| Title | : | Knock, Murderer, Knock!: A Golden Age Mystery |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 1910570818 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Kindle Edition |
| Number of Pages | : | 259 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1938 |
Knock, Murderer, Knock!: A Golden Age Mystery Reviews
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For those of us who enjoy Golden Age crime fiction, these are wonderful times, with so many out of print – long forgotten – books and authors, becoming re-available for readers to discover. Of course, the quality is mixed, but there are some real gems coming back into print and I do think that this is one of more enjoyable that I have found. Sadly, Harriet Rutland only published three mysteries, and this was her first, from 1938, which stands the test of time really well.
This has a great setting, in a Hydro hotel – a genteel spa resort, offering treatments, mostly to the elderly. The cast consists of retired Admirals and Colonels; as well as several ladies who fill their days with gossip, complaining about their ailments and envying each other, plus the staff who run the hydro. This is no romantic ideal, but a wonderfully gossipy, class obsessed, slightly sinister set of suspects. Of course, any crime novel needs a victim and, into the hydro comes the young, and beautiful, Miss Blake, who saunters down to dinner in a revealing dinner dress and creates mayhem among the residents.
Without doubt, Rutland deserves to be back in print. She wrote characters brilliantly, and did not shy away from difficult subject matter. I will admit that I did work out ‘whodunnit,’ and so, possibly, her plotting was not as strong as some other authors. However, the actual joy of this book was in the characters and the setting, both of which worked very well indeed. I will certainly be reading the other two mysteries written by this author. -
Dean Street Press has done a great job with rediscovering out-of-print mysteries, but overall I was disappointed with this one, first published in the 1930s, about a serial killer stalking residents of a hydro spa in Devon. (Admittedly, I tend to like serial killer mysteries less than more traditional Golden Age detective stories, which usually have more interesting motives).
The setting is great, with retired colonels and ladies sipping tea and exchanging scandal, and I quite liked the police inspector and eccentric amateur sleuth. But I found the writing style rather plodding and repetitive, aside from some good witty lines. And to me none of the suspects or victims are very interesting - also there are so many that I kept mixing them up at first! The author also doesn't really show how the knowledge that there is a murderer on the loose would upset the daily chatting and laughter in this type of setting.
I now realise that I made a mistake by reading the introduction, by Curtis Evans, first. (Not sure why I did this, as I usually leave them for the end.) He is very enthusiastic and compares Rutland to "crime queens" Sayers, Christie, Marsh and Allingham. But her writing is nowhere near the standard of these four - to be fair, I wouldn't have expected it to be, but the introduction raised my expectations and set me up to be disappointed! -
It’s lovely to be living in a golden age for reissued golden age crime fiction, but sometimes it’s tricky to decide which books to choose from so many lovely possibilities.
I found many reasons to pick up ‘Knock, Murderer, Knock!’ by Harriet Rutland, and it proved to be an excellent choice. It was a very well told story, and so many things were done so very well that I would have quite happily read on – and looked for the author’s other books – even if there hadn’t been a mystery to be solved.
The writing is witty and literate; the characters and the settings are acutely observed; the plot is very well managed; and the author balances an understanding of convention with a distinctive style of her own to make this country house murder mystery – set in a run-down spa resort – one of a kind.
The opening sentence is extraordinary:
“Mrs Napier walked slowly to the middle of the terrace, noted the oncoming car, looked around to make sure that she was fully observed, crossed her legs deliberately, and fell heavily on to the red gravel drive.”
The car drove around Mrs Napier and nobody went to her aid. She had a habit of staging accidents, and so her fellow residents just laughed and carried on with whatever they were doing. Eventually Nurse Hawkins came to the rescue, and was rewarded with a volley of abuse and allegations of assault.
Mrs Napier is just one of a wonderful gallery of characters.
There are two retired career soldiers, one a crossword addict and the other a fanatical knitter; there’s a haughty aristocratic who lives in fear of her humble origins being uncovered; there’s a lady author of detective novels with a young son in tow; there’s another lady who is painfully prim and proper.
There’s a middle-aged couple with two teenage daughters and a handsome young chauffeur in tow; there’s an imperious elderly lady who is waited on by her devoted maid; there’s a handsome young baronet.
And there is Miss Blake. She was young and pretty; she was friendly and she had a wonderfully sunny nature. Her wardrobe was modern and daring, her conversation was frank and open, and her sense of humour was risqué. It was no wonder that the men crowded round her and the women were infuriated by her.
I liked her, and I loved that she was reading one of my favourite books:
“The last book I saw you with was the one with the rude title,” said Mrs. Marston. “In All My Nakedness, I think it was called.”
“Without My Cloak,” corrected Miss Blake. “You wouldn’t call me naked just because I took off my coat, would you?”
