Scarweather

February 13, 2017
First published in 1934, this idiosyncratic work of psychological suspense from British author Rolls (a pseudonym of C.E. Vulliamy) spans the years 1913–1928. John Farringdale, the narrator, retains a likable innocence as he matures from university student to barrister. Playing Holmes to his Watson is Frederick Ellingham, a brilliant polymath at Cambridge University. Through Farringdale’s cousin Eric Foster, he and Ellingham meet eccentric archeologist Tolgen Reisby and his attractive young wife, Hilda. All become friendly, though the growing bond between Eric and Hilda perturbs her husband. While visiting the Reisbys at Scarweather, their remote home on the British coast, Eric disappears, presumed drowned. Ellingham suspects foul play, but WWI intervenes before he can test his theories. Only when Farringdale and Ellingham visit Scarweather again to witness the increasingly volatile Reisby’s excavation of a site called the Devil’s Hump are hidden truths revealed. This entry in the British Library Crime Classics series appeals as much for its evocative glimpse of its period and witty depiction of archeologists’ quirks as for its suspense.

March 1, 2017
The latest release in the British Library Crime Classics series, which unearths and republishes forgotten works from the golden age of British detective fiction, breaks with most expectations of what makes a mystery. This 1934 work contains a mystery, to be sure, but its solution isn't pursued with the urgency readers are used to. Instead, the investigation is taken up and set down again over the course of 16 years, starting before WWI. It's more on the level of two friends wondering about the disappearance of a third friend (the fact that one of the friends is a brilliant polymath in the Sherlock Holmes vein ultimately leads to the solution). Readers will be rewarded with a suspenseful read, rich in setting (an isolated house in the north of England near a Bronze Age burial ground); characters (the three friends become acquainted with a wildly eccentric archaeologist and his too-young wife); details about WWI and its aftermath; and a horrific resolution worthy of Hitchcock.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)