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Mystery Authors (B)



Oliver Weld Bayer



Writer Eleanor Bayer (nee Rosenfeld) (1914-1981) and her husband, attorney Leo Grossfeld Bayer (n.d.-1950), collaborated on several crime novels under the pseudonym Oscar Weld Bayer. Eleanor later married film director Frank Perry.



Brutal Question



It was shortly after he started working as radio master of ceremonies for Martha and her curious coterie of Washington socialites that Alec Pike learned of the suicide in Italy of Harvey Benson, a news analyst and boyhood friend. Alec refused to believe Benson's death was suicide. Oddly enough, the people connected with the death in Italy began to appear on Martha’s broadcasting schedule. It couldn't be coincidence. Too many people were bought off, too many stories were killed when Alec came close to real information.


Alec’s suspicions of Martha grew stronger after an attack on his life, and he cleverly set the stage to find out just how guilty she was. From that point on, fast-moving events gave the answer to a brutal question.


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Arnold Bennett



Arnold Bennett (1867-1931) was a popular English novelist, but had a deft hand at short stories, also.



The Loot of Cities



What's a bored millionaire to do? Cecil Thorold solves some puzzles, rights some wrongs, investigates some crimes, and finds romance in six stories. In addition, there are seven additional tales of crime, mystery, romance, and the supernatural by Arnold Bennett.


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Anita Blackmon



Anita Blackmon (1892-1943) was born in Arkansas. She attended Ouachita College and the University of Chicago. She taught school until she married a railroad man, Harry Pugh Smith, and they moved to St. Louis. She became a writer and eventually published over a thousand short stories and several novels.



Murder a la Richelieu



Anita Blackmon wrote two mystery novels starring the elderly Adelaide Adams, a bit tongue-in-cheek over the Had-I-But-Known tradition of detective stories. As Adelaide notes in the first story, “Had I suspected the orgy of bloodshed upon which we were about to embark, I should then and there, in spite of my bulk and an arthritic knee, have taken shrieking to my heels.”


In Murder á la Richelieu, Adelaide ends up investigating murder at the Hotel Richelieu in an unnamed Southern city (but clearly based on Little Rock, AR).


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There is No Return



Anita Blackmon wrote two mystery novels starring the elderly Adelaide Adams, a bit tongue-in-cheek over the Had-I-But-Known tradition of detective stories.


There is No Return takes place at the Lebeau Inn, isolated in the Ozark mountains. There, guests are trapped at the inn with a murderer on the loose. Both are enjoyable, sometimes humorous, mysteries with a strong female protagonist who finds herself having to deal with strange characters and mysterious events.


The paperback editions include Golden-Age mystery historian Curt Evans' bibliographic introduction to author Anita Blackmon.


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Louis F. Booth



Louis F. Booth (1903-1996) was born in Indianapolis, Indiana. He became a civil engineer with a firm in New Jersey, and wrote two mysteries.



The Bank Vault Mystery / Broker's End



The Bank Vault Mystery: Three engineers accompanied by the manager visited the vault of the Consolidated Bank. Shortly after they left, a bag containing $180,000 in cash was missing. And so commenced the famous bank vault case in which Maxwell Fenner, the casual, dapper detective, tracked six suspects through a maze of motives and murder to find a criminal genius.


Brokers' End: It was a clever set up. The Treasurer of the great bond concern of F. W. Strong lay across his elaborate mahogany desk with a bullet hole in his forehead. His revolver was at hand, the ejected shell gleamed from the carpet nearby. Motive? The House of Strong after forty years of business "without loss to any investor" had been declared insolvent by the Court and there were rumors of "irregularities" in the books. It was a clever set up, but then commenced the pursuit and detection of the most diabolically ingenious murders in the experience of the dapper, casual, and disconcertingly naive Maxwell Fenner.


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Allan R. Bosworth



Captain Allan Rucker Bosworth (1901-1986) served in the US Navy and Navy Reserve for almost four decades. He was born in Texas, worked as a journalist in San Francisco, and lived in Roanoke, Virginia, for much of his life. He wrote several books, and numerous articles and short stories.



Full Crash Dive



The submarine Starfish makes a scheduled full crash dive, but disaster strikes and it doesn’t return to the surface. Half the crew drowns and the Navy scrambles to save the rest. Retired Admiral Wetherbee is laid up with a broken leg, but he begins his own investigation into the tragedy, which soon turns into a full-blown murder inquiry with a killer roaming the hospital ship. The author uses his extensive naval background to create an atmospheric thriller on, and under, the high seas.


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Anita Boutell



Anita Boutell (1895-1972) was born in Newark, New Jersey. She ran a dance studio in Philadelphia and performed on stage in Greenwich Village. In 1938 she published the first of several mystery and crime stories.



Death Brings a Storke / Cradled in Fear



Death Brings a Storke: Dr. Archie Storke investigates the death of a gunshot victim in a quaint English village.


