One Man Show [Paperback]

Michael Innes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1991

Paperback book by Michael Innes- One Man Show- is a Sir John Appleby Mystery.

Product Details

• Paperback: 223 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins (August 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060806729
• ISBN-13: 978-0060806729
• Product Dimensions: 6.9 x 4.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,477,877 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The purloined painting, September 2, 2001

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: One Man Show (Paperback)

John Innes Mackintosh Stewart (pseudonym Michael Innes) was born in 1906 in Edinburgh, Scotland. He was educated at Oriel College, Oxford, and his mysteries reflect both his scholarship, and the year he spent in Vienna, studying Freudian psychoanalysis.

"One-Man Show" (1952), also titled "A Private View" is later Appleby. Sir John has already been knighted and married, and has worked his way up to the position of Assistant Commissioner at New Scotland Yard. He and his wife, Lady Judith (a sculptress by profession) play equal roles in solving the double mystery of who murdered the young artist, Gavin Limbert, and who stole two very famous paintings from the Duke of Horton's estate. (The Duke also plays a prominent role in the early Appleby mystery, "Hamlet, Revenge!" (1937).)

This story begins when Lady Judith drags her unsuspecting husband off to a memorial exhibition of the works of Gavin Limbert, a young artist who was thought to have committed suicide. When Limbert's `chef d'oeuvre' is stolen from the gallery, right under Appleby's nose, he feels compelled to reopen the case on the painter's mysterious demise.

Appleby's assistant, Inspector Cadover is already acquainted with the case and he serves as a stiff upper-lip to his chief's intuitive, sometimes playful method of investigation. When Appleby disappears after a nocturnal ruckus in a junk shop, Cadover takes over the case and brings it to a successful conclusion---just as he later takes on Appleby's role at New Scotland Yard after Sir John's retirement (for more about Cadover, read "The Case of the Journeying Boy" by Michael Innes (1949).)

This particular Appleby is an equal mixture of mystery and adventure---Appleby personally engages the villains in glorious, but somewhat ignominious battle; Judith hides in a closet and overhears an artist plotting murder, etc. There is a wonderful chase scene that ends when Lady Judith and the Duke of Horton save Appleby from a particularly appalling fate.

Don't let the author's gift for playful, erudite dialogue disguise his mastery of character. "One-Man Show" contains a portrait of an amnesiac young woman that is probably the most sensitive and believable in all of mystery literature (eat your heart out, Dame Agatha!)

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A painter's mysterious demise, September 2, 2001

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: One Man Show/(English Title = A Private View) (Textbook Binding)

John Innes Mackintosh Stewart (pseudonym Michael Innes) was born in 1906 in Edinburgh, Scotland. He was educated at Oriel College, Oxford, and his mysteries reflect both his scholarship, and the year he spent in Vienna, studying Freudian psychoanalysis.

One-Man Show (1952), also titled A Private View is later Appleby. Sir John has already been knighted and married, and has worked his way up to the position of Assistant Commissioner at New Scotland Yard. He and his wife, Lady Judith (a sculptress by profession) play equal roles in solving the double mystery of who murdered the young artist, Gavin Limbert, and who stole two very famous paintings from the Duke of Hortons estate. (The Duke also plays a prominent role in the early Appleby mystery, Hamlet, Revenge! (1937).)

This story begins when Lady Judith drags her unsuspecting husband off to a memorial exhibition of the works of Gavin Limbert, a young artist who was thought to have committed suicide. When Limberts chef doeuvre is stolen from the gallery, right under Applebys nose, he feels compelled to reopen the case on the painters mysterious demise.

Applebys assistant, Inspector Cadover is already acquainted with the case and he serves as a stiff upper-lip to his chiefs intuitive, sometimes playful method of investigation. When Appleby disappears after a nocturnal ruckus in a junk shop, Cadover takes over the case and brings it to a successful conclusion---just as he later takes on Applebys role at New Scotland Yard after Sir Johns retirement (for more about Cadover, read The Case of the Journeying Boy by Michael Innes (1949).)

This particular Appleby is an equal mixture of mystery and adventure---Appleby personally engages the villains in glorious, but somewhat ignominious battle; Judith hides in a closet and overhears an artist plotting murder, etc. There is a wonderful chase scene that ends when Lady Judith and the Duke of Horton save Appleby from a particularly appalling fate.

Dont let the authors gift for playful, erudite dialogue disguise his mastery of character. One-Man Show contains a portrait of an amnesiac young woman that is probably the most sensitive and believable in all of mystery literature (eat your heart out, Dame Agatha!)