man about a dog) --
The spherical ghoul --
Moon over murder --
The Jabberwocky murders --
The cat from Siam --
Satan one-and-a-half --
Death is a noise --
The little lamb --
Murder set to music --
The freak show murders --
The wench is dead --
The pickled punks --
***
Client unknown --
Crisis 1999 --3
Fugitive imposter --
The ghost breakers --
The incredible bomber --
Madman's holiday --
Twice-killed corpse --
Whistler's murder (aka Mr. Smith protects a client)--
Town wanted --
*Little apple hard to peel --
*A little white lye --
Blue murder --2
*The Djinn murder --
Murder while you wait (NA)--
*Mr. Smith kicks the bucket (aka The bucket of gems case)--
The dangerous people (aka No sanctuary)--
The night the world ended --2
*A voice behind him --
Don't look behind you (aka You'll die laughing)--2
*Miss Darkness (aka Wait in the dark)--
I'll cut your throat again, Kathleen --3
*The laughing butcher --
*The joke (aka If looks could kill)--
Cry silence --2
Cain (aka Each night he died)--
*The case of the dancing sandwiches --
*Witness in the dark (aka See no murder) --
Granny's birthday --
The hobbyist (aka The assistant murderer)--
*Nightmare in yellow--
*Mistake--
***
[Stories included in Miss Darkness: The Great Short Crime Fiction of Fredric Brown]
Little boy lost --
Good night, good knight (aka Last curtain, aka Cream of the jest) --
A matter of death --
Get out of town --
Life and fire --
The shaggy dog murders (aka To slay a man about a dog) --
The spherical ghoul --
Moon over murder --
The Jabberwocky murders --
The cat from Siam --
Satan one-and-a-half --
Death is a noise --
The little lamb --
Murder set to music --
The freak show murders --
The wench is dead --
The pickled punks --
***
Client unknown --
Crisis 1999 --3
Fugitive imposter --
The ghost breakers --
The incredible bomber --
Madman's holiday --
Twice-killed corpse --
Whistler's murder (aka Mr. Smith protects a client)--
January 9, 2013
Excellent collection of always offbeat, sometimes creepy crime stories. Brown doesn't go as far as someone like Jim Thompson, but he's not anyone's idea of cozy. The more he veers towards the traditional, the more he overwrites, and the less I like him. Most of these veer away instead of towards. My favorites include "Murder While You Wait" and "Miss Darkness" (on the more straightforward side) and "Little Apple Hard to Peel" and "The Joke" (on the shivery nightmare side).
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