Cradled in Fear: a young newlywed confronts her husband’s ancestral home complete with strange relatives and a dangerous cliff in a psychological thriller.


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Jack Boyle



Jack Boyle (1881-1928) grew up in Chicago and became a newspaper reporter in San Francisco, but drug addiction led him to crime and he served time in San Quentin. While in prison, he created Boston Blackie.



Boston Blackie & Friends



Jack Boyle’s Boston Blackie is one of the best-known crooks in mystery and crime fiction. Making a gritty start in his earliest tales, he was transformed into a “gentleman thief” who lived by his own code, taking what he wanted, but always willing to help out a pal. These stories paint emotional backdrops for the criminal class, making no excuses for crimes committed, but pointing out flaws and corruption in the justice system and in society as a whole. Boyle brings his characters to life, and some are quite memorable. Blackie himself is one of the more likable antiheroes in the genre, which is probably why his character was later reformed into a detective for the movies and a radio program. This anthology includes the original 1914 American Magazine stories, the "reboot" from Cosmopolitan, and a 1925 Los Angeles Times serial.


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Mary Hastings bradley



Mary Hastings Bradley (1882-1976) was born in Highland Park, IL, graduated from Smith College, and studied at Oxford. She married lawyer Herbert Bradley, who was an avid big game hunter and explorer, and they traveled together, with daughter Alice, on expeditions. During WW2, she was a war correspondent for Colliers. She wrote several books on her adventures, as well as numerous fiction novels.



Murder in Room 700



Philip Darrow is murdered in a hotel room, checked in under an assumed name, and the police are in pursuit of the unknown woman who had met him there. Virginia Channing is desperate that her connection not be discovered, but Phil's friend Stephen Ryder, the Assistant District Attorney, has his own suspicions.


Murder in Room 700 was published in 1931.


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Ernest Bramah



Ernest Bramah Smith (1868-1942) was an English author who published over 20 books and numerous short stories.



12 Cases for Max Carrados



Max Carrados had an accident, leaving him blind, but he doesn't let that stop him. Using his hyper-sensitive senses and keen mind, he becomes involved in a number of mysteries (many brought to him by his private detective friend, Carlyle), bringing justice to those wronged by criminal hands.


This collection includes the original 12 stories that were first published in a U.K. newspaper in 1913. (These were later collected in the first two Max Carrados books.)


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John Gordon Brandon



John Gordon Brandon was the pseudonym of John Gordon Joyce (1879-1941), an Australian-born writer with an incredible output of mysteries. He wrote over 120 novels and many short stories.



The One-Minute Murder



The Honourable A. S. Pennington, that hard-bitten, world-wandering scion of aristocracy whom some wit once christened ‘The Monocled Tramp’, investigates a murder that takes place onstage during a theater production. Aided by his man, Wibley, a reformed cracksman, Pennington races the police to solve the puzzle when he himself comes under suspicion.


The One-Minute Murder was published in 1934. Due to copyright restrictions, it is not available in the U.S.


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Dorothy Foster Brown



Dorothy Foster Brown (1901-2011) was an artist from Worcester, Massachusetts, with training from the School of the Worcester Art Museum. She specialized in Art Deco-style illustrations and paintings. She was a published poet and a well-respected button collector. She wrote Button Parade (1942, 1968) and The Big Book of Buttons (1981). Grimm Death (1946) was her only mystery.



Grimm Death



When Deacon Grimm was found dead in a neighbor’s barn, half the population of the New England village of Highbrook was suspect. The Deacon had not been a lovable character! Archer Brett, of the State Police, was no streamlined super-sleuth; he was only human, like the people and problems he had to contend with. Everyone, he found, had something to hide; seemingly innocent actions were twisted and darkened by suspicion until they emerged as perfect motives for murder, or positive signs of guilt. Archer did his best, but not before a second violent death complicated matters further.


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Richard Burke



Richard Burke (1886-1962) was a newspaper typesetter, actor, photographer, and author of ten books (several featuring Broadway detective Quinny Hite).



Chinese Red / Here Lies the Body



The inimitable Quinny Hite is on the case—tough, cocky Quinny who invariably ends up in deeper waters of detection than he bargained for. Quinny's territory is Times Square, but he'll dig in wherever he is when murder appears.


Chinese Red: A wealthy playboy disappears from a dinner party at a Chinese restaurant, only to be found murdered. Quinny finds plenty of suspects, and one beautiful half-Chinese, half-Russian singer.


Here Lies the Body: A cold-hearted patriarch is found murdered in the family cemetery. Family secrets complicate Quinny’s investigation (not to mention a jarring ride on horseback).


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The Fourth Star / Sinister Street



The Fourth Star: Quinny investigates the mysterious death of a woman found in an empty home owned by her ex-husband.


Sinister Street: Quinny is hired to investigate a robbery, but murder soon exposes a more insidious plot.


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