Customer Reviews

The Murders in Volume 2

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4 star:		(2)
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Elizabeth Daly's sleuth is the amateur detective and professional expert on texts Henry Gamadge. She supposedly was Agatha Christie's favorite author, and frankly is a better writer than Christie. She does better characterizations, plot development, and depiction of her cultural milieu--upper-class American culture around 1940. Her mysteries are not quite as imaginative [or Byzantine, to put it another way], and they often come down to about two real suspects [though it's usually hard to tell why the murders are committed]. But Gamadge's powers of inference are amazing.

In this book, the key thing is that Gamadge meets his future wife. If you like to follow the lives of mystery series heroes, this one is very good. Otherwise, the mystery is more transparent than most of hers, but is still above average and worth reading. Daly deserves to be much better known. Her mysteries are not really dated, since they display their cultural context in a way that's timelessly revealing--it's like reading Jane Austen.

Daly's amateur detective Henry Gamadge is hired by a once-great, now not-so-much, New York family to save them from what they think is a plot to divest them of their inheritance.

As always, Daly's writing is easy to follow, and this plot is very interesting, with a hint of something unnatural going on behind the scenes (not quite supernatural, but vaguely so.) The book also introduces us and Henry to his future bride, Clara.

This detective novel is written by one of the few American authors of the Golden Age -- Elizabeth Daly. I am very glad to see it in a fine paperback edition. It is indeed worth buying!

The book was in good condition and the story was excellent.

Thank you.