“Yes, I should,” came a booming whisper from Mrs. Napier, who had apparently been asleep through the rest of the conversation. “Some of the frocks she wears under that thing she calls a house-coat are no bigger than vests.”
(There are lots of lovely literary references like that scattered through this book.)
Watching all of these characters, following their relationships and their interactions was fascinating. They were all real, they were all believable, and through them the author spoke clearly of the prejudices, the narrow-mindedness, and the insecurities that made them what they were.
It was the morning after the weekly amateur talent night, when Miss Blake had been the star of the show as she stood in as piano accompanist for all the singers, that she was found dead. She was in the lounge, she was dressed in her evening gown and a fine steel knitting needle sticking out of the base of her neck.
Inspector Palk arrived to investigate. He was a plain, ordinary and unremarkable detective, and that disappointed me a little at first, but I came to realise that he was the right kind of detective for this particular story.
He investigated methodically and he was quick to make an arrest.
But then there was a second murder. And a third.
I don’t want to say any more about specifics than that.
I’ll just say that Harriet Rutland managed her plot and her large cast of characters very well. There were lots of lovely details, there were lots of different aspects to the story, and my thoughts were pulled in all kinds of directions.
I really wasn’t sure who the murderer was until the grand denouement.
I’m sure that the author played fair, I’m sure the clues were there, but I was caught in the moment from start to finish.
I loved the mixture of murder mystery, black comedy, and human drama; had Agatha Christie, Muriel Spark and G B Stern sat down to write a book together, it might have turned out something like this.
I’m sorry that Harriet Rutland only wrote two more books; but I’m delighted that Dean Street Press has them back in print, and I’m looking forward to reading them. -
Good description of the chatty life in a Hydro with everyone suspecting different things till murder. A bit disappointed about the change of the sleuth and the solving of the crime(s).
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I had never heard of this author before. With only three books to her credit, Harriet Rutland (aka Olive Shimwell) has gradually slipped into obscurity. But true golden age crime aficionados will eventually find her and devour her books. This is what happened with me. Knock, Murderer, Knock! is Rutland's first book and a brilliant first effort.
The setting is a hydropathic hotel (a place which offered therapeutic cures but was also a tourist destination - usually inhabited by elderly people). The guests are almost all on the elderly side or families except for a young man and a young woman, the butt of most of the gossip. When the first murder takes place, the hotel and its inhabitants are intrigued. But then the bodycount increases as the murderer becomes bolder and terror spreads through the place.
The characters are vividly drawn from life and you could almost feel the bitching negativity of old women who were deprived of opportunities that younger women managed to get. The ever-suffering Inspector Palk had to deal with multiple murders in addition to a Sergeant with an over-whelming imagination, all taken from detective novels. Not to mention the unwanted 'help' of Mr. Winkle, the amateur sleuth.
I really enjoyed the atmosphere of the book, which took me back in time to the amazing golden age when murders were fun, perpetrators were part of the family, and problems solved through psychological methods. The denouement was fantastic, though came just a few pages before I had sort of pinned the killer. All in all, this one gets a five stars and the other two books get added to my TBR. Also, I recommend highly to fans of golden age mysteries and cosy mysteries. -
3.5 stars. The story is built upon a very clever plot and well-selected location. It is well-written with a substantial cast of characters. My main criticism of the book is that there is very little character development and that the cast mostly serves to support the plot. I enjoyed the introduction of Mr Winkley to the ranks of Golden Age sleuths and will read the other two books by the author in due course. I highly recommend it to lovers of Agatha Christie's mysteries.
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2.5 stars. Golden Age mystery read with the Reading the Detectives group, this book offers dark humor, quirky characters and a rather gruesome murder method. It was an okay read for me because of those things, but a few problems knocked the rating down.
I enjoyed the humor, and the setting at a rather seedy “hydro” - a residential hotel that offers medical spa treatments - was very effective backdrop for the snobbery and gossiping residents. Most of the book was fun and funny, but then the third murder took it in a darker direction which didn’t seem to fit the snarky tone. Also, the appearance toward the end of a mysterious second investigator seemed odd - granted, the blustery local police investigator seemed out of his league and rather incompetent, but it still seemed odd. I almost felt, since this was the author’s first mystery, that perhaps she had written herself into a corner and wasn’t sure how to bring about a solution to the murders! Finally, the motive was rather disappointing and hackneyed (no spoilers).
So, I’m glad I tried this mostly humorous read, which held my interest for most of the book - but the ending was disappointing. -
Sharply observed
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Slightly confused in the beginning. No knowledge of what a hydro-center (or whatever it is called) is.
Love the murder weapon.
