Customer Reviews

Crime Conductor (New Portway Reprints)

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Philip MacDonald's 1931 mystery "The Crime Conductor" features amateur sleuth Anthony Gethryn, who appears in many of MacDonald's other books, including "The List of Adrian Messenger", for which he is most well known.

Gethryn is one of those detectives who are always drawn into murders. While discussing how many murders he's been involved in, his friend, Dr. Travers Hoylake, mentions that Gethryn is "Sort of like a crime conductor, what?" A few minutes later, Hoylake is summoned by a policeman because "Some silly duffer's gone and drowned himself in his bath." Hoylake cannot decide if the downing is an accident or suicide. The victim, Willington Sigsbee, was found in a locked bathroom, but Gehryn quickly proves that it's murder (of course) by showing how the bathroom was cleverly made to appear to be a `locked room'. At this point, Gethryn takes over the investigation as the "Crime Conductor".

Most of the book is in the format of letters from Gethryn to his wife who's vacationing in Switzerland. The letters are all written in different formats. One letter contains a list of all the suspects along with their motives (which they all have) and their alibis (which are all worthless). Another letter, where Gethryn questions a few of the suspects, reads like a script.

"The Crime Conductor" should appeal to you if you are a fan of classic "Golden Age" mysteries. However, some readers my find the writing style to be somewhat awkward and many readers (including myself) may find the murderer's motive to be a little bit confusing.