Champagne for One

Nero Wolfe #31

by Rex Stout, Lena Horne (Introduction)

Faith Usher had a decidedly morbid personality. She talked about taking her life, and kept cyanide in her purse. So when she collapses and dies from a lethal champagne cocktail in the middle of a high society dinner party, everyone calls it suicide—including the police. But Archie was watching it all, and suspects it was murder. So does Nero Wolfe, especially after he's warned by four men against taking the case.

For the world's most formidable detective it is a tantalizing puzzle involving an unlikely combination of philanthropy, deception, blackmail, and an unrepentant killer who just may have committed the perfect crime.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Detective, Audiobook, Mystery Thriller, Ebooks

225 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 24, 1958

About the author

Rex Todhunter Stout (1886–1975) was an American crime writer, best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe, described by reviewer Will Cuppy as "that Falstaff of detectives." Wolfe's assistant Archie Goodwin recorded the cases of the detective genius from 1934 (Fer-de-Lance) to 1975 (A Family Affair).

The Nero Wolfe corpus was nominated Best Mystery Series of the Century at Bouchercon 2000, the world's largest mystery convention, and Rex Stout was nominated Best Mystery Writer of the Century.

Reviews

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A young woman is poisoned during a dinner party held annually-- according the terms of the will of an eccentric benefactor--for the "graduates" of a home for unwed mothers. Archie--pinch-hitting as an escort for the the evening--is the only one convinced that the poisoning isn't suicide. Wolfe gets involved--of course. Reluctantly? Of course.

Ingeniously plotted, with some unusually vivid characters and scenes. One of the best of the series.

[Bettie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Description: Faith Usher talked about taking her own life and even kept cyanide in her purse. So when she died from a lethal champagne cocktail in the middle of a high society dinner party, everyone called it suicide—including the police. But Nero Wolfe isn’t convinced—and neither is Archie. Especially when Wolfe is warned by four men against taking the case. Deception, blackmail, and a killer who may have pulled off the perfect crime…it’ s a challenge Nero Wolfe can’t resist.

The TV show episode.

TR Prisoner's Base (Nero Wolfe, #21)
3* The Golden Spiders (Nero Wolfe, #22)
3* Champagne for One (Nero Wolfe, #31)
3* The Doorbell Rang (Nero Wolfe, #41)

[Jill H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Taking a break from the 900 page book I am reading to relax with my favorite detective, Nero Wolfe. My goal has been to read all the 40+ Wolfe books over the years and I have no idea how I missed this one. I need to go back and check my reading list!

Not my favorite of the Wolfe series since the solution is a bit far fetched but still entertaining. A young woman dies of poison at a social gathering that Archie, Wolfe's right hand man, is attending. The police think it is suicide but Archie disagrees and is convinced she was murdered. He drags Wolfe into investigating it and it becomes obvious that there is more here than meets the eye.And Wolfe actually leaves his house (which he seldom does) to reach a solution.

Stout has a masterful command of the English language and some of Wolfe's statements will have you reaching for a dictionary. Overall, it is interesting and, as usual, you won't figure out "who duunit". Short and delightful.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story opens when an acquaintance of Archie's phones him and asks if he can take his place at an annual high society dinner for unwed mothers that is hosted by his aunt. He is "sick". Have you ever called work and told your boss that you were "sick"? That is what Archie hears but he agrees to go.

While dancing Archie's partner tells him that another woman, Faith Usher, talked about suicide and kept cyanide in her purse. Archie promises to keep an eye on her. So he is a witness when Faith's dance partner brings her a glass of champagne and after taking a sip she falls to the floor and dies. Everyone is convinced it is suicide. Even the police. The hostess is rich and well connected. She puts pressure on the district attorney. She doesn't want bad publicity. Everyone but Archie believes it was suicide. And that is good enough for Nero Wolfe.

How did the cyanide get in Faith Usher's glass of champagne if she did not put it there? At the end Wolfe invites everyone to his office for a reenactment. The hostess, the three remaining unwed mothers, their escorts from that evening, along with Inspector Cramer and Sergeant Purley Stebbins. The explanation was quite satisfying and I think there are few authors who could have pulled this off. Possibly Agatha Christie. We even get to see Stebbins impress Wolfe!

[Mike Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

My father believed that, after the Nero Wolfe series, the world had no further need for new mystery novels. I tend to agree.

I enjoy the contemporary mysteries by Michael Connelly, Elizabeth George, Patricia Cornwell, Louise Penny and many others, but then I go back to the Rex Stout books and realize that much of what has come afterward in the mystery genre is just so much "look-at-me" shouting. "I can write about child abuse." "I can write about mutilation of women." "I can describe an autopsy that will make you lose your lunch." Some of it is pretty crass. Rex Stout is never crass.

