Sunday, November 17, 2019

The Roman Hat Mystery


The Roman Hat Mystery is the first of the Ellery Queen detective/mystery series. This writer knows his stuff. It was written in 1928 but is still easy and interesting to read. The book was a birthday present.

from the Wikipedia article:
The novel deals with the poisoning of a disreputable lawyer named Monte Field in the Roman Theater in New York City during a performance of a play called "Gunplay!" Although the play is a sold-out hit, the corpse is discovered seated surrounded by empty seats. A number of suspects whose pasts had made them potentially susceptible to blackmail are in the theater at the time, some connected with the Roman Theater and some audience members.

The case is investigated by Inspector Richard Queen of the Homicide Squad with the assistance of his son Ellery, a bibliophile and author. The principal clue in the mystery is the disappearance of the victim's top hat, and it is suspected that the hat may have contained papers with which the victim was blackmailing the murderer. A number of suspects are considered, but nothing can be proved until Ellery performs an extended piece of logical deduction based on the missing hat and thus identifies the murderer.
You can read it online here.



13 comments:

  1. I loved the Ellery Queen series on television with Jim Hutton

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    1. I've never heard of the series! Googling.... :)

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    2. Wow! These look like fun :) Thx!

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  2. Thanks for sharing the link. I love mysteries, but I'm behind on my reading.

    FYI: I'm going to post this link in my T-Day post, but I thought I'd let you know about it early. (I just got it, and am going to add it to my blog. Then I'm going to browse around it to see what books they have! :-)

    Books with Full-Text Online | MetPublications | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

    https://www.metmuseum.org/art/metpublications/titles-with-full-text-online?searchtype=F

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    1. I didn't realize the Met had any of their books available online. Cool! So many!

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  3. I do need to check out Ellery Queen!

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    1. This was my first. I'll definitely be looking for more :)

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  4. Must check Ellery Queen at the library. Like a good mystery. I thought I recognized the author's name but I'm sure I've never read or seen the TV show ... umm my own mystery to solve (col).

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    1. I need to check the library, too, to see if they have any of these available. I've bookmarked the tv series so I can watch it. ---if it's still there by the time I get around to it. You never know...

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  5. I always loved the Ellery Queen books and films. Valerie

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    1. I'm just now getting there lol I've missed a lot over the years even though I read so much. There's always more I haven't read :)

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  6. I saw the series (oir most of it) in reruns on the Decades channel a few years ago. I really enjoyed it and it kept me guessing, too.

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    1. I do intend to check out the tv series. The book was good, and the Queens are an interesting pair I'd like to see/read more of.

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