Blurbs for E. C. Bentley Mysteries

(Note: Books are listed alphabetically.)

Trent Intervenes (1938)

by E. C. Bentley

Dover Books (1981)

Cover price: $4.50

'Philip Trent is an artist, a journalist, and an urbane unraveller of highly problematical crimes. He comes to his avocation naturally, for he is a "man of tropically luxuriant mental gifts" who is "clever at getting at the truth about things other people don't understand." In fact, his wide knowledge of arcane bits of information stands him in good stead while pursuing the criminals in this collection of ingenious stories.

'Here the unshakable sleuth appears in twelve tales of misadventure, where he is called upon to bring to bear his knowledge of antiques and heraldry, gold, medicine, law, the theater, geography, languages, literature, the book world, the underworld, and the world of wine. The crimes that he investigates range from fraud and embezzlement to criminal assault and murder, yet they all succumb to his adept methods even if the criminal sometimes escapes. Several of the stories may be termed classics of the genre, including the first three -- "The Genuine Tabard," "The Sweet Shot," and "The Clever Cockatoo."

'As the celebrated author of one of the most famous mystery classics ever written, Trent's Last Case, E. C. Bentley (1875-1956) needs no introduction to mystery connoisseurs. Trent Intervenes affirms Bentley's reputation as an author of the first rank and displays his ability to write equally well in the short story form. This volume is a selection of the noted mystery story list Queen's Quorum, compiled by Ellery Queen and containing the 125 most important volumes of short stories published in the crime-detective genre from 1845 to 1967.'

"To say that Trent in small pieces is as excellent as Trent entire is recommendation enough." -- Saturday Review of Literature.

"A collection of twelve stories, each and all worthy of your attention." -- New York Herald Tribune Books.

Trent's Last Case (1913)

by E. C. Bentley

A. Perennial Library (1st edition, 1978)

Cover price: $1.95

Note: This edition has a four-page introduction by Dorothy L. Sayers.

"I suppose everybody has at least heard of Trent's Last Case. It holds a very special place in the history of detective fiction. If you were so lucky as to read it today for the first time, you would recognise it at once as a tale of unusual brilliance and charm, but you could have no idea how startlingly original it seemed when it first appeared. It shook the little world of the mystery novel like a revolution, and nothing was ever quite the same again. Every detective writer of today owes something, consciously or unconsciously, to its liberating and inspiring influence." -- Dorothy Sayers, in the Introduction

"One of the three best detective stories ever written." -- Agatha Christie

"The finest detective story of modern times." -- G. K. Chesterton

"A masterpiece of detective fiction." -- Edgar Wallace

B. Dover Books (1997)

Introduction by Douglas G. Greene

Cover price: $2.00

"Considered by many to be the ranking detective story of modern times." -- Saturday Review

'Written in reaction to what Bentley perceived as the sterility and artificiality of the detective fiction of his day -- particularly stories that featured infallible detectives of the Holmesian stripe -- Trent's Last Case (1913) features Philip Trent, an all-too-human detective who not only falls in love with the chief suspect but reaches a brilliant conclusion that is totaly wrong.

'The case begins when millionaire American financier Sigsbee Manderson is murdered while on holiday in England. A London newspaper sends Trent to investigate, and he is soon matching wits with Scotland Yard's Inspector Murth as they probe ever deeper in search of a solution to a mystery filled with odd, mysterious twists and turns.

'Called by Agatha Christie "one of the best detective stories ever written," Trent's Last Case delights with its flesh-and-blood characters, its naturalness and easy humor, and its style, which, as Dorothy Sayers has noted, "ranges from a vividly coloured rhetoric to a delicate and ironical literary fancy."'