What do you think?
Rate this book
The Bittermeads Mystery
That evening the down train from London deposited at the little country station of Ramsdon but a single passenger, a man of middle height, shabbily dressed, with broad shoulders and long arms and a most unusual breadth and depth of chest. Of his face one could see little, for it was covered by a thick growth of dark curly hair, beard, moustache and whiskers, all overgrown and ill-tended, and as he came with a somewhat slow and ungainly walk along the platform, the lad stationed at the gate to collect tickets grinned amusedly and called to one of the porters near.
266 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1922
32 people are currently reading
59 people want to read
About the author
E.R. Punshon
73 books16 followersAka Robertson Halket.
E.R. Punshon (Ernest Robertson Punshon) (1872-1956) was an English novelist and literary critic of the early 20th century. He also wrote under the pseudonym Robertson Halket. Primarily writing on crime and deduction, he enjoyed some literary success in the 1930s and 1940s. Today, he is remembered, in the main, as the creator of Police Constable Bobby Owen, the protagonist of many of Punshon's novels. He reviewed many of Agatha Christie's novels for The Guardian on their first publication.
E.R. Punshon (Ernest Robertson Punshon) (1872-1956) was an English novelist and literary critic of the early 20th century. He also wrote under the pseudonym Robertson Halket. Primarily writing on crime and deduction, he enjoyed some literary success in the 1930s and 1940s. Today, he is remembered, in the main, as the creator of Police Constable Bobby Owen, the protagonist of many of Punshon's novels. He reviewed many of Agatha Christie's novels for The Guardian on their first publication.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
July 21, 2024
I had such fun reading this book. I can't imagine how the author came up with the name of Bittermeads for the book and the house in the book, but he did. The author is E. R. Punshon, another author I've never heard of before, but that happens a lot. The book I was reading said the author's name was E. R. Punshon (Ernest Robertson) so I'm not sure why they didn't just skip the initial thing and put his entire name in the front, but they didn't. After finishing the book and liking it as much as I did I plan to read more by him, if I can find any, this one came in a box of old "junk" a friend of mine bought at an auction, although why they buy boxes of things they think of as junk is beyond me, I've read quite a few books thanks to their junk boxes. On the inside cover of the book it says this:
"That evening the down train from London deposited at the little country station of Ramsdon but a single passenger, a man of middle height, shabbily dressed, with broad shoulders and long arms and a most unusual breadth and depth of chest. Of his face one could see little, for it was covered by a thick growth of dark curly hair, beard, moustache and whiskers, all overgrown and ill-tended, and as he came with a somewhat slow and ungainly walk along the platform, the lad stationed at the gate to collect tickets grinned amusedly and called to one of the porters near. "
That isn't all that helpful if you want to know what the story is about, but it does mention something often mentioned in the book and that is that beard. Our bearded man is Robert Dunn and he is there looking for his friend Charlie Wright who has disappeared. The last time he was heard from he was at Bittermeads. So instead of walking around the town asking people if they've seen Charlie, or knock on the door of Bittermeads and ask if they know where Charlie has gone, he breaks in and finds only two women in the house, Mrs. Dawson and her daughter Ella. I can't remember where Mr. Dawson is, but he comes home while Robert Dunn is still searching for Charlie, or some sign of him, and instead of calling the police he hires him as a gardener, driver, errand runner, that kind of thing. Mr. Dawson, with the unusual first name of Deede, is a bad guy, anyone can tell that, although all he ever seems to do is sit around working on complicated chess problems. I guess being a bad guy is the reason he wasn't all that thrilled with the idea of calling the police.
As for that beard, Dunn grew it so no one would know who he was obviously, but since no one knew who he was anyway I don't know why he needed the beard. It did make him more mysterious I suppose. It turns out that finding poor Charlie is only part of Dunn's problem, things get more complicated in the second half of the book. It should have been easy for Dunn to figure out who the real bad guy was long before he did, but he wasn't looking at things as clearly as I was. It was a fun book, my favorite kind. Happy reading.
