The Spanish Cape Mystery

Ellery Queen Detective #9

by Ellery Queen, Otto Penzler (Introduction)

The Godfrey family is vacationing among the picturesque rocky cliffs of the North Atlantic seaboard, expecting peace, quiet, and, perhaps, a bit of golf or tennis. But one dusky evening in an isolated spot on the grounds of Spanish Cape, Rosa and her uncle David get into an argument about her secretive romance with one of their guests, the roguish John Marco, a handsome cad with a yellow roadster and no visible source of income. That’s when a towering one-eyed man with a .38 revolver emerges from the twilight.

When renowned sleuth Ellery Queen arrives the next day from New York City, looking forward to a summer getaway on the coast, he realizes his trip will be no walk on the beach. Rescuing Rosa, he discovers her captor mistook David for John and struck the former down instead. But Ellery  has more work to do when Rosa’s shady sweetheart is found stone dead and stark naked . . . aside from a black fedora and a theatrical-looking opera cloak. There are plenty of guests and members of the household who might have wanted John dead, but who did it—and what in the world happened to the victim’s clothes?

In this iconic series inspired by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and praised by none other than Agatha Christie, carefully planted clues, logical deduction, and an atmospheric 1930s setting combine for an irresistibly enjoyable read for anyone who loves a murderous puzzle.

Includes discussion guide questions for use in book clubs.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Classics, Crime, Detective, Audiobook, Golden Age Mystery

318 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1935

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

[Nandakishore Mridula · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never read an Ellery Queen mystery before this one, except for a short story, The Adventure of the Seven Black Cats when I was a teenager. I remember liking it. His novels are not easily available in India nowadays, so when I saw this in a second-hand shop, I immediately picked it up.

Well, I must say that Mr. Queen is different from the other investigators in that he throws a challenge at the readers to solve the mystery themselves, after he has laid all the facts on the table. In this case, I took up the challenge, and came through in flying colours! I rightly deduced the murderer. And instead of feeling letdown, I felt pumped up that I was as smart as the detective!

Well, more about that later. Onward to the story...

In his palatial mansion on Spanish Cape, (which, in the author's words, is "peculiar coastal formation on the Atlantic seaboard", an "out-thrust headland of bare rock... connected with the mainland by a narrow tongue of cliff", which is "utterly private and virtually inaccessible") the millionaire Walter Godfrey has assembled a singularly unlikeable bunch of guests. Of the whole lot, the most despicable is John Marco, a gigolo and a bounder of the first water; who is eminently "murderable", and who does get murdered in classic whodunit tradition. But before that, there are mix-ups galore.

First, David Kummer, Godfrey's brother-in-law (his wife's brother) gets kidnapped by a mentally deficient goon called Captain Kidd, under the mistaken impression that he is John Marco, while he and his niece, Rosa Godfrey, is out on the grounds. Kummer is just advising Rosa to stay away from Marco while this mishap occurs. Kidd ties Rosa up in a lonely cottage and carts Kummer off to the sea in a stolen cruiser. While she is languishing thus, the person who apparently hired Kidd to bump Marco off discovers his/ her mistake and takes remedial action. Marco is discovered, strangled to death on the beach terrace. Except for a hat and a cape, he is stark naked.

And that is when Ellery Queen steps into the picture. Accompanied by his friend Judge Macklin and the rather bone-headed inspector Moley, he succeeds in solving the crime - and pulling the proverbial rabbit out of the hat.

Before continuing further, I must warn you that there are mild spoilers. My explanation might point you on the way to identifying the murderer.

How I solved it: I concentrated on the least likely person to have committed the crime, because that is the standard whodunit tradition; then I scouted around for ways in which that person could be the murderer - and bingo! I found that the most exasperating clue could be perfectly explained in case that was the solution. And I was right! I had got to exactly where Mr. Ellery queen had got.

This is a good mystery, though rather transparent. I don't know whether all the Ellery Queen mysteries are the same. I must try my luck at solving some others!

[Bev · Rating 4 out of 5]

"That’s the trouble with clever men,” muttered Ellery. “A crime being necessary, according to their lights, they determine to commit it so ingeniously,that it will be insoluble. But the cleverer they are and the more complex their schemes, the more danger they run of going wrong."