Unlike my dad, I haven't read all the Nero Wolfe books, but give me time. Each one I read is a piece of clockwork, masterfully ticking away, the mechanism so meticulously put together that we don't even recognize the sophistication of its inner workings. Champagne for One is another one that gets the highest marks from me. Archie is in top form, as funny and as sexually charged as always.

As a gay male reader, I admire how Rex Stout has created an odd yet perfectly believable living arrangement among Wolfe, Archie and Fritz, the chef, and that is that. He is smart enough to let the reader surmise what else might be going on--or not going on--here. No matter. The characters, the plot, the setting in old New York and the carefully detailed description of Fritz's anchovy butter and other delicacies engineered for the male palate, are enough. I regret I never talked with my dad about the clever introduction Lena Horne wrote for this edition of this delicious novel.

[Anand Ganapathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another gem of a novel by Rex Stout. I don't post reviews of detective fiction generally as I might inadvertently divulge details of the plot. A must read for all fans of Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin. I surely am looking forward to reading the 4 books from this series that I have just ordered

[Ben Denison · Rating 3 out of 5]

VACATION BOOK #9 (9 of 10 during 6/11-6/26 vacation) This was a n audiobook on the way home from Kansas City > Dallas. The challenge here i had two middle school girls in the truck complaining the whole way about an audiobook (I did warn them ahead of time to bring their headphones)

Typical Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe mystery. Pretty formulaic

I love the Nero/Archie banter back and forth, but this story left me "meh".

[hotsake (André Troesch) · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid if slightly unremarkable Nero Wolfe entry. The mystery is good and Archie and Wolfe are still but this story lacked a lot of the interplay between the main cast that I look forward to.

[Vicki Cline · Rating 5 out of 5]

An acquaintance of Archie's asks him to fill in for him at a dinner given by the man's rich aunt for some unmarried mothers. One of them dies from poison and Archie is the only one who insists it was murder and not suicide, even though the young woman had often talked about killing herself and she was killed by the same kind of poison she carried around in her purse. As usual, I had no idea who the culprit was. On rereading this, I had to go from 4 stars to 5 - the denoument was so amazing.

[Bryan Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very subtle mystery and while the clues are available to the reader making the leap from clue to suspect is extremely difficult. That makes it a little frustrating because you tell yourself "awww, I should have seen that" but it also makes it really satisfying because you can tell yourself "Oh wow! that was really clever".

Archie is invited to a dinner at a former clients house and while he is there one of the guests is poisoned and dies. This guest habitually carried poison with her and and occasionally stated that she would use it some day. Everyone is convinced that it was a suicide except for Archie who is convinced that while the victim had both means and motive she had absolutely no opportunity.

Because of the social standings there is tremendous pressure on Archie to change his story. So much so that it begins to aggravate Nero due to the constant disruptions of his carefully regulated life so he decides to determine if Archie was right or not and then pass the whole mess on to Inspector Cramer after making that assessment.

One notable section in the book perfectly captures the relationship between Archie and Nero and gives a hint into why readers keep coming back to visit Nero's world over and over. The passage is the end of an argument between the two when Archie is ready to draw up a check for his severance payment. It reads:

"This is natural. That is, it is in us, and we are alive, and whatever is in life is natural. You are headstrong and I am magisterial. Our tolerance of each other is a constantly recurring miracle."

Marveling and enjoying the fruits of that miracle is what brings me back over and over.

[Colleen Chi-Girl · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the male narrator and the author’s writing - kind of old school without being overly dated. I looked up one of my fave things: Champgne and found a plethora of fiction and non fiction choices. Will keep me very busy!

[Lukasz Pruski · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rex Stout's "Champagne for One" (1958) is the second Nero Wolfe mystery that I have randomly chosen to re-read in a quest to find out whether my reception of the novels that I highly praised when I read the entire set (46) of Wolfe mysteries in the Eighties and Nineties has changed. I review the first one, "The Mother Hunt" here .

Archie Goodwin, Nero Wolfe's right hand, is invited to sit in for the sick nephew of a very rich woman who sponsors a famous annual charity party for unmarried mothers. Archie is to play a chevalier to one of the women. One of the attendees dies during the event, poisoned by cyanide. While the police and the hosts of the party maintain that the death is suicide, Archie insists it is murder. A rich guest of the party, afraid that certain events from his past may influence the police's thinking, hires Nero Wolfe to investigate.