"That evening the down train from London deposited at the little country station of Ramsdon but a single passenger, a man of middle height, shabbily dressed, with broad shoulders and long arms and a most unusual breadth and depth of chest. Of his face one could see little, for it was covered by a thick growth of dark curly hair, beard, moustache and whiskers, all overgrown and ill-tended, and as he came with a somewhat slow and ungainly walk along the platform, the lad stationed at the gate to collect tickets grinned amusedly and called to one of the porters near. "
That isn't all that helpful if you want to know what the story is about, but it does mention something often mentioned in the book and that is that beard. Our bearded man is Robert Dunn and he is there looking for his friend Charlie Wright who has disappeared. The last time he was heard from he was at Bittermeads. So instead of walking around the town asking people if they've seen Charlie, or knock on the door of Bittermeads and ask if they know where Charlie has gone, he breaks in and finds only two women in the house, Mrs. Dawson and her daughter Ella. I can't remember where Mr. Dawson is, but he comes home while Robert Dunn is still searching for Charlie, or some sign of him, and instead of calling the police he hires him as a gardener, driver, errand runner, that kind of thing. Mr. Dawson, with the unusual first name of Deede, is a bad guy, anyone can tell that, although all he ever seems to do is sit around working on complicated chess problems. I guess being a bad guy is the reason he wasn't all that thrilled with the idea of calling the police.
As for that beard, Dunn grew it so no one would know who he was obviously, but since no one knew who he was anyway I don't know why he needed the beard. It did make him more mysterious I suppose. It turns out that finding poor Charlie is only part of Dunn's problem, things get more complicated in the second half of the book. It should have been easy for Dunn to figure out who the real bad guy was long before he did, but he wasn't looking at things as clearly as I was. It was a fun book, my favorite kind. Happy reading.
September 7, 2016
A joyously overwritten tale of derring-do in the home counties.
Robert Dunn is a heavily bearded mystery man who's come to the little town of Ramsdon, and in particular to the house called Bittermeads, to try to untease a murderous plot to usurp the inheritance of an ancient title. There he finds the beautiful, aethereal Ella and her psychopathic stepfather Deede Dawson . . . and the corpse of Robert's old friend Charley Wright. At first suspicious of and inclined to kill the newcomer, Dawson eventually trusts him enough -- or seems to trust him enough -- to hire him as gardener, chauffeur and general odd-jobs man. Robert and Ella soon fall in love, of course, even though for a while he suspects her of knowing complicity in her stepfather's crimes. There's more murder, and more feverish misunderstanding, before the truth of the dastardly conspiracy is revealed . . .
This, the first of Punshon's works that I've read, is melodrama rather than mystery fiction; all but one of the reveals are so heavily presaged that they don't come as much of a surprise, and the writing revels in clumsy elaboration. (I gather his style grew more sophisticated in the 1930s and 1940s, when he was at the peak of his popularity.) But to criticize the novel on those grounds is to miss its point entirely. What The Bittermeads Mystery offers us is a rattling good yarn, one of those where I consistently found myself reading a chapter or two more than I intended every time I picked it up.
You can find The Bittermeads Mystery at Project Gutenberg.
Robert Dunn is a heavily bearded mystery man who's come to the little town of Ramsdon, and in particular to the house called Bittermeads, to try to untease a murderous plot to usurp the inheritance of an ancient title. There he finds the beautiful, aethereal Ella and her psychopathic stepfather Deede Dawson . . . and the corpse of Robert's old friend Charley Wright. At first suspicious of and inclined to kill the newcomer, Dawson eventually trusts him enough -- or seems to trust him enough -- to hire him as gardener, chauffeur and general odd-jobs man. Robert and Ella soon fall in love, of course, even though for a while he suspects her of knowing complicity in her stepfather's crimes. There's more murder, and more feverish misunderstanding, before the truth of the dastardly conspiracy is revealed . . .
This, the first of Punshon's works that I've read, is melodrama rather than mystery fiction; all but one of the reveals are so heavily presaged that they don't come as much of a surprise, and the writing revels in clumsy elaboration. (I gather his style grew more sophisticated in the 1930s and 1940s, when he was at the peak of his popularity.) But to criticize the novel on those grounds is to miss its point entirely. What The Bittermeads Mystery offers us is a rattling good yarn, one of those where I consistently found myself reading a chapter or two more than I intended every time I picked it up.
You can find The Bittermeads Mystery at Project Gutenberg.