The Spanish Cape Mystery (1935) finds Ellery Queen on vacation and immediately confronted with a baffling murder and a too-clever-for-his-own good murderer. The story opens with David Kummer and his niece Rosa sitting outside the family's Spanish Cape home having a little confidential chat about Rosa's interest in the handsome ne'er-do-well John Marco. Next thing they know they're being hustled to an empty neighboring cottage by giant tough guy, Rosa is tied up, and David (who the giant insists is John Marco) is knocked out and toted off to a boat.

Enter Ellery and his friend Judge Macklin who are renting the cottage in question for a late summer vacation. Imagine their surprise when they find the door busted in and a pretty young woman tied to a chair. They're even more surprised when they take her home and discover that John Marco has been found murdered in the very spot from which Rosa and David were kidnapped. Marco was banged on the head, strangled with wire, and found naked as the day he was born except for an opera cape. Ellery works with Inspector Moley of the local police to find out why David was kidnapped; why Marco was killed; why the corpse was naked; and who did it. By the time David escapes from his captor, Ellery is ready to answer all the questions.

This is the last appearance of Queen's Challenge to the Reader as well as the last of the "international" titles (Roman, French, Dutch, Egyptian, Spanish....). I grew up on the TV version of Ellery Queen with Jim Hutton and I always loved when Ellery would break the fourth wall, turn to the audience, and ask us if we knew who did it. Because at that point we had all the clues.

For years now I have been challenging my readers to solve my cases by the exercise of close observation, the application of logic to the winnowed facts, and a final correlation of the individual conclusions... Technically there are no snags. The facts are all here at this point... Can you put them together and logically place your finger on the one and only possible murderer?

I also loved it when I discovered that the challenge came from the early books. It's a shame they stopped using it, but I could see that they might have wanted to avoid getting thoroughly entrenched in a rut. This is a good solid mystery from the early period of the Queen novels--though perhaps not quite as mystifying as others. I did spot the killer--but that didn't detract from my enjoyment.

First posted on my blog My Reader's Block. Please request permission before reposting any content. Thanks.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently acquired 23 novels by the infamous Ellery Queen through a used bookstore on-line. (Powells)
In case you never heard of this author, Ellery Queen is a pseudonym for two people, Frederic Dannay and Manfred B. Lee. All of the novels were written between the 30's through the 70's and as far as I know, are all out of print.
The novels are all murder mysteries and the great detective, Ellery Queen, not only solves each case, but the reader is invited along side the detective to solve the mystery himself. With about 20 pages left to the story, the detective will challenge the reader at that point, and declare that all the facts have been given, so who done it, and how?
"The Spanish Cape Mystery" starts off with a naked dead body sitting in a chair facing the ocean. How did the victim die? Who did it if it was murder? Why is the victim naked? All these questions and more are answered to my satisfaction as the story unfolds.
All in all this mystery has many twists and turns as Ellery Queen deduces step by step all the answers to solve this mystery. A quick read and very satisfying. 4 stars

[Martin Gibbs · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another great Ellery Queen novel. I enjoy the challenge to the reader, because unlike other mystery writers, the EQ team provides everything for you to solve the case. Although I can't ever seem to do it (probably because I just enjoy the ending and "listening" to Ellery explain everything in his reasoned, clinical manner). At least in this one, I had it down to two folks, one of whom was the murderer... oh well.

I wonder how audiences received this in 1935; EQ put some things on the table that I wasn't sure were so openly discussed back then. But then again I could be wrong.

However, it was a little long. I think the authors were trying to fit their standard length and it just went overboard. True, it was a clever way to bury a few clues within details, but it could have been a novella, or a longer story included in a collection.

All in all, a nice one. I enjoyed it, as I do all of the EQ novels in the 1930s. As I mentioned in my review of On the Eighth Day, I do not like that many of the later novels were farmed out to others... I prefered the originals, in their yellowed, musty tomes.

[Luffy Sempai · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ellery Queen books are quite inconsistent. They're a mixed bag. The more difficult is it to solve the crime on your own, the worse the book is. This I've gleaned from experience in reading the blighters. As for this particular book, there was too much melodrama and not enough drama. Concretely, too much eavesdropping was going on to facilitate the solution of the case. Ellery Queen had to find out a lot of the mystery by a too well informed butler. There was a single murder, and by the time the mystery hemmed and hawed, I was losing interest.

