The Adventures of Ellery Queen

Ellery Queen Shorts #1
A review of the Mysterious Press eBook (February 5, 2013) of the Frederick A. Stokes hardcover original (1934) collecting various stories mostly written and published in the Redbook, Mystery, Great Detective Stories and Mystery League magazines during 1933-34.

[3.8 Average rating for the 11 stories, rounded up to a GR 4 star rating]
I had never read Ellery Queen previously, although the books are considered part of the American side of the Golden Age of Crime 1920-1940 which is usually associated with British writers such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers. That era and sub-genre is one of my favourites so I took a chance on the first of the short story collections.

See cover at show more target="_top">https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/...
The cover of the latest edition as of 2023 of "The Adventures of Ellery Queen" as published under the American Mystery Classics imprint. Ellery Queen's pince-nez glasses are prominently shown. Image sourced from Goodreads.

I enjoyed these quite a lot. There was a definite hint of paying homage to Arthur Conan Doyle and his classic Sherlock Holmes stories. The title of the book echoes The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock Holmes #3 - 1892) and some of the stories have subplots that hint back to certain Holmes cases.

The fictional detective Ellery Queen was both the story protagonist and the writing pseudonym of cousins Frederic Dannay (1905-1982) and Manfred B. Lee (1905-1971). They wrote over 40 novels and short story collections under that name. After Lee's passing in 1971, Dannay retired from writing the series. The series has been adapted several times for radio and television. A mystery stories magazine in the same name was founded in 1941 and continues to this day as the bi-monthly Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.

The following provides individual story ratings and synopses. They are setups only and do not reveal endings, so I have not spoiler blocked them.
1. The Adventure of the African Traveler ****. Ellery Queen agrees to mentor three criminology students. They all investigate a current case involving a business traveler who has recently returned from South Africa. The three students propose three different solutions, but Ellery Queen has a fourth solution in mind.

2. The Adventure of the Hanging Acrobat ****. The woman in a theatrical acrobatic duo has been murdered by seemingly being hung, although various other methods of murder would have been easier and were close at hand. There appears to be a clue from the way the rope is knotted.

3. The Adventure of the One-Penny Black ***. An extremely rare stamp has been stolen after a group of collectors were attending a showing at a stamp merchant. The culprit appears to have been a temporary worker for one of the collectors. This story has a subplot which echoes the classic Sherlock Holmes story The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle. Also, no one is murdered for a change.

4. The Adventure of the Bearded Lady ****. A doctor and amateur artist has been murdered in what appears to have been for a motive of financial inheritance. The only clue is that his final act was painting a beard on Rembrandt’s wife in a reproduction of a Rembrandt painting.

5. The Adventure of the Three Lame Men ***. A financial magnate appears to have been kidnapped at the apartment of his mistress. From a trail of muddy footprints on the floor it appears that the kidnappers were three lame men. Ellery Queen has a different theory.

6. The Adventure of the Invisible Lover ****. Ellery Queen to called in to try to clear an accused man of murder. His solution requires going to rather extreme lengths in a graveyard where the victim is buried.

7. The Adventure of the Teakwood Case ****. Murder occurs at an apartment building where there have been a series of jewelry thefts. Ellery Queen realizes there is a clue from the victim’s teakwood cigarette case.

8. The Adventure of the Two-Headed Dog *****. Ellery Queen takes shelter at the Two-Headed Dog Inn and Cabins while travelling to visit a friend. He hears the story of how one of the cabins is haunted ever since a jewel thief stayed there. But then a murder occurs that very same night with Queen on hand to solve it. I especially enjoyed this one due to its allusions to Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles.

9. The Adventure of the Glass-Domed Clock **** The proprietor of a gem and curio shop is found bludgeoned to death in his store. Before he died he managed to crawl to a display case and grab an amethyst gem and to smash a glass-domed clock. Ellery Queen must figure out if those are clues to the murderer’s identity.

10. The Adventure of the Seven Black Cats *** Ellery Queen goes to a pet store hoping to buy an Irish Terrier and ends up deducing a murder at a nearby residence when told of a recluse who has bought a similar black cat a week for the past seven weeks. Jodi, if you are reading this, please avoid this one as it is disturbing about the fate of the cats. Trivia: There is a character named Harry Potter in this one!

11. The Adventure of the Mad Tea-Party **** Ellery Queen attends a friend’s family children's birthday gathering out on Long Island where the adults are planning a play of the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party to entertain the children who will attend. But on the night before the party, the host disappears and then a mysterious set of parcels begin to be delivered but without a ransom note.

Trivia and Link
There is an Ellery Queen specialist site which provides extended information about the editions of The Adventures of Ellery Queen includes some detailed story discussions (Note: Some spoilers included). You can read it at Queen.Spaceports.com. show less

These are stories I was very fond of when young and still like, though on rereading the first stories (in which Queen is teaching an applied criminology class to 2 men and a woman0 I realize that he used very heavy handed stereotypes to describe the young woman. He also criticizes all of them for relying on just one clue each to solve the case, when in fact he does the same. Still, I wish he had continued the stories about the class.
The hanging acrobat is more subtle but powerfully grim. The one penny black is one of the many variants on Conan Doyle's "Six Napoleons" --theft of a series of apparently valueless objects., in this case copies of a widely sold book.

I really like mysteries from the 30s and 40s, and Ellery Queen books are classics. The slightly effete bookish Ellery Queen, his tough dad, and improbably solved murder mysteries are tons of fun.

I had forgotten how enjoyable the old Ellery Queen stories were. If you like mysteries, this is a great read!

These vintage detective tales appeared in pulp magazines of the early 1930s. They seem unlikely to be of interest to anyone other than die-hard devotees of the genre's early history. Most of the stories are extremely far-fetched in plots, motives, and solutions to the crimes at hand. Further, in a departure from the tradition of mystery stories, the reader is never given sufficient information to figure out the perpetrator. Little wonder then that one must proceed to the end to find out what EQ himself knows or has secretly observed.

On my scale of 1 to 5 stars, I awarded most of these stories zero to two apiece. Below are the included stories with my personal rankings:

The Adventure of The African Traveler (1*)
The Adventure of The show more Hanging Acrobat (1.5*)
The Adventure of The One Penny Black (0*)
The Adventure of The Bearded Lady (3*)
The Adventure of The Three Lame Men (2.5*)
The Adventure of The Invisible Lover (0*)
The Adventure of The Teakwood Case (2*)
The Adventure of The Two Headed Dog (2*)
The Adventure of The Glass Domed Clock (0*)
The Adventure of The Seven Black Cats (1.5*)
The Adventure of The Mad Tea-Party (2*) show less

Eleven short stories,most of which are well worth reading.Queen (the detective) is a somewhat Sherlock Holmes type of investigator.Many of the problems are of the academic sort and I particularly liked 'The Two-Headed Dog' and 'The mad Tea-Party.

The short stories continue the sheer genius of these authors.