August 9, 2022
This was a very good mystery and well written. It had a very evil villain. There were some unexpected twists and turns and it kept my interest throughout.
May 27, 2010
The Bittermeads Mystery is a golden age murder mystery, published in 1922 but reading more like an early Edwardian novel. There is the usual convoluted plot, manly man heroes, gentle beauties, and plenty of cold grey eyes. There are moments when the story is in danger of sinking below the weight of heavy-handed clues, but never to the point of being boring.
I know very little about the author. Apparently, Ernest Robertson Punshon was a prolific writer of this kind of story, born in 1872, who also wrote under the name of H Robertson Halkett.
But there was that burning in Rupert's heart that made him heedless of all danger, and indeed, he who for mere love of sport and adventure, had followed a wounded tiger into the jungle and tracked a buffalo through thick reeds, was not likely to draw back now. –The Bittermeads Mystery, E R Punshon (1922)”The writing is not all as bad as that, but you get the idea: great fun in a Boy’s Own Paper style.
I know very little about the author. Apparently, Ernest Robertson Punshon was a prolific writer of this kind of story, born in 1872, who also wrote under the name of H Robertson Halkett.
October 30, 2014
So awful that it deserves a special rating for turgid phraseology. But it means well. And Punshon was not always this bad. (Okay, I suppose he was... The Solitary House was pretty awful too.)
September 11, 2016
strangely told story - but it pulled me in just enough to finish it as it granted me the benefit of distraction while watching a wretched football loss
March 18, 2025
The story opens with a man who's amazingly strong, stealthy (despite being large and apparently ungainly), alert, and an excellent tracker. He feels more like a larger-than-life pulp hero than the protagonist of a detective novel, and indeed this is less a detective novel than it is a thriller. The difference between the two often comes down to time orientation: the detective novel is about solving a crime in the past, and the thriller is frequently about preventing a crime in the future. Not that the main character does a particularly wonderful job of that, at least for the first half of the book. He's busy gaining the trust of one of the criminals, falling for the love interest while trying to work out if she was complicit in the murder of his old friend, and maintaining his undercover identity. There has been more than one murder, but it's not really a mystery who committed them; the trick is getting to a point where he can prove it and foil the villain's plans.
It's only around the middle of the book that we discover exactly who he is and get at least some idea of what he's trying to do and why (I guessed it before the reveal, but not a long time before). About two-thirds of the way in, I, but not he, figured out who the mysterious figure behind the crimes was; the main character is notable for his physical rather than his mental aptitude. I was never in any danger of being bored, though; the tension is well maintained, in part by keeping information unrevealed as long as possible. And then there's a race against time to save multiple people in different places, where seconds could count.
The style, particularly at the start, is excitable and overdramatic, again more like a pulp adventure novel than the urbane narration I'm used to in classic detective stories.
The author isn't good with commas, using them to splice sentences together, placing them incorrectly in sentences or leaving them out where they're needed, and not using them when he splits a sentence of dialog in two parts with a tag; he punctuates the second part, incorrectly, as if it was a stand-alone sentence. Today's authors do this kind of thing all the time, but a century ago it was less common, and publishers generally had better editors, who knew the rules even if the authors didn't.
Between the not-too-bright protagonist, the pulpy prose and the mediocre copy editing, I can't give it better than a Bronze-tier rating in my annual recommendation list, but if you ignore those things, it's exciting and full of tension and, at times, action-packed.
It's only around the middle of the book that we discover exactly who he is and get at least some idea of what he's trying to do and why (I guessed it before the reveal, but not a long time before). About two-thirds of the way in, I, but not he, figured out who the mysterious figure behind the crimes was; the main character is notable for his physical rather than his mental aptitude. I was never in any danger of being bored, though; the tension is well maintained, in part by keeping information unrevealed as long as possible. And then there's a race against time to save multiple people in different places, where seconds could count.
The style, particularly at the start, is excitable and overdramatic, again more like a pulp adventure novel than the urbane narration I'm used to in classic detective stories.
The author isn't good with commas, using them to splice sentences together, placing them incorrectly in sentences or leaving them out where they're needed, and not using them when he splits a sentence of dialog in two parts with a tag; he punctuates the second part, incorrectly, as if it was a stand-alone sentence. Today's authors do this kind of thing all the time, but a century ago it was less common, and publishers generally had better editors, who knew the rules even if the authors didn't.
