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Uncle Abner: The Doomdorf Mystery
Contents:
The Doomdorf mystery
The wrong hand
The angel of the Lord
An act of God
The treasure hunter
The house of the dead man
A twilight adventure
The age of miracles
The tenth commandment
The Doomdorf mystery
The wrong hand
The angel of the Lord
An act of God
The treasure hunter
The house of the dead man
A twilight adventure
The age of miracles
The tenth commandment
- GenresMystery
130 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1918
1 person is currently reading
53 people want to read
About the author
Melville Davisson Post
192 books11 followersMelville Davisson Post (April 19, 1869–June 23, 1930) is an American author, born in Harrison County, West Virginia. He earned a law degree from West Virginia University in 1892, and was married in 1903 to Ann Bloomfield Gamble Schofield. Their only child, a son, died at eighteen months old and Mrs. Post died of pneumonia in 1919.
After the death of their son, he left law practice and went on an European tour with his wife. Upon return from Europe, he began writing short stories and became America's highest paid short story writer. He was an avid horseman, and died on June 23, 1930, after a fall from his horse, and was buried in Harrison County. His boyhood home, "Templemoor", is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as of 1982.
Although Post's name is not immediately familiar to many in this era, his stories are available through Gutenberg and many collections of detective fiction include works by Post. There is a case to be made for these stories to be among the finest of detective fiction in America. No less than Ellery Queen and Howard Haycraft both praised Post's writing as among the finest of American detective writing.
Post's best-known character is the mystery-solving, justice dispensing Virginian backwoodsman, Uncle Abner. Post also created two other recurring characters, Sir Henry Marquis and Randolph Mason. He also wrote two non-crime novels. His total output was approximately 230 titles.
After the death of their son, he left law practice and went on an European tour with his wife. Upon return from Europe, he began writing short stories and became America's highest paid short story writer. He was an avid horseman, and died on June 23, 1930, after a fall from his horse, and was buried in Harrison County. His boyhood home, "Templemoor", is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as of 1982.
Although Post's name is not immediately familiar to many in this era, his stories are available through Gutenberg and many collections of detective fiction include works by Post. There is a case to be made for these stories to be among the finest of detective fiction in America. No less than Ellery Queen and Howard Haycraft both praised Post's writing as among the finest of American detective writing.
Post's best-known character is the mystery-solving, justice dispensing Virginian backwoodsman, Uncle Abner. Post also created two other recurring characters, Sir Henry Marquis and Randolph Mason. He also wrote two non-crime novels. His total output was approximately 230 titles.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
July 29, 2018
Locked Room Mystery #6
Crime=4 stars: A man is murdered/shot in a locked room. The windows are atop a 100 foot rock cliff, the windows haven't been opened (if ever) and the room is bolted/locked from the inside. Extra point for original location (the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia).
Solution=4 stars: The actual solution approaches the unbelievability of Edgar Allen Poe's "Rue Morgue". But when two people confess: a preacher who goes around destroying stills and says the man's death is an answer to his prayers while a housekeeper says she used a wax effigy and stabbed it with pins, resulting in the death and then we learn that neither is actually responsible, one has to appreciate this deeply atmospheric work when a third solution, almost as baffling is offered.
Summary: 4 stars: this is one of the most unusual locked room mysteries I've read, and one of the few offering 3 solutions.
Crime=4 stars: A man is murdered/shot in a locked room. The windows are atop a 100 foot rock cliff, the windows haven't been opened (if ever) and the room is bolted/locked from the inside. Extra point for original location (the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia).
Solution=4 stars: The actual solution approaches the unbelievability of Edgar Allen Poe's "Rue Morgue". But when two people confess: a preacher who goes around destroying stills and says the man's death is an answer to his prayers while a housekeeper says she used a wax effigy and stabbed it with pins, resulting in the death and then we learn that neither is actually responsible, one has to appreciate this deeply atmospheric work when a third solution, almost as baffling is offered.
Summary: 4 stars: this is one of the most unusual locked room mysteries I've read, and one of the few offering 3 solutions.
December 17, 2016
I can't remember how I stumbled upon this terrific set of mystery stories. Regardless, the 4.55 average goodreads rating is exactly what I would give it. I might have gotten to five stars had I not had to read it on a Kindle, which is simply a less connected experience than a physical book. And the prose is a bit archaic, consistent with the early 20th century when this was written. Be warned that this is not an easy read to track down. My local librarian did a national library search, to no avail. However, the Kindle edition is available on Amazon for $0.99, and I decided I could afford that.