And once I got past all these old people (probably some of whom are my age!) and the bizarre locale I actually found this an enjoyable mystery. A different kind of murder weapon than we usually see.
And I had the wrong killer … again. -
Upon a second reading I have upgraded this book from 3 to 4 stars.
Extremely well written and quite complex. I found it quite hard going early on as there are a lot of protagonists to get to grips with. However, it got better and better as it went on.
Lots of red herrings and side issues made it difficult (for me, anyway) to figure out whodunit.
Inspector Palk is not particularly engaging but Mr Winkley is a bit more interesting. I wonder if he crops up again in other books.
This was her first foray into crime writing and I enjoyed it enough to try the other 2 of the 3 crime novels she wrote.
Good value from Kindle for under a quid. -
3.5 stars. An entertaining Golden Age mystery set at a "hydro" or spa, with a cast of cranky, eccentric residents as the suspects. Although they were probably well within the normal range at the time, I found it hard to get past the attitudes about women - interesting how many of the books enthusiastically perpetuating them were written by women (who probably would have been judged harshly under those same standards) themselves.
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Careful with that knitting needle…
The long-term residents of Presteignton Hydro are mostly an elderly bunch, solid middle-class people, retired military men or the wives or widows of the same, and the occasional member of the titled gentry. So beautiful young Miss Blake stands out and becomes the subject of envy and gossip among the women and the target of lust among the elderly men. When she is found dead with a knitting needle through her brain, Inspector Palk finds himself up to his armpits in suspects, but soon catches his murderer… or so he thinks. And then another woman is found dead…
This is quite a fun mystery in the typical Golden Age style. The Hydro setting means there is a small circle of suspects, each with secrets and possible motives, while the police detective soon has to give way to the talented amateur – not that Mr Winkley, with his background in the military and his links with Scotland Yard, is exactly an amateur, but he doesn’t work through the normal police structure. He also doesn’t show up until the book is more than half over, so although poor Palk is upstaged at the end, it’s him we spend most time with in the early parts of the investigation.
Rutland has a keen eye for class and snobbery, and has a lot of fun with her characters, from the lowly housemaids all the way up to the not-quite aristocratic Lady Warme (her title a relic of her dead husband, knighted for being the man behind “Warme’s Patent Cornflour”, as her fellow residents can’t help reminding her from time to time). Palk is also fun, though we rather laugh at him than with him which I’m never as keen on. He jumps to conclusions, and having jumped is reluctant to ever admit he may have been wrong, so even the introduction of a second corpse, murdered in the same way, doesn’t shake his belief that he has caught the right person for the first murder. The second murder must be a copycat, he feels. But then the third body turns up and even he has to admit that three separate murderers might be stretching coincidence too far…
Although I enjoyed reading this overall, there were a couple of things that didn’t work for me and that I felt stopped it from reaching the top ranks of vintage crime. The first murder was of a perfect Golden Age victim – mysterious, shady background, not quite suited to her surroundings. The second victim, however, is a young woman who didn’t “deserve” to die and she left behind grieving relatives, whom I felt Rutland didn’t handle particularly well. The third murder was of someone else who, in my opinion, was too innocent to be a suitable victim, and I found it hard to reconcile the overall tone with these latter two murders. I also felt that the motive was a bit hackneyed and also a little obvious – I had a good idea of who the murderer was from quite early on, and also of why they were doing it.
As a result of these points I enjoyed the first half considerably more than the second. The characterisation of all the residents is well done – not too in depth and perhaps a little caricatured as “types”, but no less fun for that. As well as the Cornflour Widow and a variety of others, there’s the nurse seeking a husband, the put-upon doctor having to deal with as much hypochondria as genuine illness, the rivalry between the elderly men for beautiful Miss Blake’s attention, and the aspiring mystery writer whom Rutland uses to poke gentle fun at her own craft. In such a small, enclosed community there’s plenty of gossip along with the usual petty squabbles and resentments of those with too much time on their hands. Based on the first half it was heading for the full five stars from me, but I found my enthusiasm wore a little thin when the events darkened to a point where I found the light, humorous tone increasingly jarring.
Four stars, then, and I’d be happy to read more of Rutland in the future, though it appears she only wrote three books and then stopped, for reasons unknown.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com -
Set in a Hydro Spa hotel, this introduces a Policeman Palk, to solve an unusual murder of a young woman staying there. The other residents are all of a much older age, the young Miss Blake is not much thought of by the other females there, but is a bit of a hit with the ageing males. This is Palk's first big case and to be honest he fumbles his way through. When a second death occurs, we are introduced to Mr Winkly whose hobby we are told is as an amateur detective, and who seems to be accepted by the residents. The setting of the Spa, is quite isolated, so the cast remains small, allowing us to get to know who is who.
