Perhaps the best 39th book in a series that I have ever read. Published in 1964, this book tackles some tough interracial issues that are still unsolved today, and it wasn't twenty years ago that I was working with folks who would have been ready to go after an interracial couple with a shotgun. Nero Wolfe isn't prejudiced, but of course the fact of color - or gender, for that matter - in 1964 couldn't be ignored, and when the murderer is eventually unmasked the motive rings true without getting preachy about it. Archie Goodwin is always fun to read about, and the action is nonstop as it should be, but the clue that eventually leads to the denouement seems a little unlikely to me. Still, one has to make allowances for book #39 - anything that will be really logical will have already been done. But reading Rex Stout is like eating potato chips - you can't stop after just one. ( )

This is a good follow up story to Too Many Cooks. I like it very much. ( )