I find the plot convoluted, quite clumsy, and the whole story rather implausible. Coincidences galore. As usual, I am annoyed by the excessively theatrical conferences in Wolfe's office, attended by all the protagonists and, sometimes, the police. It gives the author a chance to show pontificating Mr. Wolfe at his best (which is also his worst). One sentence made me smile: "A man who would never see eighty again came out hobbling over, squeaking at me, 'What's your name?'" The novel is a pleasant and very fast read (about two hours), but I believe Mr. Stout's average level is higher. Now I will conclude my experiment by reading Mr. Stout's "Murder by the Book", which I considered a masterpiece a long, long time ago.

Two stars.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best Nero Wolfe mysteries I've read. The mystery is good and mysterious, plus it's a little longer than some of the others I've read, so there's more time to enjoy the characters. Archie and Wolfe are, if possible, even more delightful than usual, and the other recurring characters get chances to shine as well, especially Saul Panzer. I've never made a list of favorite Nero Wolfe books, but if I did, this would be on it.

[Susan]

I was pleased to find a new-to-me Nero Wolfe mystery with all the usual characters and routines— Archie Goodwin, Fritz the chef, Theodore the orchid man, Inspector Cramer of the NYPD, Saul Panzer, Orrie Cather, and Fred Durkin, the PIs, and of course the big man himself. This 1950s mystery is not their best outing, but a clever twist at the end tied seemingly disparate plot strands into a tidy bow.

[Syrdarya · Rating 2 out of 5]

Archie goes to a dinner party as a favor to a friend, and a woman dies of cyanide poisoning.

I felt like I should like this book, but I really didn't. The whole "she must have committed suicide just because she talked about it!" schtick was very unbelievable to me, and something about all the suspects and witnesses (and even the victim) just failed to interest me in any of them.

[thefourthvine · Rating 4 out of 5]

You could honestly do a survey of the US's changing attitudes about unmarried pregnant women using the Wolfe novels, and this one would be a key data point. Otherwise, it's a solid, middle-of-the road novel. (But I think about it every time I carry two cups of something and hand one to someone else; sorry, Stout, but I don't always hand off the cup in a given hand.)

[K.B. Hallman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I never tire of Archie and Nero.

[Gilbert Stack · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the very impressive things about Rex Stout is the truly wide assortment of ways he comes up with for people to murder each other in his stories, In Champagne for One, it’s poison, but no one can figure out how the poison was administered—no one but Nero Wolfe, that is.

The setting is a little bit complicated. Archie Goodwin is asked to attend an annual event to honor the deceased first husband of a fabulously rich New Yorker. The deceased husband had done a lot of work with helping unmarried women who find themselves in a family way give birth and restart their lives. Once a year, four of those women are invited to his (now his wife’s) home for a sort of society affair in which they are paired with men of good birth for an evening of civil conversation. Archie doesn’t fit the description but gets dragged into the affair at the last moment when one of the intended guests gets laryngitis. One of the women dies by cyanide poisoning when drinking a glass of champagne. Because she was known to be contemplating suicide, everyone wants to believe that she killed herself. But Archie saw her take the drink and knew she had not added anything to it.

That’s the set up—tremendous political pressure for Archie to change his statement and Wolfe getting dragged in half against his will. Add to that a secret client who needs to keep his own relationship with the dead woman from becoming public knowledge and a whole host of suspects who are rather angry that this whole difficult affair won’t just go away.

And then Wolfe pulls the first of two cats out of his bag—he thinks of an angle that no one else is pursuing that surprised me even though we’ve had all the same information paraded before us that Wolfe has had. The second act is how he catches the murderer.

I’ve not embarrassed to admit that I would never have figured this out if Wolfe/Stout hadn’t told me, but after he revealed the secret I certainly felt like I should have.

If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.

[Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the better Nero Wolfe mysteries!

[Bev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rex Stout's Champagne for One comes garnished with an unhealthy dose of cyanide.

This outing for Nero Wolfe and his leg man Archie Goodwin doesn't begin with a client. No. It begins when Archie does one of his good deeds and acts as a stand-in dinner guest for an acquaintance, "Dinky" Austin Byne. Byne claims to have a cold and wants Archie to attend a black tie function at his aunt's house in his stead. Archie knows full well that Byne's cold is non-existent, but is curious enough about the dinner to agree--as long as auntie is willing to invite him. You see, Wolfe & Goodwin had been hired by Mrs. Robilotti in the past to recover some missing jewelry and she had taken exception to some of Archie's remarks. He just wants to be sure that she'll let bygones be bygones.

