Postscript to Poison (Golden Age Detective Novels) by
Dorothy Bowers
pbk out December 05
(Rue Morgue Press)
at £8.56
Rue Morgue have in recent years done a great service to fans of classic detective
fiction by republishing long-lost titles from the Golden Age. Long-forgotten authors
such as Joan Coggin and Maureen Sarsfield have thus gained a fresh and appreciative
audience. This time, publishers Tom and Enid Schantz have truly excelled
themselves. First, they are bringing back into print the complete works of Dorothy
Bowers. Second, they have themselves acted as detectives and uncovered the mystery
of what happened to this talented writer – once touted as a successor to Dorothy L.
Sayers, no less – who published five novels over the ten-year period from 1938 and
then, having been inducted into the prestigious Detection Club, promptly disappeared
from sight. An informative introduction to this, Bowers' debut novel, gives a concise
but valuable account of her life and literary career and explains that she died of TB in
the same year that her last book appeared. The Schantzes opine that: 'Had she lived a
normal lifespan, it seems likely that she would have produced a sizable body of work,
firmly establishing herself as one of the masters of the genre.' On the evidence of this
book, it is a reasonable judgment, for here we have a sound plot allied to writing of a
quality markedly superior to that of much of the fare produced by mystery novelists in
the 1930s. A thoroughly agreeable book from a small publisher deserving of much
support from mystery fans.
(
Martin Edwards
- author of the highly acclaimed Harry Devlin Mysteries)
Postscript to Poison (Golden Age Detective Novels) by
Dorothy Bowers