[Shabbeer Hassan · Rating 2 out of 5]

A cool quirk of all Ellery Queen books has been the challenge of solving the mystery thrown at the readers just before the solution is revealed. And I love such puzzlers, but disappointingly so this was the transparent one I have ever encountered. Right from the initial setting, if one pays attention to the clues you could guess where it is going and if a mystery book does so, it rather spoils the charm.

My rating - 2/5

[David Zerangue · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very challenging book for me to read. Not that it was complex. It was full of pointless dialog and needless red herrings. The entire exchange between characters was forced. And the 'how did you know?' moments were too excruciatingly long. The only reason I gave it 2 stars is because the plot was interesting enough. I do not think I will be reading another Ellery Queen novel as there are far superior mystery writers out there...

[Ariadne Oliver · Rating 2 out of 5]

The pace of this book dragged a lot. There wasn't any suspense. I figured out who the murderer was quote easily. The ending might have made more impact if I'd have cared for any of the characters. Add a dash of fat phobia to all this and it just wasn't a very fun book.

[João Fialho · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uma releitura de um policial após +30 anos e ainda sabendo quem era o assassino (indicador que foi um livro que me deixou boas lembranças).
Foi um (bom) livro para férias (nem só em agosto se faz férias).
Um bom desafio lógico bem ao estilo dos anos 30/40. 🙂

3.5*/5.0*

Por simpatia ao Ellery Queen (meu companheiro de longa data) arredondo pra 4* (não há meia *).

[Davida Chazan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I finally got approval for an ARC of one of these classic crime fiction books that are being re-released. You can find my #bookreview for this book on my blog here. https://tcl-bookreviews.com/2022/11/0...

[evan B · Rating 5 out of 5]

finished this right before going out and i’m drunk rn anyway lol loved it might go back on my ellery queen grind

[Sergio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un bel giallo di Ellery Queen: un romanzo ben congegnato e ben scritto che tiene sospesi fino all'ultima pagina.

[Jesse · Rating 4 out of 5]

A real triumph of craft--Ellery's closing exposition of the mystery is quite remorselessly logical in the most Holmesian when-you-eliminate-the-impossible sense, more or less reasonably explaining why a dead man was found naked, on a deck, wearing only a cape. And the emotional motivations behind characters' actions are actually somewhat complex and resonant. Which helps a lot, because, wow, the ten pages in which Ellery and his friend the judge drive out to this remote place are well-nigh unbearable. Just a few choice bits:
"We must be nearly there, Judge." "Not far. Drive on, O Hermes!"

"The wire made Ellery whoop for joy, sling some things into a suitcase, grin goodbye to Djuna and his father, and make for his 'faithful Rosinante,' a Quixotic affair of wheels and gadgets which had once been a famous racing-car. And he was on his way. They had met at the appointed place, embraced, babbled like women for an hour, conferred solemnly on the problem of whether to wait over the night..."

"'Fishing,' groaned Ellery. 'You're a veritable Mr. Tutt! Always makes me think of broiled human skin and smarting eyes. I haven't brought even an--an anchor. Do people fish?'" "'They do, and we're going to. I'll make a young Walton out of you yet.'"

There's a side-eye at Philo Vance's knowledge of perfumes, which would perhaps land better if Ellery didn't cite La Rouchefoucauld and de Staël within two paragraphs and also "drawl" quite often, including sentences that I can't really understand how you could drawl. Oh, and there's one female character whose entire being is wrapped up in that she's so fat and unattractive that it's completely impossible to treat her as anything but a grotesque.

Once again, I just don't buy the Dannay/Lee claim that their character is actually Jewish, unless their point is that, like their decision to choose WASPy pen names rather than publishing, or trying to, as Emanuel Lepofsky and Daniel Nathan, Ellery is passing. ARE there any overtly Jewish Golden-Age, or hardboiled, novelists? Aside from Israel Zangwill's Big Bow Mystery, which came out in 1892, I can't think of any. The first acknowledged Jewish mystery writers who come to mind are Harry Kemelman, whose first Rabbi Small novel came out in 1964, and Roger L. Simon, whose The Big Fix dates to 1973. This CrimeReads list cites, uh, The Chosen, which, no. This article cites Kemelman. Here's a book on depictions of, though not by--mostly upper-class Brits, so you can pretty much guess what's happening there. I assume Tod Goldberg knows the answer to this question.

