The problem of the wire cage

Readers are in for a double treat in this latest addition to American Mystery Classics, which, like the British Library Crime Classics, re-issues long out-of-print mysteries from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. The first treat is the mystery itself by John Dickson Carr, considered the master of the "impossible crime" mystery. The second is the introduction by writer and director Rian Johnson, himself the concocter of impossible crimes in the films Knives Out and Glass Onion. This tale, first published in 1939, is set on the grounds of an English estate. A love triangle, in which an arrogant aristocrat and a struggling barrister vie for the affections of a young woman, makes for a tense party. Once the woman commits to marrying for money, the aristocrat is found strangled to death with his own scarf in the middle of a tennis court on the grounds. Only the victim's footprints are etched into the clay leading to and from the net. Enter amateur sleuth Dr. Gideon Fell, who provides the traditional "one of you is the murderer" summing-up with aplomb. Brilliant.

How could someone be strangled to death in the middle of a sodden clay tennis court without the killer leaving any footprints? That riddle animates this excellent entry in the Gideon Fell series from Carr (1906--1977; The Hollow Man), originally published in 1939 and now appearing with an introduction by Knives Out filmmaker Rian Johnson. The story opens with four characters playing mixed doubles on Dr. Nicholas Young's estate, near London. Frank Dorrance is engaged to Brenda White, with their union primed to net them a considerable fortune from Brenda's guardian. Hugh Rowland, a criminal defense attorney known for getting guilty clients acquitted, harbors his own feelings for Brenda. The members of the love triangle are joined by Young's high-society neighbor, Kitty Bancroft. After the quartet's game is disrupted by heavy rain, one of them is found choked to death on the court, with only their own footsteps visible in the mud, and Fell is called in to investigate. Carr's tricks and puzzles are as thrilling as ever, and Johnson's introduction offers sharp insight into the story's enduring appeal ("The beating heart of any John Dickson Carr tale is the delicious terror of the unsolvable... and the implication that the monster is just outside your window"). This is an ideal introduction to a master of mystery fiction's golden age. (Jan.)