Carr, John Dickson as Carter Dickson - The Reader is Warned (1939)

A masterpiece of misdirection. We begin with the highly improbable and descend rapidly into the impossible, knowing all the time that the maestro is there to guide us back to sanity at the end of it all.

Herman Pennik is a telepath; or claims to be. He can read minds, and demonstrates it; worse, he claims that he can kill someone with a thought. Sam Constable doesn't believe it when Pennik predicts his death; but Constable dies that night without a mark on his body.

The second victim is Constable's wife Mina; and the third looks set to be the young narrator Dr. Sanders, but he is saved by the timely intervention of H.M. and Inspector Masters. H.M., threatened with elevation to the House of Lords, is his usual irascible self; Masters a little more on the ball than usual. A murderer is caught and Pennik gets his comeuppance.

Could it actually have happened? Who knows? But if it had, this is surely the way it would have. Carr is in top form here, strewing red herrings around with wild abandon. Only an ugly and uncharacteristic piece of racial prejudice prevents it from reaching the top rank of his works.

Jon.