Mystery, Inc.

Mystery, Inc. is a delightful tale about a specialty bookshop owner who has made a habit of acquiring competing stores, not by purchasing them, but by murdering their owners and then buying the stores at bargain basement prices from the grieving heirs. As the title suggests, the bookshops at issue specialize in mysteries, and our villain, though an enthusiast of the genre, has not read enough of his own stock. Not surprisingly, his scheme does not work out quite the way he planned when he comes up against Aaron Neuhaus, the proprietor of Mystery, Inc. What is even more satisfying than the resolution of our narrator's encounter with Mr. Neuhaus, however, is the store's gruesome history and the ambiguity of Mr. Neuhaus's own acquisition show more of it. As Mr. Neuhaus says,

"If you are an aficionado of mystery-detective-crime fiction, you know that someone, in fact many people, and many of them ‘innocent,’ must die for the sake of the art — for mystery’s sake. That is the bedrock of our business: Mystery, Inc. Some of us are booksellers, and some of us are consumers, or are consumed. But all of us have our place in the noble trade."

I received a free copy of Mystery, Inc. through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. show less

A disguised man waits until the end of store hours to visit Mystery, Inc., a popular specialty bookstore in a New Hampshire seaside town. He knows that the owner will send the employees home while he himself helps a serious collector willing to spend a lot and ask many questions. The disguised man's purpose for the visit is as evil as can be. He is a bookstore-buying serial killer. He goes into a book store he wants to buy, but instead of making an offer to the owners, he murders them in a way that looks like a natural death, then lowballs the grieving family and acquires the store and its stock.
But Mystery, Inc. is special. Not only is it a beautiful store full of valuable first editions by Dickens, Christie and Doyle, but the owner is show more exactly the sort of man the killer would like to be himself, content in his work and happily married. Unaware that the customer who keeps adding books to his tab is actually planning on killing him and stealing the rare books, the friendly owner begins telling the story of his haunted bookstore.
Number 21 in The Mysterious Bookshop's Bibliomysteries. show less

Charles Brockden (not his real name) is the owner of several bookstores dedicated to the mystery novel. He has acquired these stores through unconventional but perhaps fitting means. Now he has found a new store that he just has to have. Unfortunately, the present owner isn’t ready to give it up but, then, Charles was never one to take no for an answer.

I’m not usually a fan of the short story – unless it’s really well-done, it always seems at least to me that there’s just too much missing for me to feel satisfied after finishing one. But Mystery, Inc. is Joyce Carol Oates’ entry in the Bibliomysteries series for Mysteriouspress and her typical clean, precise language makes it a complete and fully self-contained tale show more examining the inner workings of the obsessive mind and the lengths it will go to obtain the object of its obsession. There is even a touch of the macabre to ramp up the creep factor. The story, to be sure, is predictable in the way that, say, Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado is predictable – there is no doubt that we, the reader, know long before the main character what is going to happen – but this foreshadowing just makes the tale that much more chilling.

Mystery, Inc. is both a satisfactory murder mystery and an homage to the murder mystery from Poe to Chandler and to the bookstores dedicated to them. The pace is more like a slow-acting poison than a quick thrust to the heart with a sharp knife but that just serves to give the goose bumps more time to rise. show less

Although I’m not a great fan of mystery novels, I decided to read this book because I usually enjoy short fiction better than long novels, I love stories about books and bookshops, and because I thought that a mystery story written by Joyce Carol Oates wouldn’t be the typical one. And I wasn’t disappointed at all. "Mystery, Inc." is a very short book (less than 50 pages) that can be read in one seating but that I found highly enjoyable and well-written. A wonderful tribute to the old style mystery novels and writers like Poe , Wilkie Collins or Doyle. And even if this is not one of the highlights in Oates’ career, I would definitely recommended it, maybe not to those who love complex, long and deep mystery novels, but to anyone show more looking for a light, entertaining and clever story. show less

(ARC was provided to read and review.)

