Turmoil at Brede

by Seldon Truss

Jazz Age themed mystery novel of "Paul Nicosia's palatial and famous Temple of Youth [that] catered to London's world of fashion".

Genres: Mystery

275 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1931

About the author

(Leslie Seldon Truss)
UK (1892 - 1990)
aka George Selmark

Reviews

[Lisa Kucharski · Rating 4 out of 5]

The year is 1931, England! I would say this is a mystery action story and when you read it, it reads like a movie- with a strong jaw line and lovely ladies. This is a story that starts off running and you find a young lady trying to free her father from evil grip. She fails at the attempt but finds an ally and together they get into all sorts of dangerous predicaments. Scotland Yard, is also in on the affair having watched several suicides and mysterious deaths coincide with a great deal of money going missing.

The story is of the period but with much more action that usual. One of Truss' earlier works of a long list of novels. Very surprised to read that only one was turned to a movie when it seems his work would lend itself very readily to the screen.

[Rick Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is quite a tangle of intrigue. We have society matrons, a beautician, and lawyers dealing in a shady scam triangle to set up debutantes with proper marriages, then causing their deaths to cash in on their estates. Mr. Penn of Pentonville will immediately bring to mind Simon Templar (The Saint) of Leslie Charteris books, and fans of The Saint will feel right at home. He is an adventurer operating under an alias, just on the outside of the Law. Wealthy, with a fast car and fast fists. The action takes place at Brede Hall, the stereotypical country manse; complete with a tower and dungeon - and the Temple of Youth, an elaborate beauty parlor complete with hidden rooms, paintings on the wall with the eyes cut out so spies can peer through them, and a beautician who enjoys performing lobotomies on undesired witnesses. Mr. Penn's true identity will come as a surprise.

[Anna Katharine · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought The Crime Club 1931 first edition of Turmoil at Brede at a local bookstore primarily for the fun Art Deco cover design and end papers, and because Seldon Truss was a new author to me. Unfortunately, he's also a somewhat boring author to me- this was less of a Golden Age mystery and more a work of sensational fiction. There are hidden passageways, death chambers ancient and modern, improbable poisonings, and so many people in disguise that the reader has no chance of understanding motives until the whole unlikely plot is revealed. The usual tropes of the day are out in full force- evil genus, inscrutable Asian, obese debauched impoverished gentleman, helpless innocent plucky young heroine to melt, sylph-like, into the arms of her rescuer.... yeah. There's a reason this work is largely forgotten, as it hasn't aged well. Oh, and it's old enough that characters regularly use 'ejaculated' to mean 'spoke suddenly and forcefully,' which always makes me giggle...

[Kate Sheldon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read it in May 2017. My note says it was an adventure mystery, and that I couldn't put it down.

[Arthur Pierce · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book only mildly interesting until, at about the halfway point, it turned quite melodramatic. From that stage it became considerably more entertaining.