The best novel...by Ellery Queen?

[Kurt Sercu]

Still a bit like having to choose between your children... but whenever someone asks for a title to start with, what would your advice for them?
I always tend to elaborate a 'bit' before I give them the choice.
"The Greek Coffin" gets top marks but then there was
"Ten Day's Wonder" as an exemple of a Wrightsville novel
Surely "On the Eight Day" deserves a place in this list, and one I especially liked "A Fine and Private Place" so it has to be included here...

I liked "Cat of Many Tails" and "The Egyptian Cross Mystery" quite a lot.

[Dale Andrews]

This is a tough one. I would include "The Finishing Stroke," "The Fourth Side of the Triangle" and "And on the Eighth Day." However, I want to hold a space open for "The Greek Coffin Mystery" which I haven't yet read but will within the next couple weeks. By and large I think the finest Queens are those post Halfway House. I think "The Finishing Stroke" is a particularly fine "end of the series" opus. It suffers only from the fact (as to which we are lucky) that it did NOT end the series!

[Sinister]

The Egyptian Cross Mystery
The Tragedy of X, as "Barnaby Ross"-- some critics don't like this one, as too unbelievable. Humbug! It's a great cracking read, fairly clued, unusual murder method (the first one), least likely suspect, a memorable dying clue for the last murder -- victim's fingers crossed to form an X -- I'm not giving anything away, you still won't guess it until the murderer is unmasked.

Sinister

"Tragedy of X" is the first and best of the Barnaby Ross books (there were only four). It involves murders on public transport (street cars and commuter railway), something that has hardly ever been used so well and skillfully. But what I was referring to was "Egyptian Cross" by EQ in his earlier days when the stories were 'told' by this unknown JJMcC, some sort of family lawyer back when Ellery started out as an aristocratic rich kid before having to go out and start making a living. The basis of this story is that the murder victims are left crucified and beheaded (hence the Egyptian cross, or Ankh, but more properly a Greek Tau). The reason for its being done is very perfectly plain, but it was very well done for its time.

[Sinister]

Yes, and in the Egyptian Cross are some memorable moments--Ellery and Dad inspecting the lonely mountain road where the first victim was found-- Another victim lashed to the mast of the boat to form the cross--the seeming insignificant clue that Ellery waves in front of your face at the last murder scene, but which points to the guilty party, only you don't see it--the cross country (sort of) chase until the murderer is unmasked -- and the chilling moment when you almost jump out of your chair to shout, "Oh, wow-I didn't see that one coming!" Yes, if I could only take one Queen book to a desert island, it would be The Egyptian Cross Mystery.

Inis

[Xavier Lechard]

All Queens I read had something great or good. The only one I didn't like, because of its predictable trick, is "The Last Woman In His Life" but it's hardly a major novel.
My ever-changing favorites would include:
- "Calamity Town"
- "The Murderer is a Fox"
- "There Was An Old Woman"
- "The Scarlet Letters"
- "The Origin of Evil"
- "The Finishing Stroke"
- "The Fourth Side of the Triangle"

[mescallado]

It's been ages since I read Queen (the most recent re-reading was the complete Adventures and its sequel). For the novels, I prefer the following (mostly due to the writing rather than the plotting:
1. The Door Between
2. The French Powder Mystery
3. The Finishing Stroke
4. The Murderer is a Fox

I enjoyed the puzzle in Ten Days Wonder considering the plot and solutions were rather silly. The Scarlet Murders showed good dramatic moments, but I felt it should not have been an Ellery story (maybe create another protagonist?)

[Dr Sheppard]

My picks as the best Ellery Queen's have to be: The American Gun Mystery, The Spanish Cape Mystery, and There Was An Old Woman. I absolutely defy ANYONE to pick the respective murderers before Ellery unmasks them. Like that other wily old serpent, Agatha Christie, E Q plots impeccably, clues fairly, and decieves like a master. I envy all of you who are coming to these novels for the first time. Enjoy!

[Rod]

Thought for discussion. Don't you think in a fair play mystery you ought to be able to make a reasonable ir stab at the motive. I can think of at least three Ellery's...fairly clued as they undoubtedly are...where for all the evidence we've been given prior to the solution , EQ might just as well have said ' Because the victim accidentally ran over the murderer's budgie..'

[Xavier Lechard]

Originally posted by Rod
Thought for discussion. Don't you think in a fair play mystery you ought to be able to make a reasonable ir stab at the motive. I can think of at least three Ellery's...fairly clued as they undoubtedly are...where for all the evidence we've been given prior to the solution , EQ might just as well have said ' Because the victim accidentally ran over the murderer's budgie..'

Titles! Titles! Titles! We want titles!

[Rod]

I think I'm right about 'The Chinese Orange', but I don't have it any more to check. I'm 'sure I'm right about Dutch Shoe' and 'American Gun'

Spoiler

In 'shoe' the murderer can only be a woman, and only one woman could have done it; so absolute fair play. but her motive is that she's secretly married to the victim's heir.However, there's not the slightest hint that either of them is married to anybody, or, if memory serves, that they've even met. In 'Gun' proper reading of the clues will prove that the murderer has a stunt double, who is the real victim. But since we only know he exists when Ellery explains, how can we possibly guess at the motive. (I think he's made some heavy pass at the murderer s daughter; but again, no suggestion that anything of the kind has happened to her)

All of this is from decades old memory, so i could be making an idiot of myself. Wouldn't be the first time.

[NBooth]

"Roman Hat" is the same way, isn't it?

Spoiler

A motive--blackmail--is provided, but not tied to the killer--this of course is fair, for the other evidence can, interpreted correctly, lead to the killer; but, no hint--no clue--is given as to what the details of the blackmail--the killers's "tainted blood" (not my words)--might be.

Rod, you're right about "Dutch Shoe;" I seem to recall thinking at the time (though my subjective mind may be acting up here) that it wasn't strictly fair....

[Patrick Gore]

My favorite Queen is The Greek Coffin Mystery. I also like Cat of Many Tails, in which Ellery behaves like less of an ass than in most of the books. I find most of the early novels to be a little too frivolous and the later books too pretentious, but these two strike a good balance.

By the way, I just read Ten Days' Wonder and The Door Between, in both of which books:

Spoiler

the reader is expected to condone that fact that Ellery manipulates a killer who is beyond the reach of the law into committing suicide. The act is especially egregious in Ten Days since Ellery has just been castigating himself for playing God with people's lives.

Now I think it is symptomatic of the pretentiousness of these later novels -- that is, of their superficial appearance of gravitas -- that the moral ambiguity of Queen's behavior is never really explored beyond a few platitudes about his playing God. Never are we invited to consider Queen as potentially a worse criminal than his vanquished foe -- as does happen, for example, in certain of Carr's novels.

[Archer Brisbane]

Originally Posted by Dr Sheppard

My picks as the best Ellery Queen's have to be: The American Gun Mystery, The Spanish Cape Mystery, and There Was An Old Woman. I absolutely defy ANYONE to pick the respective murderers before Ellery unmasks them. Like that other wily old serpent, Agatha Christie, E Q plots impeccably, clues fairly, and decieves like a master. I envy all of you who are coming to these novels for the first time. Enjoy!

Jumping in here (this is my first post), I quite concur with your admiration of Queen's plotting skills, but I find it surprising that you list THE SPANISH CAPE MYSTERY as one of the works for which you defy readers to anticipate the solution. While fairly and interestingly clued, I consider SPANISH CAPE to be one of the most transparently plotted of Queen's (or any other Golden Age writer's) works.