Mystery, Inc. is a short story in the now Death Sentences series (former Bibliomysteries, which I found more fitting). These are novellas or shorts by popular authors, all dealing with a mystery in the world of books. No matter if Sigmund Freud has to deal with an unwelcome visitor or deadly secrets in the London Library, if you like this form of "Lethal Literature" as much as I do, you will surely find something in the series to suit your taste.

In this short, we get a first person account from Charles Brockden, (of course, he doesn't tell us his real name), a dedicated lover of antique books and owner of several bookshops. Now he has set his eyes on Mystery Inc., a beautiful old bookstore in New show more Hampshire. The shop's owner doesn't know it yet, but Brockden is certain, soon he will be the new owner of the store and all the leather bound and exquisite first editions will be his.
There's just one minor problem, he has to get rid of the momentary owner first. But Brockden is sure of himself, he will, and not for the first time, perform an untraceable murder. As it goes with arrogance, it can lead to a minor oversight or tiny neglect and things might not go according to plan.
A particular highlight was for me the name of the shop's owner, Aaron Neuhaus, as Neuhaus is a chain of bookshops in Germany, which made it sound all the more real.

Turning the pages, Oates takes us on a delightful tour through the bookstore, which is just a joy for everybody who loves books. As a fan of her work, I have to admit, I've read better short stories from the author, but there's no doubt, Mystery, Inc. is well worth a look.
I liked the style of the story a lot as it reminded me of Edgar Allan Poe and Oates has also an eerie surprise for the reader in store. show less

Mystery Inc. by Joyce Carol Oates is a 2015 Mysterious Press/ Open Road Media publication.

This book is part of the BiblioMysteries publications in which well known mystery authors submit short mysteries tales about Deadly books.

In New Hampshire a bookstore anyone would covet has become an obsession for one man, who is determined to have it, by any means necessary.

While the story is quite short, and it won't take the reader very long to determine the way of things, I found this sinister little tale quite entertaining. Trying to imagine the possibility of owning such rare and antiquated books, is mind boggling. If such gems do exist, behind glass, or locked in a safe somewhere, the very idea of it is enough to overwhelm the senses of show more any die hard mystery fan.

The descriptions of the store and the supposed collections the owner has acquired over time was what kept my imagination in high gear. The mystery itself wasn't really much of a mystery though, and ended up being rather predictable. However, the writing was, as always, superb, except that I am puzzling over the use of the first person narrative in this particular case.

All the same, it's always a pleasure to read anything by Joyce Carol Oates. 4 stars show less

Murder for Merging - Bibliomysteries #21
Review of the Mysterious Press/Open Road eBook (April 7, 2015) of the Mysterious Press hardcover & paperback (July 15, 2014).

A stranger using the alias of Charles Brockden makes a late day visit to an exclusive rarities and first editions bookstore named Mystery Inc. We learn that his plan is one of murder and acquisition and that he has amassed a small network of bookshops through this very same method.

The owner appears to be very welcoming and appreciative of Brockden's interest in the store and tells him about its somewhat haunted past. But there are increasing hints that the owner is aware of his visitor's malevolent intentions and may be preparing to turn the tables on him.

I admired the show more rising tension of this story and its regular references to book rarities. I hadn't been previously aware of Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810) who has been referred to as "the father of the American novel", see Wikipedia for that reference.

Trivia and Links
Joyce Carol Oates (1938-) is a prolific writer of novels and short stories, the most popular of which (according to its number of GR ratings and reviews) is We Were the Mulvaneys (1996). She is also known for the Wonderland Quartet (1967-1971) and the Gothic Saga (1980-2013) series. Her fictional life of Marilyn Monroe Blonde (2000) was recently adapted for the feature film Blonde (2022) directed by Andrew Dominik and starring Ana de Armas as Marilyn Monroe.

The Bibliomysteries series are short stories commissioned by Otto Penzler's The Mysterious Press to be written around the theme of deadly books. They are individually published in limited edition hardcovers, paperbacks and ebooks, and periodically collected in anthology editions such as Bibliomysteries (2013, containing stories 1-15) and Bibliomysteries: Volume Two (2018, containing stories 16-30). There does not appear to be a Goodreads Listopia for them, but on Library Thing the current listing (as of mid-September 2024) includes 40 short stories. show less