SO, anyway, despite having a lot to overcome, overcome it does. There's less of Ellery being unbearable and more classic clue dispersal. I feel like if I ever do manage to figure out one of the solutions to these fair-play books, the world will end.

[JDL · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've promised myself to read all of the other Nationality Mysteries before Penzler Publishers releases American Gun in October as part of their American Mystery Classics series, and I'm keeping true to that promise. And so I have reached the eighth of these nine mysteries, and also the final one to be written with the nationalities in mind. The Spanish Cape Mystery, alongside its successor Halfway House, is often seen as the gateway from the complex puzzle-oriented, character-development-barren land of the First Queen Period into the short lived Second Period and into the lauded Third Period which introduced us to Wrightsville. Wrightsville, however, is not where we are headed in this one. The setting of Spanish Cape (said to be located somewhere around the North Atlantic, so New England maybe?) is one of the best parts of the book - the actual physical characteristics of the island, along with the isolating atmosphere it gives off. This physical atmosphere alongside the emotional atmosphere gives the book an overall feel much like Christie's Evil Under the Sun, which was written nearly a decade later. The characters, although we are seeing some actual character development, are still nothing special. We have the Godfreys, a rich family who have their own troubles, the help (of whom Tiller the valet is one of the most interesting characters,) and several guests including the vicious victim John Marco, the strange Munn couple, and the meek Mrs. Constable, the victim of some authorial fat-shaming. Add Ellery Queen, his elderly friend Judge Macklin, and local Inspector Moley (note the lack of Inspector Queen here) and we have the characters. The mystery itself was intriguing - who murdered John Marco, and why was his corpse left completely naked except for an opera cape strewn about him - and what does this all have to do with the kidnapping of Godfrey family members David Kummer and Rose Godfrey, the former being mistaken for Marco by the titan-like Captain Kidd? The cluing of the mystery is really good - as some things are added throughout the novel, other parts will be unheeded except for the most intuitive readers. Come the Challenge to the Reader (Queen's penultimate Challenge at that,) I was able to figure out who the killer was - in fact I'd known for most of the book. I was unsure if Queen would add in a certain extra twist, but that twist did not come, and it was probably for the better - the solution already has enough in it that adding that certain thing would just make any suspension of disbelief impossible. Overall, a solid entry in the Queen canon, but still nothing special. I'd maybe rank this one alongside Roman Hat and Dutch Shoe, which have been my bottom two so far. I might put it between Roman Hat (which is at 8) and Dutch Shoe (now at 6; I've started to change my opinion on this one a bit... I don't hate it anymore but I'm nowhere near loving it either.) In October I will be finishing my run of Nationality Mysteries with The American Gun Mystery - I'd say with a bang for the pun value, but it's probably going to be a fizzle.

[Michael Reilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a recent American Mystery Classic release. Otto Penzler, the owner of the Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, edits the series. Every month since 2018 they have re-issued an American mystery novel published after WW1 and before 1960. Penzler has a very high batting average. He mixes books from successful authors from that period, like Ellery Queen, with one off quirky books that are long forgotten.

The books are attractive paperbacks. They have helpful introductions which usually provide a little about the author and give some context. It is a wonderful publishing enterprise and I wish them continued good luck. (I subscribe to the series through the Mysterious Bookshop. I feel like I get a present every month.)

This is an Ellery queen mystery from 1935. It is set on a small peninsula on the New England Coast. The land is owned by Walter Godfrey, a wealthy financier. He lives there with his wife Stella and his daughter Rosa in a huge Spanish style mansion.

Rosa and her uncle are kidnapped. Rosa is released and her uncle is taken away in a boat by a massive hulking criminal. The criminal thinks he has kidnapped Rosa's boyfriend, John Marco. Hours later Marco is found dead on the grounds of the mansion. He was strangled while sitting on a patio chair. He is naked except for his black fedora and an opera cape.

Ellery Queen and his friend Judge Macklin stumble into the middle of this when they rent the cottage next door for a fishing trip. The local police ask for Ellery's help and the game is afoot.

