Another of the Sir Henry Merrivale mysteries, again a closed room mystery with snow (but no tracks anywhere).

Up there with the rest of them me thinks.

Big Ship 1 July 2024 ( )

‘’H.M.’s room, spacious in decayed finery, is in the most ancient part of the damp old rabbit-warren, once a part of Whitehall Palace: it looks down over a bleak strip of garden, the Victoria Embankment, and the river. A smoky blue twilight - the frost twilight of Christmas week - blurred the window now. Bennett could see reflections from the lamps along the parapet of the Embankment; he could hear the window rattle to the pelting hooting of buses, and the stir of the fire under the battered white-marble mantelpiece.’’

A Hollywood starlet, who has been desperately trying to convince Britain that she can actually act, is found murdered in a pavilion surrounded by the traces of a heavy December. With absolutely zero evidence, James Bennett and Sir Henry Merrivale will try to find the culprit of an impossible crime.

This mystery is the epitome of the tradition of the Christmas Murder mystery. The imposing setting, dark and mysterious, the enigmatic victim, the cast of characters, the sympathetic amateur sleuth, the snow, the howling wind, the spectres in the corridors. The atmosphere is superb, and the story is nothing short of remarkable.

BUT. The dialogue is insufferable. Good Lord, who speaks with a dozen ‘’oh ah’’s every two sentences? With the bright exception of Bennett, the interactions are atrocious, Kate and Louise’s exclamations are absurdly dramatic, there is too much ‘’show, not tell’’ and Sir Henry is simply NOT amusing.

If you can distance yourselves from the dialogue, you’ll enjoy this Christmas mystery immensely. Unfortunately, I did not. ( )

Excellent locked-roomer of the "no footprints in the snow" variety (see Blake's [b:Thou Shell of Death|1909418|Thou Shell of Death (Nigel Strangeways, #2)|Nicholas Blake|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1300574909s/1909418.jpg|1801658]). Suspects are amusing showbiz caricatures, solution is both surprising and satisfying. ( )

The second of the Henry Merrivale stories, which, like the first (the Plague Court Murders) is grimmer than some of the later ones which are more cheerfully preposterous. In this a sexy actress who failed on the London stage but became a movie star in America is planning a triumphant return to London playing Charles II's mistress, but while staying in the mistress's room at White Priory --a room in a little building set on a lake, with only one entrance by a sort of causeway -- --she is brutally beaten to death at the time of a snow-storm which (in classic locked-room fashion) apparently shows no-one could have come to kill her. Sir Henry Merrivale (who American nephew is visiting at this time) and his Scotland Yard ally Humphrey Masters investigate. ( )

Second in the series featuring Sir Henry Merrivale, HM to his friends, The White Priory Murders begins with the death of an actress. She is found in a building close to an English country house, but here's the thing: the murderer left his or her footprints in the snow, but none ever came out. This fact, plus a few other simple clues, lead to a mystery where everyone has a motive, but everyone also has an alibi. Once the local police have a go, it will be up to HM to solve the case.

I love these old books, but they're so incredibly verbose as to at times become distracting. The murder mystery itself, however, is good and solid. There are plenty of suspects, plenty of motives, and thus a lot of red herrings for the reader to sort through. HM's unraveling of the whole thing at the end was very well done.

If you like golden-age mysteries, you should put this one on your reading list, or if you're a fan of John Dickson Carr and haven't yet read this one, you will want to do so. Modern mystery readers might become a bit impatient due to the overdone verbiage, but on the other hand, that's kind of a signature trademark with Carr in most of his books.

Overall, not bad, not one of my favorites of Carr's books, but still a pretty good read. ( )