Blurbs for Cyril Hare Mysteries

(Note: Books are listed alphabetically.)

Tenant for Death (1937)

by Cyril Hare

Dover Books (1981)

Cover price: $3.50

"Agreeable and meticulously worked out tale ... with more humor than found in most Scotland Yard exploits." -- Saturday Review of Literature

'My Lord, I only desire to state that if when I come out of prison Mr. Ballantine is still unhanged, I shall be happy to rectify the omission. Having uttered those last words to the court, failed banker John Fanshawe is led away to begin serving four years in prison for his role in the spectacular Fanshawe bank collapse.

'This urbane and polished mystery opens shortly after Fanshawe's release from prison. Flamboyant London financier Lionel Ballantine, reputedly involved in the Fanshawe scandal, is found strangled in a dreary South Kensington flat. Suspicion immediately centers on Fanshawe but the case facing Inspector John Mallet of Scotland Yard is not to be solved so easily. Indeed, as it turns out, there are a whole dockfull of suspects with motives for disposing of the unpopular Mr. Ballantine.

'With impressive skill, the author weaves an engrossing tale of financial skulduggery, false identity, bigamy and other nefarious doings that figure in the tangled circumstances of a near-perfect crime. Readers will have ample opportunity to test their own crime-solving skills as Inspector Mallet tracks his prey, for the solution of the crime is only revealed at the very end of the novel. Moreover, it is through pure ratiocination that the clever sleuth finally unmasks the true perpetrator.

'Tenant for Death was first published in 1937 by Cyril Hare, a pseudonym for Alfred Alexander Gordon Clark, an English jurist and mystery writer. It was the first full-length detective novel by the author who went on to create the celebrated detective Francis Pettigrew and such classic mysteries as Tragedy at Law and Death Is No Sportsman. When first published, the present book evoked these comments from The Spectator: "Readers should note that here a new star has risen ... wit, fair play, and characterization; the way in which an air of probability is combined both with clear, terse narrative and with a good deal of subtle suburban atmosphere, proves the extreme skill of the writer."'