The plot is satisfyingly complicated with red herrings, lots of likely suspects and multiple motives. It is a very cynical story where almost no one comes out looking good. It is also fairly sordid and is a little more explicit about sex than most mysteries of that time. The characters are well developed and there is a satisfyingly horrible cad.

Queen does have a good take on the credibility problem which many mysteries have. Who would ever commit such a complicated crime. His explains;

"That's the trouble with clever men" muttered Ellery. " A crime being necessary, according to their lights, they determine to commit it so ingeniously that it will be insoluble. But the cleverer they are and the more complex their schemes, the more danger they run of something going wrong.....The perfect crime is the chance killing of an unknown man in a dark alley with no witnesses. Nothing fancy. There are a hundred perfect crimes every year---committed by so called submoronic thugs."

This is a first-rate classic mystery.

Bonus junior high humor.

I giggled when an unknown person reconstructs the torn pieces of a note on a table in a bathroom and the Police Chief asks Queen, "Why in the bathroom? That's something else that smells."

[William · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid as always- I've yet to find a *bad* Ellery Queen after having read 7 entries.

This one has your typical secluded estate with guest at which, inevitably, there has been a murder. I do prefer this set-up over Queens set in NYC given that it more definitively limits the suspect list.

In the negative column, this does have the issue with early Queens- in order to reach a sufficient level of complexity, the book requires 238 densely typeset pages. Queen simply doesn't read as breezily as Christie. I will say, though, that there's a trade-off there. At this point, I can usually predict Christie's solutions. Queen, on the other hand, I very rarely get right. On that note...

I solved this one. Sure, I was missing some of the finer details, but who, why, and much of how I got. This is probably a good first Queen to read if you want to see how involved his solutions are but actually still have a chance of solving. Stuff like Egyptian Cross, Dragon's Teeth, and French Powder are quite a bit trickier. Solving it, however, didn't prevent it from being a fun and well-constructed puzzle to solve (unlike lesser-Christie), and I didn't fully commit to the correct solution until I'd done a bit of thinking and re-reading, which brings me to...

This is one of those early Queens that has the Challenge to the Reader. I really appreciate these. True, Christie and other usually do a good job of communicating that a reader has all the clues by having the detective say "aha! I've solved it" and then asking the inspector to gather everyone up, but I appreciate how explicitly Queen lets the reader know they should think everything over and try to solve- it keys folks into the notion that reading Queen is meant to be an active challenge rather than a passive imbibing of information linearly, page by page.

In any case, good stuff. Glad to have Queen and Carr to read now that I have less than 20 Christies left! It'll be like graduating detective college and moving on to detective grad school :P

[Pamela Mclaren · Rating 3 out of 5]

A young woman and her uncle are kidnapped from their summer home by a mysterious character named Capt. Kidd. After a drive and a short battle between the two men, the young woman is tied to a chair and left in an empty cottage, frantic because her uncle is unconscious and their kidnapper has told someone, by phone, that he will throw the man overboard.

The next morning, enter amateur detective Ellery Queen, and his friend Judge Macklin, who come to the cottage expecting to spend a quiet couple of weeks, only to find an unconscious Rosa Godfrey. The traumatized woman relates a shocking story of mistaken identity — her uncle, David Kummer, was been taken in the belief he is John Marco, one of the guests of the Godfrey family at their summer home.

Queen and Macklin return Rosa to her family only to find the mystery growing: Marco has been murdered on the terrace and is discovered naked other than an opera cloak. In a house full of suspects, one thing is obvious, Rosa's mother, Stella, and female guests Laura and Cecelia Munn have something to hide.

Why was Marco naked? And why did Stella Godfrey invite a houseful of guests she didn't know to her home? What are all the women scared out of their wits?

Queen quickly becomes part of the investigation, digging for clues only he can appreciate. This is a witty, clever mystery in traditional Ellery Queen fashion. And even when sleep deprived, Queen quickly discovers what is going on. He pulls all the clues together and sets a trap that leads to at least one of the bad guys. Then in the traditional "Challenge to the Reader," in which he urges readers to try to solve the mystery, Queen makes the final reveal that ties the story all together. Fun characters, situations and dialogue make this a good read.

