Customer Reviews

The Crossword Murder (Prime Crime)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's a bad sign when you have to put a book down after reading only the first chapter. After several attempts to get started, I finally forced myself to get further into it hoping it would get better. Unfortunately, it only got more annoying as the writers showed their lack of understanding of the puzzle world although I have to admit, the idea of a rich crossword editor made me laugh at loud at its ridiculousness. Other problems: normal crosswords are constantly called cryptics even though those are two very different puzzle types, the crosswords included in the book needed to go through a good crossword editor to fix up problems with the clues and poor entry choices, one of the main characters takes a huge leap from seeing BLACK and MAIL in a grid to believing that the constructor was being blackmailed (and the words weren't even close to one another in the grid).

If you want crosswords and mysteries put together, you're probably better off reading the earlier Herbert Resnicow books which had puzzles by Henry Hook, a professional crossword constructor.

I thoroughly enjoyed Nero Blanc's 'The Crossword Murder'. It harkend back to good old-fashioned classic mystery writing. Characters and situations were contemporary but with a feel that was reminiscent of Nick and Nora Charles. It was bright, stylish and challanging. The puzzles did however stump me in several places, but I don't want a crossword puzzle to be 'dumbed-down'. I was glad to see that there was a sequel, 'Two Down' and bought it as soon as it was available. Here's hoping this book series has a good long run with many sequels to come!

Combining crossword puzzles with a murder mystery is a good idea, but the authors don't carry it off. The writing is generally amateurish and the plot less than challenging. The authors are even relegated to the triteness of a climax that depends on having the otherwise-intelligent heroine do something laughably stupid, thus putting herself in mortal danger. Lastly, the puzzles aren't very difficult nor do they play a significant role in the solving of the mystery.

I picked up "The Crossword Murder" in the airport shop and finished it before I crossed the Pond. Good plot twists, great puzzles, and a nice romance to boot. I found myself wishing I'd picked up the next book in the series for the ride home.

In this series opener of the pseudonymous Nero Blanc's crossword mysteries, private eye Rosco Polycrates investigates the murder of crossword editor Thompson Briephs. Briephs is a scion of the local aristocracy, the son of imposing patrician Sara Briephs and the nephew of her brother, democratic senator Hal Crane. Briephs is also a bit of a loon. Eschewing his family's more traditionally tasteful lifestyle, Briephs lives alone on an island in a house that was built to his specifications, a labyrinthine, red-walled replica of an ancient Minoan palace. This is unlikely in the extreme, of course, but it does provide an excuse for numerous classical references in the book, including a quotation from Sophocles' Ajax: "Silence gives the proper grace to women."

The character quoting Sophocles with disapproval is a crossword editor herself, Thompson Briephs's counterpart in a rival newspaper. Anabelle Graham is beautiful and intelligent, capable of reciting a list of four-letter Greek goddesses even in trying circumstances, and she is, unfortunately for Rosco, married. As the solution of Briephs's murder depends on the solution of a series of crossword puzzles--anticipating his demise, Briephs left clues--Belle becomes involved with Rosco's investigation and interested in the private eye himself.

Although The Crossword Mystery strains credibility in its description of Briephs's island home, the book is a good read, and the hesitant flirtation between Rosco and Belle is fun to watch. Crossword enthusiasts in particular will enjoy the book: it includes six puzzles for readers to solve along with Belle, among them Harrison Briephs's posthumous cryptics.

Reviewed by Debra Hamel, author of Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece

Thompson C. Briephs is the crossword puzzle developer for the Newcastle Herald. That is he was the puzzle guru for the Massachusetts paper until he is found dead from an apparent heart failure. No one sees foul play with Thompson's untimely death except his wealthy mother Sara who insists that her fifty-one year old son was in perfect health. Since the police refuse to listen to Sara, she hires private investigator Rosco Polycrates, who tries to dissuade her from wasting her money since the medical examiner already ruled as to cause of death.

However, Rosco accepts the case and begins to make inquiries into Thompson's life. To help him understand puzzle makers, Rosco turns to Thompson's rival and peer, Annabell Graham of the Herald. Soon crossword puzzles arrive that Thompson seems to have authored. The clues to the puzzle point towards the identity of the killer.

THE CROSSWORD MURDER is an inventive, unique novel that shows there are still many creative ways to distribute clues to readers. The story line is clever, uncanny, and entertaining as fans of mysteries solve the puzzles in order to solve a who-done-it. Is this a gimmick-laden plot? Yes, but it works because Nero Blanc does not ignore his characters or allow them to be overwhelmed by the stratagem. The audience will share in the fun of uncovering the killer's identity along with Rosco and Anna.

Harriet Klausner

I picked up this book while shopping one day, intrigued by the fact that it included some crossword puzzles and I am a fan of them. After reading the book, I realised the crossword puzzles were extraneous and that I did not have to do the puzzles to help figure out who committed the murder.
Private investigator Rosco Polycrates is hired by the mother of a murder victim (crossword editor for a local newspaper) to investigate the death, which is first ruled natural causes. He has the help of sexy (of course) but married Anabella Graham, the crossword maven for the rival newspaper.
The writing was lively in some spots, but amateurish in others, particularly in its characterizations of the secondary characters, who mostly came across as stereotypes - ugly secretary in love with handsome boss, prissy society column writer, cheating aging sex goddess married to older man, etc.
Not for sure if I will pick up the second in the series or not.

I read The Crossword Mystery a while back, and even read a couple more in the series to see if my initial impression was correct.

The Crossword Mystery had all the elements I usually enjoy in a cozy, but it was just too cerebral for me. Just when I would get into the story, a crossword clue would crop up, interrupting the flow. Eventually I just skipped over the crosswords and kept reading, but that wasn't very satisfying either. I felt I was missing half the story.

I love both crossword puzzles and murder mysteries, and I really wanted to love this series, but the atmosphere was a little too rarified for me.
Doubtless that is due to inadequacy on my part.

First in a cozy mystery series. Rosco is a PI investigating the murder of a newspaper crossword writer. He ends up getting help from Belle, another crossword writer from another paper. She believes that the murderer's identity can be found in puzzles that the murder victim created just before his death.
This is a good mystery--good twists and turns. It kept me guessing until the end. There is also a romantic aspect in it as Rosco and Belle get close during the book. I will continue with this series.

If you'd like the intersection of non-gory murder mysteries and crossword puzzles, this series would be a natural for you. Nero Blanc is a pseudonym for a husband-and-wife writing team (black and white, for the squares on a crossword grid, get it?). After seeing the documentary "Wordplay," I went looking for more information on the world of crossword puzzles and stumbled across this series. I then read an interview online in which the husband explains that, separately, his wife's style is flowing and lyrical, while his work is in international thrillers, with gritty characters, and quick and often coarse "tough guy" dialogue. Well. I give this book a C-. The story line is actually quite good, but the dialogue is totally hokey most of the time. Moreover, one minute the characters are acknowledging, internally if not otherwise, their respective smarts, and then you turn the page and they are expressing amazement that someone could possibly know or have figured out the most basic, obvious thing. There's a budding romance embedded in the story, and one minute the characters make "flawed adult" sense, which I can buy, and the next minute they have the reasoning powers of a 2-year-old, which I can't. In other words, by dividing the writing tasks they way the authors seem to have done, not only does the style seem to change for inexplicable reasons and at inexplicable times, but consequently even the personalities of the characters bounce around, which really undermines their credibility. I'm going to give the series one more try to see if the authors' second outing was any better, but that's as much reading time as I'll allocate to this series if I don't see marked improvement.