~NEW Version with ORIGINAL Cover and Illustrations~
a rare lost "classic" Locked Room mystery novel
first published in 1912, now in public domain,
plus the classic Locked Room short story,
"The Doomdorf Mystery"
by Melville Davisson Post
(author of UNCLE ABNER)
edited by Russell Atwood
(author of EAST OF A and LOSERS LIVE LONGER:
Synopsis:
"Three men--a judge, a priest, and a doctor--meet over two evenings to ponder how a dead man found alone in a locked room was killed, even though all evidence points to the impossible suggestion that the murder could not have been committed by a human hand, and each man in turn relates other cases of murder and their unraveling, killers and their undoing, innocent men and women trapped in circumstances beyond their control, before finally agreeing on a solution to this baffling mystery."
A novel of interlocking short stories of guilt and detection, misadventures involving cursed currency, voices from beyond the grave,a phony psychic turned detective, failed heists, courtroom showdowns, and cold-blooded murder...
Shows off all the diverse elements of the author's fertile imagination as he weaves an Arabian-Nights full of surprise twists and strange come-uppances.
Melville Davisson Post deserves his place among Poe, Twain, and O. Henry as a great early America writer. He lived and wrote on the cusp of a new century, like us, straddling two worlds, trying to preserve the history of the old while adjusting to the rapid changes ushered in by the new. His prose style is modern and his plots fast paced.
From the ORIGINAL 1912 PUBLISHER's note:
"A new and thrilling detective story by this well-known writer. The mysterious death of a recluse in his library is the main theme.. There is absolutely no clue to the cause of his death, and the mystery is doubled by the fact that, although the room is shot up and in the greatest disorder, both windows and door are found locked on the inside--the man dead in a pool of his own blood. The clearing up of the mystery leads the reader through many exciting adventures. Mr. Post has written a story well worth reading and recommending the other fellow to read."
***
Melville Davisson Post (April 19, 1869 - June 23, 1930) was an American author, born in Harrison County, West Virginia. His family settled in the Clarksburg, West Virginia area in the late 18th Century. He earned a law degree from West Virginia University in 1892, and was married in 1903 to Ann Bloomfield Gamble Schofield. Their one child died while an infant, and Mrs. Post died of pneumonia in 1919. He was an avid horseman, and died on June 23, 1930, after a fall from his horse, and was buried in Harrison County.
Although Post's name is not immediately familiar to those outside specialist circles, many of his collections are still in print and many collections of detective fiction include works by Post. Post's best-known character is the mystery-solving, justice dispensing Virginian backwoodsman, Uncle Abner. Post also created two other recurring characters, Sir Henry Marquis and Randolph Mason. He also wrote two non-crime novels.
Genre: General Fiction
a rare lost "classic" Locked Room mystery novel
first published in 1912, now in public domain,
plus the classic Locked Room short story,
"The Doomdorf Mystery"
by Melville Davisson Post
(author of UNCLE ABNER)
edited by Russell Atwood
(author of EAST OF A and LOSERS LIVE LONGER:
Synopsis:
"Three men--a judge, a priest, and a doctor--meet over two evenings to ponder how a dead man found alone in a locked room was killed, even though all evidence points to the impossible suggestion that the murder could not have been committed by a human hand, and each man in turn relates other cases of murder and their unraveling, killers and their undoing, innocent men and women trapped in circumstances beyond their control, before finally agreeing on a solution to this baffling mystery."
A novel of interlocking short stories of guilt and detection, misadventures involving cursed currency, voices from beyond the grave,a phony psychic turned detective, failed heists, courtroom showdowns, and cold-blooded murder...
Shows off all the diverse elements of the author's fertile imagination as he weaves an Arabian-Nights full of surprise twists and strange come-uppances.
Melville Davisson Post deserves his place among Poe, Twain, and O. Henry as a great early America writer. He lived and wrote on the cusp of a new century, like us, straddling two worlds, trying to preserve the history of the old while adjusting to the rapid changes ushered in by the new. His prose style is modern and his plots fast paced.
From the ORIGINAL 1912 PUBLISHER's note:
"A new and thrilling detective story by this well-known writer. The mysterious death of a recluse in his library is the main theme.. There is absolutely no clue to the cause of his death, and the mystery is doubled by the fact that, although the room is shot up and in the greatest disorder, both windows and door are found locked on the inside--the man dead in a pool of his own blood. The clearing up of the mystery leads the reader through many exciting adventures. Mr. Post has written a story well worth reading and recommending the other fellow to read."
***
Melville Davisson Post (April 19, 1869 - June 23, 1930) was an American author, born in Harrison County, West Virginia. His family settled in the Clarksburg, West Virginia area in the late 18th Century. He earned a law degree from West Virginia University in 1892, and was married in 1903 to Ann Bloomfield Gamble Schofield. Their one child died while an infant, and Mrs. Post died of pneumonia in 1919. He was an avid horseman, and died on June 23, 1930, after a fall from his horse, and was buried in Harrison County.
Although Post's name is not immediately familiar to those outside specialist circles, many of his collections are still in print and many collections of detective fiction include works by Post. Post's best-known character is the mystery-solving, justice dispensing Virginian backwoodsman, Uncle Abner. Post also created two other recurring characters, Sir Henry Marquis and Randolph Mason. He also wrote two non-crime novels.
Genre: General Fiction
Used availability for Melville Davisson Post's The Nameless Thing