Although I did guess the murderer towards the end, I still enjoyed the book, and will eventually get to the other books by this author, -
Harriet Rutland was a 'Golden Age' mystery writer although relatively unknown until recently when Dean Street Press decided to reissue her books, of which sadly, there were only three.
This was her first mystery and maybe according to critics, the weakest of the three, but don't despair, it's a solid read on it's own, and if her other two are better, than I'm in for a treat, because I intend to give both of them a read.
I don't like to rehash story lines so I won't other than to say that it takes place in a British health spa around the thirties and it has that slightly claustrophobic feeling, 'there's a murder amongst us and we don't know who', storyline.
Typical of Golden Age mysteries, you get your money's worth of suspects, motives, smart and bumbling police work along with a healthy dose of sly humour.
If you like Golden Age mysteries, this one is a lot of fun and I recommend it. -
Harriet Rutland, is, without doubt, the best of the recently revived "forgottens" of the Golden Age. It is a great pity that she wrote just three detective novels. She is vastly superior in style, language and wit to Agatha Christie in her prime, although inferior in ingenuity of plotting.
This was a huge pleasure when first encountered two years ago and has stood up well to a second reading. I did think that the murderer was not too difficult to spot nor the motive obscure, but the red herring were interestingly placed, and the introduction of Mr.Winkley at a late stage was a nice touch.
The setting in a hydropathic hotel, and the characters who were far from stereotypical, were well-realised.
Highly recommended. -
I've been looking about for some other Golden Age mystery writers apart from the Christie/Sayers/Marsh/Allingham quartet to enjoy and am rapidly realizing that these 4 were the Queens for good reason-no one else does it quite like they do.
This was a fine read about a murder set in a sort of spa/residence with the usual cast of spinsters, faded gentry, staff with secrets, unhappy young people trapped with their parents, femme fatale and dashing Doctor. The mystery was suitably convoluted and the local Inspector and his crew were up to the job, but it just wasn't particularly gripping. I will stick to the Queens for my further mystery reads! -
I love a good "Golden Age" mystery - this one did drag a bit.
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Three and a half stars. Love the "golden age" of mystery writing. I did have trouble keeping all the characters straight, as there were quite a few suspects.
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This is a solid Golden Age Detective mystery where the serial killer isn't exactly hard to figure out, but the characters that appear make it quite a fun trip to get there.
Hydro Hotel - (esp formerly) a hotel or resort, often near a spa, offering facilities for hydropathic treatment.
A collection of personalities with various ailments (real or imagined) find themselves at a Hydro in search of a cure in 1930s England. In such closed surroundings, folks pass the day with gossip and knitting. Until one of their number is found with a knitting needle in her neck.
This book isn't as tightly written as it could be and the detective changes about 70% of the way through the book. But it was still fun, with some solid dialogue, and a few red herrings. I guessed who did it but the author managed to shake my assurance with the third murder.
Worth a try if you love the mysteries of the 1930s and 40s! -
Such a pleasant and rewarding cozy mystery. I enjoyed being pulled into the story of a series of bizarre murders at a rural English spa-type hotel, where people go for the "cure"... Rutland indeed has an eye and ear for specific "types" of inter-war Brits; the older ex-military, the lonely spinsters and the de-feminized career women. She combines cutting observations and some absurdity with pathos of gruesome murder and some true sadness. The last two chapters are a very satisfying outcome!
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Really probably 2 1/2, but I'm feeling relatively kind today, so I shall round up. The setting was good and there were some sly, darkly humorous bits that I appreciated. But it felt very drawn out, I clocked the murderer and the very cliched motive pretty early on, and the detectives were not particularly impressive. I do, however, have Rutland's other mysteries on my Kindle, so will no doubt give her another go at some point.
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Interesting setting: it is some sort of worn-down medical facility that could be used as a residence by either those using the treatments or those who weren't and was also open to day trippers. The characters are mostly quirky elders with a couple attractive young women for spice. Lots of humor in the characters interactions and a reasonable mystery.
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Chapter on introduces us to all the characters one by one.
Chapter two introduces us to the institution.
Chapter three goes through all the characters again as they go about their day.
Chapter four faithfully goes through all the characters again, from the top of the list to the bottom, as they attend a concert.
Chapter five on wards: murder! And we go through all the characters again as they talk to the police inspector one by tedious, one.
I love a good mystery, but I just gave up on this one. -
If you love Golden Age mysteries, you'll adore this novel.
After reading this book, I wondered why only Christie's popularity has endured to the present age. Rutland's novel are well plotted and full of blistering wit. Perhaps her perspective was too scandalous until now. -
Interesting characters in an unusual setting. Lots of fun.
