Thirteen Guests (British Library Crime Classics)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1464204896 ISBN 13: 9781464204890

Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press, 2015

Mystery crime fiction written in the Golden Age of Murder

"There's murder, mutilation, and mayhem aplenty until the redoubtable Detective Inspector Kendall reveals his clever conclusions with a timetable of mischief." ―Publishers Weekly

'No observer, ignorant of the situation, would have guessed that death lurked nearby, and that only a little distance from the glitter of silver and glass and the hum of voices, two victims lay silent on a studio floor.'

On a fine autumn weekend Lord Aveling hosts a hunting party at his country house, Bragley Court. Among the guests are an actress, a journalist, an artist, and a mystery novelist. The unlucky thirteenth is John Foss, injured at the local train station and brought to the house to recuperate―but John is nursing a secret of his own.

Soon events take a sinister turn when a painting is mutilated, a dog stabbed, and a man strangled. Death strikes more than one of the house guests, and the police are called. Detective Inspector Kendall's skills are tested to the utmost as he tries to uncover the hidden past of everyone at Bragley Court.

This country-house mystery is a forgotten classic of 1930s crime fiction by one of the most undeservedly neglected of golden age detective novelists.

About the Author:

J. JEFFERSON FARJEON (1883-1955) was the author of more than sixty crime and thriller novels that were highly acclaimed in his lifetime. Farjeon is the author of Number Seventeen, a play that was adapted for the big screen by Alfred Hitchcock. His Christmas crime novel, Mystery in White, was republished as a British Library Crime Classic and became a bestseller.

Review:

"The prolific Farjeon (1883-1955) remains a master of the English country house mystery, as shown by this entry in the British Library Crime Classics series. First published in 1936, it plays with the unlucky 13 superstition. When John Foss, a young man with a secret, injures his ankle while getting off a train, a charming young widow, Nadine Leveridge, brings him to Bragley Court, the estate of Lord Aveling, a politician. The 12 other guests include an actress, a novelist, an athlete, a painter, a gossip columnist, and an opposition politician. It turns out they all have emotional baggage as well as agendas. There's murder, mutilation, and mayhem aplenty until the redoubtable Detective Inspector Kendall reveals his clever conclusions with a timetable of mischief. The book holds up remarkably well, though readers should be prepared for some racial and class stereotyping (e.g., an Asian cook is referred to as 'the Chinaman')." (Publishers Weekly)

"...cosy readers as well as fans of Golden Age novels should enjoy Thirteen Guests. Martin Edwards contributes an interesting and informative introduction to this entry in the British Library Crime Classics series." (Mary Reed Eric Reed Mysteries)

"This reprint of a 1936 leisurely-paced British Country House police procedural contains an engaging mystery due to a fascinating scandalous cast whose interplay makes for a droll insightful cozy. J. Jefferson Farjeon wrote an intriguing still relevant period piece as the acceptance of de facto racism and social caste strata remain timely with the need for the Gay Rights and Black Lives Matter movements, and the 1% control of the economic-political complex." (Midwest Book Review)

"Thirteen Guests, A British Library Crime Classic by J. Farjeon is a mesmerizing Country House murder with multiple suspects, murky motives & flowerly language. I gave it four stars." (Carolyn Injoy-Hertz InJoyful Book Reviews)