Tag: Ellery Queen

The French Powder Mystery

by Ellery Queen (Frederick A. Stokes, 1930)

audiobook read by Robert Fass (Blackstone, 2013)

More of the same. Ellery pontificates upon every detail in a manner contrived to suggest great intelligence (while painstakingly running through deductions). The investigation plays out blow-by-mundane-blow with much repetition, asking little of the reader save incredulity at the culprit’s day job.

The Roman Hat Mystery

by Ellery Queen (Frederick A. Stokes, 1929)

audiobook read by Robert Fass (Blackstone, 2013)

An undemanding read in that the prose is straightforward and brooks no abridgement in relating every last action and brainstormed exchange of the investigation. The Queens are well drawn but the mystery conjures indifference, its solution buried beneath piles of mundane detail.