Apparently she will. She calls and invites Archie to attend the affair--an anniversary dinner held in honor of her deceased husband and featuring an night out for "lucky" young women from the husband's pet charity: Grantham House, a shelter and place of "improvement" for unwed mothers. The idea is to give the women suitable male companionship and entertainment (conversation, dinner, and dancing) for an evening. Oooh. Lucky ladies.

All goes well until Mrs. Robilotti breaks out the champagne. Faith Usher, one of the women, has advertised that she keeps a vial of cyanide in her purse--just in case she should decide to end it all. She accepts her champagne from Mrs. Robilotti's son, takes a drink, and promptly dies...an apparent suicide. Everyone there agrees that she must have decided that now was the time. The police think that suicide would be a nice tidy solution to the case. There's just one problem. When Goodwin was informed by another of the women of the cyanide-toting habits of Faith, he spent the rest of his evening watching Faith and her purse. And he's willing to swear that she absolutely did not dump anything into her drink before partaking of it. Inspector Cramer can't shake him. The Assistant Commissioner can't either. He saw what he saw...and he didn't see what he needed to have seen for it to be suicide.

Of course, calling it murder isn't an easy solution either. Because from all appearances, there's no way anyone could have put the poison in that particular glass and have been sure that Faith would have gotten it. So, was Faith the target? Did the murderer not care who died? Did Faith really manage to perform a sleight of hand trick that fooled even Archie? Or is everybody, including Archie, missing something?

This is Rex Stout at his best. Talk about sleigh-of-hand...nothing up my sleeve and hey, presto, here's a clue you missed! Goodwin is at his wise-cracking best. Wolfe is his grumpy, genius self. Cramer huffs and puffs and blows nobody's house down. The interviews are spectacular and I thoroughly enjoyed the play between Archie and Saul Panzer late in the book. Four stars.

[Daryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've read six or seven Nero Wolfe novels over the last six months, and generally I've enjoyed them. They're easy and mostly pretty entertaining. I've always felt like genre fiction was enjoyable more for its plot than for its style, and I've tended to feel like I'd go to literature you might call capital-L Literature for my appreciation of style. But the more I think of it, the more I think this isn't the case at all for somebody like Stout (and, by extension, I suppose for others doing similar things, even within genre fiction).

The Nero Wolfe novels are usually pretty predictably plotted (if at times outlandishly plotted in their details). Something happens to drag Wolfe into a case and either he assembles a room full of people around him in a set piece denouement or he ventures out against his better judgment (for some purpose other than work) and solves a case that allows him to return to the comfort of his orchid room and his rigid schedule. That's the basic plot of all the novels I've read so far. Sure, some details change -- Archie makes wisecracks at different people, or there's a lacquered box or cyanide delivered in some different ghastly way -- but on the whole, the plotting itself isn't what's enjoyable about the books.

The characterization isn't all that interesting either. Wolfe is not a well-rounded character (well, he is rounded physically, I suppose, by Archie's estimation). Archie is pretty flat too. They are fun characters to live with, but they are not characters who develop meaningfully in any capital-L Literary way, and this is what I mean when I say that there's not much to the characterization.

But still, there's something about these novels that really appeals to me, and I think it's got to be some sense of style. There's something about the particular way Stout writes the books that makes me want to read them; it is not either the plotting or the depth of characterization; it is something about the interplay of the characters, though, and I suppose it's something about the consistency of that interplay -- which is to say that there's a sense of a distinct style to these novels. And this style reaches beyond anything I would ever previously have thought of as capital-S Style, and this means that my tendency to sort of sneer at genre fiction as not capital-L Literary and thus maybe not entirely worth my attention is misguided and snooty (heck, maybe downright Wolfeian).

All of which is to say, with respect to this book, that it is a Nero Wolfe book through and through and that I liked it (didn't love it), as it fits right into a very specific style that I've found I really enjoy, genre fiction or no.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to revisited this series some day.

4* Black Orchids (Nero Wolfe, #9)
3* Champagne for One (Nero Wolfe, #31)
TR Fer-de-Lance (Nero Wolfe, #1)
TR The League of Frightened Men (Nero Wolfe, #2)
TR The Rubber Band (Nero Wolfe, #3)
TR The Red Box (Nero Wolfe, #4)
TR Too Many Cooks (Nero Wolfe, #5)
TR Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe, #6)
TR Over My Dead Body (Nero Wolfe, #7)
TR Where There's a Will (Nero Wolfe, #8)
TR Not Quite Dead Enough (Nero Wolfe, #10)

[Pamela Shropshire · Rating 4 out of 5]

An acquaintance of Archie calls and asks him to attend a party in his stead because he is sick. Archie agreed, even though the hostess, Mrs. Robilotti, is a former client who fussed because of the size of Wolfe’s fee. Mrs. Robilotti is a wealthy socialite whose late husband had established a home for unwed mothers. Every year, Mrs. Robilotti invites some of the women to a party at her home where eligible bachelors will also be in attendance.

