Inspector John Appleby has a difficult and delicate task when he investigates the murder of the unpopular Josiah Umpleby of St Anthony's College.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Born in Edinburgh in 1906, the son of the city's Director of Education, John Innes Mackintosh Stewart wrote a highly successful series of mystery stories under the pseudonym Michael Innes. Innes was educated at Oriel College, Oxford, where he was presented with the Matthew Arnold Memorial Prize and named a Bishop Frazer's scholar. After graduation he went to Vienna, to study Freudian psychoanalysis for a year and following his first book, an edition of Florio's translation of Montaigne, was offered a lectureship at the University of Leeds. In 1932 he married Margaret Hardwick, a doctor, and they subsequently had five children including Angus, also a novelist. The year 1936 saw Innes as Professor of English at the University of Adelaide, during which tenure he wrote his first mystery story, 'Death at the President's Lodging'. With his second, 'Hamlet Revenge', Innes firmly established his reputation as a highly entertaining and cultivated writer. After the end of World War II, Innes returned to the UK and spent two years at Queen's University, Belfast where in 1949 he wrote the 'Journeying Boy', a novel notable for the richly comedic use of an Irish setting. He then settled down as a Reader in English Literature at Christ Church, Oxford, from which he retired in 1973. His most famous character is 'John Appleby', who inspired a penchant for donnish detective fiction that lasts to this day. Innes's other well-known character is 'Honeybath', the painter and rather reluctant detective, who first appeared in 1975 in 'The Mysterious Commission'. The last novel, 'Appleby and the Ospreys', was published in 1986, some eight years before his death in 1994. 'A master - he constructs a plot that twists and turns like an electric eel: it gives you shock upon shock and you cannot let go.' - Times Literary Supplement.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Alternate title: Seven Suspects,
By E. A. Lovitt "starmoth" (Gladwin, MI USA) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Death at the President's Lodging (Penguin crime fiction) (Paperback)
My favorite Inspector Appleby mysteries take place in an academic setting. This subset of his mystery novels is undoubtedly a byproduct of the many years that Michael Innes (whose real name was John Innes Mackintosh Stewart) spent laboring in the halls of academia. Among the seats of learning where he taught are Queen's University in Belfast, and the universities of Oxford, Adelaide, and Leeds.The author could not help but involve a legion of eccentric, pompous, and even murderous professors in the death of the president of St. Anthony's College (modeled after the colleges at Oxford University). Their academic spats and bumblings are a good part of what makes this book readable. Innes is wickedly funny when it comes to poking fun at the habits of his donnish colleagues and undergraduates. "Death at the President's Lodging" starts out as a locked room mystery where the only suspects are locked into the college grounds for the night. The president's body is found in his own library, but we gradually learn that the corpse was subject to a great deal of postmortem perambulation as his colleagues try to establish their own alibis and manufacture evidence that points to their academic enemies. Nothing is as it first seems, not even time of death. A trio of undergraduates provides the comic relief as they chase one of the suspects (supposedly at an archeological dig in the Middle East) across the English countryside and finally deliver him to Inspector Appleby in a large wicker clothes basket (shades of Falstaff!). As Inspector Appleby winds his way through the skeins of plot and counter-plot created by great intellects gone murderously askew, his intuition is played off against the rather unimaginative plodding of local Constable Dodd. Dodd is a bit of a dry stick compared to the irrepressible Appleby, who in his very first appearance in this mystery (published in 1936), is already showing signs of what his successor at Scotland Yard refers to as his 'waywardness.' Enjoy Inspector John Appleby's literary debut for the hijinks of the undergraduates, the plots and counter-plots of their devious professors, and the erudite style of their donnish creator. The plot is overly complex, but it is brilliantly resolved and a lot of fun to read.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not a page-turner...,
By Ron "mvg@whidbey.com" (Whidbey Island, WA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Death At The President's Lodging (Inspector Appleby Mystery S.) (Paperback)
A golden age murder mystery where there is a finite number of suspects in a confined setting -- this time a university area locked down at night with only a few people having keys.
I got through the book in time, but found it a tough go occasionally. A few too many side diversions, some of which including characters I wasn't sure even belonged in the story. The solution is a bit crazy, but I was so glad to be done with it, that I took it in stride. Not a page-turner, but ok if nothing else is available and you are into books set in English schools.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Also known as 'Seven Suspects',
By E. A. Lovitt "starmoth" (Gladwin, MI USA) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Death at the President's Lodging (Paperback)
My favorite Inspector Appleby mysteries take place in an academic setting. This subset of his mystery novels is undoubtedly a byproduct of the many years that Michael Innes (whose real name was John Innes Mackintosh Stewart) spent laboring in the halls of academia. Among the seats of learning where he taught are Queen's University in Belfast, and the universities of Oxford, Adelaide, and Leeds.
The author could not help but involve a legion of eccentric, pompous, and even murderous professors in the death of the president of St. Anthony's College (modeled after the colleges at Oxford University). Their academic spats and bumblings are a good part of what makes this book readable. Innes is wickedly funny when it comes to poking fun at the habits of his donnish colleagues and undergraduates. "Death at the President's Lodging" starts out as a locked room mystery where the only suspects are locked into the college grounds for the night. The president's body is found in his own library, but we gradually learn that the corpse was subject to a great deal of postmortem perambulation as his colleagues try to establish their own alibis and manufacture evidence that points to their academic enemies. Nothing is as it first seems, not even time of death. A trio of undergraduates provides the comic relief as they chase one of the suspects (supposedly at an archeological dig in the Middle East) across the English countryside and finally deliver him to Inspector Appleby in a large wicker clothes basket (shades of Falstaff!). As Inspector Appleby winds his way through the skeins of plot and counter-plot created by great intellects gone murderously askew, his intuition is played off against the rather unimaginative plodding of local Constable Dodd. Dodd is a bit of a dry stick compared to the irrepressible Appleby, who in his very first appearance in this mystery (published in 1936), is already showing signs of what his successor at Scotland Yard refers to as his 'waywardness.' Enjoy Inspector John Appleby's literary debut for the hijinks of the undergraduates, the plots and counter-plots of their devious professors, and the erudite style of their donnish creator. The plot is overly complex, but it is brilliantly resolved and a lot of fun to read.
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