Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe Mysteries) (Mass Market Paperback)

~ (Author) "That sunny September day was full of surprises..." (more)
Key Phrases: main exhibits building, compressed his lips, exposition grounds, Clyde Osgood, New York, Nero Wolfe (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

It has been years since the orchid-growing eccentric Nero Wolfe has been outside his beloved home. This novel finds him in upstate New York with Archie Goodwin where he must endure poor food, uncomfortable chairs, warm beer, and three dead bodies. A family feud over the fate of a prize bull (send him to a stud farm or a steak house) plus tacky publicity stunts and blackmail all fit into the situation, told from Archie's point of view. Michael Prichard's reading is clear and adds to the atmosphere and overall enjoyment of the story. Recommended.?Denise A. Garofalo, Mid-Hudson Lib. System, Poughkeepsie, NY
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

Review

"It is always a treat to [hear] a Nero Wolfe mystery. The man has entered our folklore." -- The New York Times Book Review

"Nero Wolfe, the fat detective of Rex Stout's novels, towers over his rivals...he is an exceptional character creation." -- The New Yorker

"Rex Stout...raised detective fiction to the level of art. He gave us genius of at least two kinds, and a strong realist voice that was shot through with hope." -- Walter Mosley --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Crimeline; 2nd printing edition (February 1, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553254642
• ISBN-13: 978-0553254648
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #366,537 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Full of Bull, November 13, 2000

By	A. Wolverton (Crofton, MD United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe Mysteries) (Hardcover)

Rex Stout's sixth Nero Wolfe novel "Some Buried Caesar" is considered by many fans and critics to be the first great offering in the series. Wolfe, on his way to an orchid competition in upstate New York, takes an unexpected stop when Archie crashes the car in the middle of nowhere. While stranded, Wolfe and Archie encounter a prize-winning bull worth $45,000, a wise-cracking female named Lily Rowan, and of course, murder.

Like the previous Wolfe outing "Too Many Cooks," Stout places the heavyset detective out of his element, and the results are wildly entertaining. Among the highlights: Wolfe drinking warm beer (Horrors!), Archie in jail for the first time, and many unsavory characters. With this novel, Stout really has a good grip on his characters and how they behave. Great fun!

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Wolfe Stands the Test of Time, August 12, 2002

By	"curtcow" (Short Hills, NJ USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe Mysteries) (Audio Cassette)

I'm not sure I'd tale the time to sit down to read Stout's old classics, but Michael Prichard's audiobook narration captures both Archie Goodwin and his rotund boss in a way that makes a long summer car trip seem a lot shorter. Tom Pratt, who owns a bunch of fast food restaurants circa 1938, buys Hickory Caesar Grindon, a champion sire of prized Guernsey cows, for $45,000. The Osgoods, Fred and his children Clyde and Nancy, old money riding out the Great Depression on thousands of family owned acres around Crowfield, NY, want to stop the sale to Pratt who intends to barbecue Caesar. Pratt's niece Carolyn tells Archie of a vamp named Lily Rowan, who destroyed Clyde Osgood and has her brother Jimmy in mind for her next conquest. Lily, a precocious presumably promiscuous fixture in future stories, is fascinated by Archie, her "Escamillo" whom she is meeting for the first time.

Clyde is found dead in the pasture with Hickory Caesar standing over him. Wolfe's only there because Archie ran his car into a ditch on the way to an orchid exposition, but he decides to stay on to prove the bull didn't kill Clyde. He finds a letter telling of a debt owed to Bronson, a mysterious man of questionable character who came to Crowfield with Clyde. The next day Bronson is found dead in a barn stall with a pitchfork through his chest, a stall Archie was in the day before.

Police Captain Barrow believes Archie is holding out, which he is, arrests him as a material witness to murder and throws him in the county jail. A fun sidebar develops when Archie meets Basil, a con man who's mastered a game with three spoons and a pea. Basil shows Archie how to get things done in the lockup, and within a day Archie is organizing the inmates in the Crowfield County Prisoner's Union.

Wolfe appears in DA Waddell's office in his "customary unhurried waddle" and browbeats him to release Archie with the notion that he needs him to solve the crimes the DA and Capt. Barrow cannot. They do, of course, and the solution seems so obvious once Wolfe ties together all the facts he saw that others missed. Isn't that what Nero Wolfe is all about?

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Piercing Mystery--And That's No Bull, July 10, 2002

By	George R Dekle "Bob Dekle" (Lake City, FL United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe Mysteries) (Audio Cassette)

Tom Pratt, the nouveau riche owner of a chain of cheap eateries, buys a champion bull for $45,000.00 and announces his intention to barbecue it for 100 hand-picked guests. The Guernsey League is scandalized and tries to buy the bull back, but Pratt is obdurate. Nero Wolfe and his confidential assistant Archie Goodwin, on their way to an orchid show, crash (literally) the party in time to witness an idiotic bet made between Pratt and Clyde Osgood, the eldest son of Pratt's longtime rival. Soon thereafter, Archie is set to guard the bull against mischief. The bull isn't harmed under Archie's watchful eye, but he becomes distracted by the beautiful Lily Rowan and the next thing he knows, he finds the bull, with bloody horns, worrying Clyde Osgood's gored-to-death body. Wolfe gets hired to investigate the death, anthrax breaks out, a guest of Osgood's gets pitchforked, Archie gets arrested on suspicion of murder, and Wolfe (who solved the murder before anyone else knew it was a murder) slothfully allows all his evidence to go up in smoke. Funny and fast-paced, this story is the closest thing to a fair-play mystery that I have ever read in the Nero Wolfe corpus. If you grew up on a farm as I did, you stand a fair chance of figuring out who done it and how done it before Wolfe wins first place at the orchid show and eats his last fricassee at the Methodist women's food concession. The real trick in this one is how to prove it. Wolfe shakes off his indolence, springs Archie from jail, and engineers an elaborate caper designed to bring the killer to justice.