One of the young women is known to carry cyanide in her purse, and has talked about killing herself. During the party, her dance partner brings her a glass of champagne; she takes a sip, and falls down dead.

Everyone is satisfied that she did commit suicide — all except Archie. He is adamant she couldn’t have put poison in her glass, and it was indeed in the glass. Inspector Cramer, other police, and the Police Commissioner himself press Archie to state he could have been mistaken, but he knows what he saw — or rather, what he didn’t see.

Wolfe is forced to step in and either prove or disprove Archie’s statement. Another solid effort by Stout, another enjoyable period piece.

[Robyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Snapshot of social mores in the mid-50s | I love the series, have been reading it for decades, but my original list of which I had read got lost, so it's been difficult to figure out which few remain that I've not previously read. This turns out to be one, and while it's as excellent in quality as the rest, I didn't like it as much because of the assumption that the young women who had had babies without being married were immoral, while the fathers of those babies were allowed to cover their "indiscretions" and go on with their lives unhampered. Some of the women were teenagers after having their babies, and some of the fathers were much older men absolutely rolling in money who gave the girls they picked up fake names, but the condemnation fell only on the girls. I don't normally try to solve Wolfe novels, because they're not always fair play, Stout often has an operative provide Wolfe with information the reader doesn't get. But in this case I found the solution relatively straightforward quite early. Still satisfying.

[Abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ho sempre trovato i gialli di Rex Stout veramente straordinari, la particolarità di un investigazione che mostra il dualismo dell'acume impersonificato da Nero Wolfe e dell'intraprendenza che prende la forma di Archie Goodwin mi hanno sempre profondamente colpito.
Nonostate lo stile inconfondibile di Rex Stout sia sempre piacevole ed appassionante (una volta iniziato un romanzo di Nero Wolfe sono sempre tentata di leggerlo tutto in una giornata) ho trovato che questo particolare giallo non presentasse un finale soddisfacente come quello di altri romanzi dello stesso autore. Trovo infatti che il finale sia rimasto troppo aperto, quasi inconcluso tato da spingermi a chiedermi se in realtà il mio libro non avesse pagine mancanti.
Detto ciò voglio comunque sottolineare che in diversi passaggi il libro mi ha tenuto con il fiato sospeso e che, pur non essendo l'inchiesta che preferisco, suggerisco a chiunque di leggere questo romanzo

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

I must have missed it when I first read it, but this might be the best--or most representative--Nero Wolfe novel. It moves quickly; it features most of the key players, with lots of Saul and Cramer and Fritz; it talks in detail about food and orchids and the layout of the brownstone; it pits Archie and Wolfe against lawyers, the Commissioner, and antagonistic rich people; it fucks with Archie and Wolfe's sexism and gender expectations; and it's an impossible crime problem. I didn't guess the murderer, but I thought I had, which is always fun. And an unwed mother reaches through Archie's car window and tweaks his nose. A very good introduction to the books.

Speaking of which, this edition has another very good introduction, from Lena Horne (!).

[Bob Mackey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jumping ahead about 10 places in my chronological Nero Wolfe readthrough to get rid of a hefty double-volume before a move. This is the 20th Stout book I've read, and maybe his work is losing a bit of its novelty for me, but my last two Wolfe mysteries only rose to the level of a two-star review. That said, I really enjoyed Champagne for One and found it a nice return to form. We have a good, old-fashioned poisoning, just one victim, and a cast that starts too big and is whittled down to a manageable size by the halfway point.

It's also very slightly risque, especially for a book from this era: Much of Champagne for One is invested in a home for "unwed mothers," so we get a peek into a very 1950s view of sexual norms being violated. Take it from an author born in 1886: girls just want to have fun.

[Jaana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lomalukemista kesämökin hyllystä, tätä en varmaan ollut ennen lukenutkaan. Taattua Nero Wolfea, hauska ja viihdyttävä. Ja Archie on NIIN nokkela ja komea ja hyvä tanssimaan!

[Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy the heck out of Archie.

[Yelena · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my second Rex Stout / Nero Wolfe book. I don't think it's the best mystery I have ever read, but it's just so damn charming. The language, the humor and characters are just absolute pleasure.