Between the not-too-bright protagonist, the pulpy prose and the mediocre copy editing, I can't give it better than a Bronze-tier rating in my annual recommendation list, but if you ignore those things, it's exciting and full of tension and, at times, action-packed.
December 11, 2021
Undercover-Abenteuer im ländlichen England der 1920er, der Held ist eher ein Nachfahre der Wildwesthelden, sprich ein Spurensucher und lautloser Anschleicher, der die auch Flöhe husten hört.
Das erste Drittel ist absolut prickelnd, danach geht dem Autor ein wenig die Puste aus, aber die Auflösung ist absolut schlüssig, der Showdown verfügt über die eine oder andere überraschende Wendung. Zwei Drittel des Romans bleibt der Leser über Motivation für die verdeckte Operation im Unklaren. Bis dahin gab es schon zwei Leichen, die eigentlich zu den Guten gehören. Auf jeden Fall alles andere als Whodunnit-Kost.
Das erste Drittel ist absolut prickelnd, danach geht dem Autor ein wenig die Puste aus, aber die Auflösung ist absolut schlüssig, der Showdown verfügt über die eine oder andere überraschende Wendung. Zwei Drittel des Romans bleibt der Leser über Motivation für die verdeckte Operation im Unklaren. Bis dahin gab es schon zwei Leichen, die eigentlich zu den Guten gehören. Auf jeden Fall alles andere als Whodunnit-Kost.
January 31, 2018
I quite enjoyed this rattling good yarn. I wondered for most of the story just who the mysterious bearded man was whose point of view we were seeing. I hoped with all my might that the evil stepfather would be done down. More than anything, I wondered what Dunn wondered: did Ella know what was in the crate she dropped off?
May 18, 2018
Pynchon; great writer of prose as well as a great plot and character developer
The story had intervened moments but was not too descriptive in its violence which I always appreciate. The plot was believable, but the main character .... you had to know he was other than portrayed early in the story.
The story had intervened moments but was not too descriptive in its violence which I always appreciate. The plot was believable, but the main character .... you had to know he was other than portrayed early in the story.
June 26, 2020
Good early 1920s thriller
A pre-Bobby Owen stand-alone story from this excellent Golden Age detective story writer. This is a cracking thriller with romantic undertones, rather than a police procedural whodunnit like his later, more famous, works.
A pre-Bobby Owen stand-alone story from this excellent Golden Age detective story writer. This is a cracking thriller with romantic undertones, rather than a police procedural whodunnit like his later, more famous, works.
June 9, 2018
Cool story. This author hasn't failed to entertain me till now. A nice mistery with a touch of romance.
April 26, 2023
Very nicely written mystery with vivid characters and great atmosphere.
January 20, 2024
Not quite a nail-biter but had to keep turning the pages
March 6, 2017
Great mystery!! unique plot... kept me guessing until the end.
Loved this complex mystery! The characters were original and well developed, and the storyline was captivating. I was sorry to finish this good read!
Loved this complex mystery! The characters were original and well developed, and the storyline was captivating. I was sorry to finish this good read!
May 6, 2024
Swoon-worthy romance and mystery
It is a good mystery, and the villian was a surprise. Lots of events and red herrings.
Our dear hero starts out with no clues. The "did she? did he?" conversations he had with himself were too much most of the time, so I skipped a bit. I am very glad I stayed until the end to get the whole story.
It is a good mystery, and the villian was a surprise. Lots of events and red herrings.
Our dear hero starts out with no clues. The "did she? did he?" conversations he had with himself were too much most of the time, so I skipped a bit. I am very glad I stayed until the end to get the whole story.
June 1, 2016
It read as an earlier work than it really was, but it had potential. Overwrought in places and very melodramatic, but had some suspense and did hold its mystery until almost the end. I'll read more of this author.
February 7, 2017
The writing is melodramatic, the hero's a tad insecure, the other characters are evil or vapid, you have no idea what's going on for 3/4 of the book when all is revealed, and the denouement is quick and yet clumsy. None of which make this a good book, it is however, oddly readable.
June 15, 2011
I got this for free on amazon for my kindle. It is an old mystery, so a bit outdated and dramatic.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews