A Surprise for Christmas

August 1, 2021
Edwards, who must either really love or really hate Christmas, presents yet another collection of seasonal mysteries originally published between 1893 and 1963, half of them during the 1950s. The most serious disappointment is Catharine Louisa Pirkis' "The Black Bag Left on a Doorstep," the historically important but uninspired introduction of detective Loveday Brooke, which Edwards has evidently chosen to make the other 11 reprints look good. And so they do. The highlights are stories by celebrity authors tweaking their usual formulas. G.K. Chesterton's ceremonious "The Hole in the Wall" replaces Father Brown with the lesser-known Horne Fisher. The vanishing knife in Carter Dickson's "Persons or Things Unknown" offers a precursor to the historical mysteries he would perfect as John Dickson Carr. And the normally suave Julian Symons' "Father Christmas Comes to Orbins" is an elaborately plotted jewel robbery that goes elaborately wrong. For the rest, Roderick Alleyn solves the mystery of an unpleasant bully electrocuted by his radio in Ngaio Marsh's "Death on the Air"; raffish Arthur Crook rescues a student nurse and her doctor fiance when their innocent actions land them in the clutches of a gang of murderous drug dealers in Anthony Gilbert's overlong "Give Me a Ring"; the short-shorts by E.R. Punshon, Ernest Dudley, Victor Canning, Cyril Hare, and Margery Allingham provide virtuoso lessons in how much action and atmosphere can be packed into 10 pages; and Barry Perowne's "The Turn-Again Bell," in which a Christmas miracle saves both a stubbornly anti-religious father who's refused to participate in his daughter's wedding to the rector's son and the rector in question, ends the volume on the most Christmassy note of all. Is the Yuletide well running dry? Only next year will tell.

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Starred review from August 9, 2021
Edwards’s exceptional fourth anthology of golden age Christmas-themed mysteries (after 2018’s The Christmas Card Crime and Other Stories) features tales from heavy hitters such as G.K. Chesterton and Julian Symons as well as less familiar names. Set during a housewarming gathering in Sussex, Carter Dickson’s “Persons or Things Unknown” raises the question of whether sleeping in one of the rooms is safe. During the 17th century, a witness in that room saw a “man hacked to death, with thirteen stab-wounds in his body, from a hand that wasn’t there and a weapon that didn’t exist.” This ingenious story showcases Dickson’s ability at devising head-scratching impossibilities while playing totally fair with the reader. Ngaio Marsh’s Scotland Yarder Roderick Alleyn must solve a Christmas murder whose victim may have been killed by his radio in “Death on the Air.” And Margery Allingham has Albert Campion probe why a mailman was murdered on the holiday in “On Christmas Day in the Morning.” Obscure authors such as Ernest Dudley and E.R. Punshon also impress. Edwards shows no sign of running out of quality material.

October 1, 2021

This is the fourth collection of wintry and holiday-themed short mysteries gathered together under the guidance of the British Library. All 12 of this volume's stories are written by classic crime authors, from the well-known (Ngaio Marsh) to the less-familiar (Victor Canning), and were previously published between the 1930s and 1960s. For each story there's a brief introduction about the author's work and life and a list of read-alike suggestions. The anthology has a variety of authors and time periods and a nice range of whodunit styles for any reader. None of the mysteries sacrifices a clever twist or turn in service of their holiday-season settings--instead, it adds to the entertainment. VERDICT With perfectly sized stories for stolen moments during a busy season, there's something for everyone in this well-curated anthology.

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