[Arthur · Rating 1 out of 5]

This did not age well. At least, I hope that's the problem.
Like Christie's Hercule Poirot, Ellery talks too much & is too impressed with his ability to solve murders. Oh, how his explanation dragged on and on and on and on at the end. However, the other characters do their best to speak equally often and say even less.

In addition to a banal plot whose only outstanding feature was the nudity of the victim, the book is rife with aspects that may have been acceptable in 1935 but are much harder to swallow in 2024. To wit:
--cops tromping all over crime scenes;
--misogynist attitudes (fat-shaming, finding nude female murder victims acceptable but not nude male murder victims, middle-aged women being at "that dangerous age" when they apparently lose all common sense and self-control);
--blithely discounting the fact that a young woman was kidnapped, tied up, and hit her head on a hard surface;
--no concern over the missing maid, whose disappearance would certainly have made her a suspect;
--finding it perfectly acceptable that a young woman would have an affair with her mother's erstwhile lover-cum-blackmailer;
and, the most egregious,
--a private detective, a police inspector, and a judge all watch a man beat his wife so they can eavesdrop on her "confession," which they would have gotten if they had interrupted the beating.

I did not enjoy this book, my first of Ellery Queen. I doubt I will read another. And although I certainly don't want to put up with Queen's endless talking, I also have no desire to revisit the 1930s if this book is typical of the culture at the time.

[Jan Peregrine · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not sure if I've read an Ellery Queen mystery before, but only meant to. The series that began in 1929, I believe, was written by two immigrants, it sounds like, and includes thirty novels, short story collections, and a mystery magazine until the 70s. The ninth in the series, The Spanish Cape Mystery takes place on a millionaire's personal island and involves the murder of a house guest found naked with his black cape over his shoulders

Queen plays the detective who is very analytical, but doesn't always solve a case. He's on vacation with his old friend, a retired judge, when they stumble into a vacation cottage meant for them, but a kidnapped woman presents herself and she's the millionaire's only daughter.

Queen includes a preface written by one of his friends, but nothing else is known about him and also a challenge to the reader close to the end when all the clues have been given.

I didn't guess the killer at that time, but later on. It was quite a fun puzzle.

There's blackmail, an inspector, some old-fashioned words, and lots of intriguing characters I'll be reading more of the series, especially the previous one that Queen couldn't solve. It must be an extremely frustrating read!.

[Bernie4444 · Rating 5 out of 5]

"In the mountains of truth" quote Nietzche, "you never climb in vain"

I have to admit that I watched the movie first. They run parallel but as with most movies, they are a pale reflection of the well-designed book.

Ellery Queen and Judge McClain are on vacation at a seaside cottage near a cape called "Spanish Cape." Little did they know that they were going to be involved in a strange mystery with a mix of victims and suspects.

We are used to mysteries like "And Then There Were None" where we get introduced to people upfront and know one of them is a ringer. This story however has many secretive people and Ellery must extract the truth like pulling teeth.

Part of the fun or maybe a distraction is that Ellery has a habit of quoting various writers contemporary and from antiquity. If you read a lot of 20's mysteries you will be o.k. but if not, you will need a dictionary on hand.

We also hear in-depth expiations that may us jump to conclusions and in every chapter, we suspect a different person. The wonderful part of the Ellery Queen books is that all the clues are there and you are expected to extrapolate the solution to the mystery before Ellery reveals his logic.

[Alberto Avanzi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un giallo che, come nei migliori di questo autore, ha anche un valore letterario, rappresentando come il male si possa nascondere anche in situazioni di apparente benessere materiale e felicità. Mi ha ricordato a tratti Il grande Gatsby per la sua atmosfera.
Sulla costa atlantica degli Stati Uniti, un uomo molto ricco ospita diverse persone, fra le quali si percepisce tensione. Due persone della casa vengono rapite da un misterioso “gigante”, un uomo di altissima statura e lineamenti caratteristici. E quella notte stessa, ci scappa anche il morto, uno degli ospiti viene trovato cadavere, vestito solo con cappello e mantella, ma completamente nudo sotto la mantella. Questo mistero (simile nella bizzarria a Delitto alla rovescia, ma qui gestito in modo più intrigante) richiede una persona dotata di logica ferrea, e caso vuole che Ellery Queen si trovi da quelle parti. L’ enigma, pur non geniale, e forse prevedibile per i lettori più esperti e attenti, è comunque di buon livello, e soprattutto è sensato e abbastanza coerente. Un ottimo giallo classico quindi, per gli amanti del genere

