Hare, Cyril - Death is No Sportsman (1938)

Death Is No Sportsman (1938) has a fishing background, like parts of Ronald A. Knox's Double Cross Purposes (1937). Both books even have a somewhat similar map, showing a river running North and South. The vivid depiction of the topography and river setting is one of Hare's strongest accomplishments here. There are other fishing mysteries, including a small section of Lee Thayer's QED (1921), and Rex Stout's novella "Immune to Murder" (1955) in Three for the Chair.

Death Is No Sportsman is at its best in its storytelling, which is absorbing throughout, and poorest in its solution, which is not that inventive. In this it resembles his later An English Murder. Both books are fun to read, but neither offers much in the way of puzzle plot ingenuity. Hare mainly follows his characters all over his wonderfully imagined river landscape. He eventually comes up with some mild surprises about their movements, but never actually turns his story into one of those intricate alibi plots beloved by Realist School authors. This is both good and bad: Bad in that Hare never creates much of a puzzle, and perhaps good in the sense that such alibi-time table stories can get awfully wearying! Still, this Inspector Mallett book can be seen as belonging to the Crofts tradition, with a policeman hero, a Background of fishing, a detailed topography and map, a setting on the water, and much information about business.

The characters and social background here recall the preceding Tenant for Death: we have corrupt businessmen and their sinister schemes, a young Gentleman who gets involved in some two-bit plotting himself over his lady love, and a well-to-do, sophisticated woman involved in affairs. However, the actual intrigues of all of these people are subtly different than in the first book, making for pleasant variations. The crooked business schemes are especially juicy, in their satirical depictions of moral rot in British business of the time. They form a scathing look at the upper classes.

Hare also expresses some ecological concerns, that seem more relevant today than ever. The obnoxious, upper class murder victim here is obsessed with power and control over others, at all levels. In this he resembles the politicians to come in An English Murder. Hare links his desire for control over money and business, control over nature and the environment, and control over women as sinister actions with a common root cause. In this, Hare anticipates many current social critics.

Hare's story also briefly condemns his lower class villagers for lacking sexual morality. Hare echoes in a mild way Gladys Mitchell's The Saltmarsh Murders (1932), which also depicts a traditional English village whose peasant inhabitants are sexually uninhibited. Both novels feature a village girl who has a baby out of wedlock, both feature the vicar's dominating battle-ax of a wife as a character, a woman who runs the village with an iron hand. However, Hare's attitude towards his village is far more indulgent than Mitchell's ferocious tome. His biggest satire is directed at the village's upper class Chief Constable, a memorably awful expressor of upper class attitudes.

The lawyer, Stephen Smithers, is interestingly characterized. Abrasive, rude, high-handed and egotistical, one first suspects that Hare is setting him up as a villain. However, as the tale progresses, one gradually discovers that he is among the most honest and truthful of the characters, virtues that compensate a bit for his outrageous personality flaws. He and the police are also about the only people who can offer any effective resistance to the book's upper class monsters.

Mike Grost