There are eighteen stories in this collection, and almost all are excellent. They include several "locked room" stories and other classic mystery forms. They take place in the Virginia mountains (which became West Virginia in 1863, but this has not happened yet) and are all told through the voice of Martin, who is 9 years old when the volume opens and at least a year older by the end. The characters are consistent: Martin, his Uncle Abner, Abner's brother (Rufus), Squire Randolph and the peculiar Doctor Storm.
There is a consistent form to the stories. Each contains the verbal picture of a genre painting of life in the rough-hewn Virginia mountain region, generally with lovely descriptive writing. The problem arises (often a death, but also missing items of value, fraud etc) and seems to have an easy solution. Abner arrives and solves it. Sounds pretty drab, I know, but each problem is wonderfully different, and Abner's solutions are believable and refreshing.
Uncle Abner is a terrific character, even if his personality is not really fleshed out besides being an ace amateur detective, and being a large, formidable guy. He is very Old Testament in his rigorous adherence to a quest for justice. "The law is not always justice," he says in one of the stories. I must admit that after the recent presidential election, it was comforting to read something where there was a clear distinction between what is right and what is wrong. Doing the right thing is essential to Abner, and he is fairness and justice personified.
No, there is no character development, a tall order in a short story, anyway. And the characters are fairly stock. The women are either young and attractive or withered and elderly. African Americans appear in many of the stories, and are treated with more respect than I might have expected in a book written in 1919, but they are also somewhat interchangeable and uniformly simple in their approach to life -- and very happy to be servants, it seems. The villains are always male, if I remember correctly.
It's odd to me that Post seems to have been forgotten. He was very good at this stuff, and this book was a pleasure from beginning to end.
There are eighteen stories in this collection, and almost all are excellent. They include several "locked room" stories and other classic mystery forms. They take place in the Virginia mountains (which became West Virginia in 1863, but this has not happened yet) and are all told through the voice of Martin, who is 9 years old when the volume opens and at least a year older by the end. The characters are consistent: Martin, his Uncle Abner, Abner's brother (Rufus), Squire Randolph and the peculiar Doctor Storm.
There is a consistent form to the stories. Each contains the verbal picture of a genre painting of life in the rough-hewn Virginia mountain region, generally with lovely descriptive writing. The problem arises (often a death, but also missing items of value, fraud etc) and seems to have an easy solution. Abner arrives and solves it. Sounds pretty drab, I know, but each problem is wonderfully different, and Abner's solutions are believable and refreshing.
Uncle Abner is a terrific character, even if his personality is not really fleshed out besides being an ace amateur detective, and being a large, formidable guy. He is very Old Testament in his rigorous adherence to a quest for justice. "The law is not always justice," he says in one of the stories. I must admit that after the recent presidential election, it was comforting to read something where there was a clear distinction between what is right and what is wrong. Doing the right thing is essential to Abner, and he is fairness and justice personified.
No, there is no character development, a tall order in a short story, anyway. And the characters are fairly stock. The women are either young and attractive or withered and elderly. African Americans appear in many of the stories, and are treated with more respect than I might have expected in a book written in 1919, but they are also somewhat interchangeable and uniformly simple in their approach to life -- and very happy to be servants, it seems. The villains are always male, if I remember correctly.
It's odd to me that Post seems to have been forgotten. He was very good at this stuff, and this book was a pleasure from beginning to end.
December 22, 2022
A short and concise mystery-that I could have sworn I'd read before, but the circumstances were different in this story than the one I remember reading. Despite that-this is one of my favorite locked door mysteries. Absolutely brilliant solution!
December 30, 2024
Interesting concept, but can be summed up as “stereotypically bad man gets shot by own gun because of coincidentally placed bottle”, and all of the Bible phrases and the fact that the men believe it was god’s justice really date this story. (And the fact that Abner and Randolf question both people and instead of answering “I literally have no idea how he died, I just heard a gunshot and assumed he was dead in his locked room”, both answer in really cryptic phrases that don’t actually deny they were involved? No.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 17, 2022
Three and a half stars: An easy to read book, but maybe not in one sitting since the stories are similar in tone and can tend to run together in one's mind. The Doomsdorf Mystery is what led me to read Post since I enjoy locked room/impossible crime stories, and that is one of the more famous early examples. But the stories in this collection are not all of that ilk, and some are entertaining, some just ok.
August 19, 2020
Interesting plot
Read
March 2, 2024The Doomdorf Mystery
April 19, 2013
Wonderful short story! The characters were all fully formed and three dimensional, the writing was sharp, and the moral of the story was neat and full of truth. I think I need to seek out more Melville Davisson Post books.
April 1, 2023
Can’t tell if what I read was utter brilliance or madness.
December 31, 2016
What a funny murder mystery!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews