Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-02-01
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turn. Not agreeable, to be sure. Not any
where near charming and Whimsical and al
together engaging. But enough alike, on the
ground floor or in the cellar, to realize that we,
too, are going along with this fellow who finds
temptation at every corner and who, Of course,
yields to it as the only effective way of getting
rid of it, oscar Wilde said that In substance.
Said 1t better, CT course)
This is Baccio Cards adventlire-and yours
and mine Looking for the moon, reaching for
the rainbow all of us. Plainly all that this
Card wanted was to write book. You and
want instead, maybe-wel almost any equally
modest success However we are not interest,"
ing. Baccio Cardi Is For he succeeds in get
ting into Jail, in coming upon good friends Of
the road, fakirs and quacks and such Who
with their other gifts, know all about the way
the sun drifts down upon an otherwise gloomy
world, how the rain sings as it potters its way
from the clouds, what the animals are so en-
crossed about-nothing much, but making love
and eating, but they seem to do things better
than we do less messily. oh, this is q great
business I'd go along, for an hour IL were
you. Shut up our account books and your
calculatings and come along!
THE BACK SEAT MURDER. BY Herman
Landon, author Of The Voice in the Closet"
etc. New York: Horace Liveright.
IN THE CASE of the down-trodden and over
worked mystery tale-and every one Of the
tribe Is both in these days-a good start appears
to be about half the battle for success. We are
faded, we readers of detective yarns. We have
to be Seduced into attention by some unusual
gesture at just about the first send-on. And
here we have it. It takes a minute for US to
realize that that old nancier sitting at his desk
debating a letter to his secretary, is writing
about that secretary himself. The letter goes
ON to state the writer's suspicion against the
new man. Rather plaintively he dictates that
he has new secretary who is anything but,
and q new nurse. Who also is masquerading in
q role from which she is, in fact, far removed.
That is novel, you see It is different and at
once you turn to the young clerk, just to see
how he is taking it. Splendidly. Not q hint,
not sign. It looks like start that may open
out to revive the sleepineSs Of the average
reader toward crime fiction. It is all right.
Much better than the average. More startling
in its demands upon the reader to believe that
the moon is made of green cheese-but it is,
you see. Even odder truths than this come out
under the agile mind Of Herman Landon. You
assent it all and would without question have
accepted more of the same brand of ingenuity
In committing murder and getting away with
1t. We growl over detective tales We lie about
not liking them. One wonders why everybody
no exclusion here's at heart carried away
by them. Is it, could it be- because of the real
mystery that every minute of human life is?
Mysterious beginnings, mysterious journey more
mysterious arrival finally Nobody should let
Seat Murder!" Say it couldn't have happened
that way. Then run to catch the next bewilder-
ing thriller of the same kind that comes out.