[Fran Young · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's been quite a while since I read a mystery set in the 1930's. Charming but of course predictable. The usual striking but isolated setting -- in this case a manor house set on a cliff above the sea. The stock set of wealthy characters, all hiding secrets, all somehow involved in the eventual murder. Then in comes the police, upstaged by the detective (Ellery Queen), who hijacks the investigation and of course solves the crime. In this particular book, he's accompanied by an old friend, "the judge". As it unfolds, there are many frail and fainting women, tough and chivalrous men, and sneaking around at all hours, hiding on balconies and behind bushes to spy on each other. And to make it stylistically perfect, the denouement comes in a final climax scene with all involved where Queen lays out the who done it and how done it, before he rides off into the sunset in his Duesenberg automobile. Enjoyable and interesting, even if a little dated.

[SANDRA Ahola · Rating 3 out of 5]

I give this book 3 and 1/2 Stars. it was engaging and the characters were surprisingly quirky. it amazes me how a book that is almost 100 years old does not seem particularly dated.

The story moved along and the mystery was interesting. I have not read an Ellery Queen book before and after reading this I felt like I didn't know much about Ellery. Although the characters seemed interesting, everyone was seen from an outside point of view and you don't get to know what any of them are thinking.

This book made me realize I need stories that dive inside the character's minds in order for me to find it a satisfying read.

[Kelley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a mildly entertaining read. This is the first Ellery Queen novel that I've read, and it may not the last. This whodunnit it clever enough, but for me, I happened upon the solution very early on. I'm no super sleuth, so some luck was part of the reason, through no fault of the author. I will say that I was disappointed we really didn't learn much about Ellery Queen, the character, much at all. He was not a well-developed character at all, and in fact we learn more about almost all the suspects than we do about him. Still, this was a light easy-enough mystery novel to ponder.

[Bill Suits · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is very good. I haven't read a Queen mystery in a long time, and this was worth it. I figured out who did it and why, but couldn't figure out the how.

Having read the book I could see why this was the first Queen book to be made into a movie. After seeing the movie I recommend you just read the book. They completely butchered this one up in Hollywood.

I cannot think of a single book adaptation that I actually liked in a movie form. This is something to stay away from on the screen. Enjoy the book.

[Shawna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a slog. I love mysteries, and I'm not even sure why I stuck with this other than a struggle in quitting books I begin. I didn't appreciate the police detective at all. He was so heavy-handed and unrealistic. Anyone using his methods is sure to learn nothing from witnesses. The characters showed little growth, nothing about what was likeable about them or anything really to make them interesting or sympathetic. I have another Ellery Queen, but it is going to be a little while before I begin it.

[Erik Deckers · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a fun read and my favorite EQ book out of the first 9. I was actually able to figure out the killer within the first third of the book, thanks to one early sentence about the killer and the victim being almost the same size and wearing the same style of clothes. I also appreciated that fact that Ellery didn't withhold the answer for a whole freaking month while the police did their regular work (see American Gun Mystery, which was terrible and dumb!).

[James Farner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another pretty strong mystery with some fun commentary on how the cleverer/more complicated a crime is, the more likely it actually is to be caught because of specificity (at least in the world of detective novels!). Unfortunately, the women are not treated great in the one (granted, it’s a 1935 book, but it stands out quite a bit more in this one compared to some of the others, which is too bad).

[Abhinav Kumar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Splendid use of expression, tad bit old school and very rich in vocabulary. I had a tough time understanding some words but definitely learnt newer ones during the reading experience. Ellery keeps the reader highly engaged throughout the chapters and the mystery isnt revealed until the end which makes it all the more interesting. Highly recommend this to mystery lovers.

[stormhawk · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ellery Queen doesn't even get to take a decent vacation. Any idyllic spot to which he travels ends up littered with dead bodies.

Not sure if I liked this story better because it was a better story, or because I rose to and met the "challenge to the reader." Yes, I finally figured one of these Queen mysteries out, I tell you, with my own little gray cells.