Bøker av Stuart Palmer

Hildegarde Withers was one of the first female schoolmarm detectives to appear in mystery. From her appearance in The Penguin Pool Murder in 1931, the teacher caught the attention of the American reading public. In the years that followed, she appeared in a number of films, a humorous series of collaborative mysteries with the Chicago lawyer, John J. Malone, and of course - short stories. Multiple collections of Stuart Palmer's works exist, including Crippen & Landru's Hildegarde Withers: Uncollected Riddles in 2002. Now nearly two decades later, another Crippen & Landru collection Hildegarde Withers: Final Riddles? As more newspapers, magazines, and documents are put online, we have been able to locate more works by Palmer, with possibly more to come in the future. Hence, the less than certain title . This collection contains stories about Hildegarde Withers, Howie Rook, Sherlockiana, and other characters as well.

Hildegarde Withers is just your average school teacher-with above-average skills in the art of deduction. The New Yorker often finds herself investigating crimes led only by her own meddlesome curiosity, though her friends on the NYPD don't mind when she solves their cases for them. After plans for a grand tour of Europe are interrupted by Germany's invasion of Poland, Miss Withers heads to sunny Los Angeles instead, where her vacation finds her working as a technical advisor on the set of a film adaptation of the Lizzie Borden story. The producer has plans for an epic retelling of the historical killer's patricidal spree-plans which are derailed when a screenwriter turns up dead. While the local authorities quickly deem his death accidental, Withers suspects otherwise and calls up a detective back home for advice. The two soon team up to catch a wily killer.At once a pleasantly complex locked room mystery and a hilarious look at the foibles of Hollywood, The Puzzle of the Happy Hooligan finds Palmer, a screenwriter himself, at his most perceptive. Reprinted for the first time in over thirty years, this riotously funny novel shows why Hildegarde Withers was among the most beloved detectives of the Golden Age American mystery novel.