---

Transcript

Hello there, mystery readers. Do you like keeping up with new books, especially historical mysteries? Then you should sign up for my New Release historical mystery newsletter at SaraRosett.com/historical. It goes out twice a month with my hand-picked selection of the latest historical mystery books.

Here’s what one reader, Cassie, had to say about it: “Thank you so much for putting these all together! I’ve already added these to my reading list!” You can keep up with new releases and discover new historical mysteries . . . because we all need a little mystery in our lives, right? Sign up at SaraRosett.com/historical. And now onto the podcast.

Welcome to Mystery Books Podcast where you’ll discover new mystery books and authors. I’m USA Today bestselling mystery author Sara Rosett. I’m also a bookworm who specialties in the mystery genre. I love sharing my favorite mystery discoveries  from classic golden age novels to contemporary cozies. This is Season Two Episode Two, and it’s all about The Sloane Square Mystery by Herbert Adams.

The Sloane Square Mystery by Herbert Adams was published in 1925, and it is a standalone mystery.

Book Blurb

So let me read you the blurb.

“London, 1924. Two young society gentlemen, Bruce Graham and the Honorable Edward Lamport are making their way home from a party in the early hours of the morning and discover the body of a wealthy philanthropist, who is the uncle of their friend Rollo. When it becomes clear that Rollo is the prime suspect, Bruce and Edward–along with the smart and independent Joan–band together to find evidence that will clear their friend’s name.”

Here’s the first line, actually the first two lines, because the first line is pretty short.

“It was nearly half past one on Sunday morning. Sloane Square, busy all day with traffic that streamed across it from six different directions, was silent and deserted.”

Story Behind the Story

I’m working with McGuffin Publishing to bring out some of these classic books, reprints of these classic golden age novels that have sort of been forgotten. And I did some research into Adams, the author of this book, and there’s really not a lot about him, but we do know a lot about the books he wrote, even though some of them are really hard to find.

So the story behind the story and some fun facts about this book, Herbert Adams lived from 1874 to 1958. And he was incredibly prolific novelist; he wrote over 50 mysteries. And he’s best known now for his golf themed mysteries. And he had two long running series characters. One was the solicitor or lawyer, Jimmie Haswell, and he first appeared in The Secret of Bogey House, which was published in 1924. And after that book came out, Adams went on to write eight more books with that character.

Jimmie in that book is more of a minor character and I’m not sure why Adams made the switch to include him as the protagonist. But maybe he just felt like, you know, having an attorney provided him more options, I guess, with a character. Or maybe readers’ reception was the reason; we didn’t really know. In 1936, Adams introduced another character, a gentleman sleuth with a fondness for golf in Death Off the Fairway. And that was Major Roger Bennion, and he proved to be even more successful than Haswell.

Adams wrote a total of twenty-eight books featuring this gentleman sleuth. So there’s plenty of those out there. But it’s very interesting that even though he wrote so many books, Adams is really not well known today. His books have kind of faded from the collective consciousness of classic mystery readers. And I’ve really enjoyed reading The Secret of Bogey House and The Sloane Square Mystery. He also wrote fifteen standalone novels under the name Herbert Adams, as well as two other novels under the pen name Jonathan Gray. The Sloane Square Mystery is one of his earliest mysteries.

Themes and Tropes

Let’s get into the themes of this book. I think the strongest themes in this book are Friendship and Loyalty.

Bruce has a nickname, Spider and Ned. Those two friends stick by Rollo and help him clear his name when he’s accused of murdering his uncle. And this is a good look at the friendships between Bruce and Ned and Rollo and Joan as well. Joan comes in a little bit later. Bruce is the one who kind of leads the charge, but Joan is right there helping him. Ned is kind of the comic relief, although he is just as close a friend. But Rollo, he can’t count on his family. They’re not supportive of him at all. But it’s his friends who help him out.

And it’s interesting because this was written it was published in 1925. And so World War I was not that long ago when this came out. And Bruce tells why he feels compelled to help Rollo. And it’s an insight into their friendship, but it’s also an insight into the attitudes and the language really that people had at that time to handle the stress or what we would call post-traumatic stress of the war. They made light of it, and you can see that in the terminology they use.

So this is why Bruce says he must help Rollo. He says “Out there, in the early days when we were bolting according to plan, I got left behind in a village. I had stopped a bit of shell and was forgotten. Old Rollo came back and whisked me off from just under the Germans’ noses. So I owe him something.”

So I thought that was very telling in my writing of the historical mysteries. I’m trying to catch that same sort of tone where death and war and all of this is just kind of referred to in a passing manner and kind of in a jokey way. And I think that’s how they dealt with the stress of the war.

Loyalty isn’t limited just to the soldiers. Joan is Rollo’s ex fiancee, and she is fiercely loyal, much more so than his relatives. She is an interesting character and I really enjoyed reading about her. I can tell you that in reading Golden Age fiction, she’s a really well rounded character. With a story that takes a male protagonist with a lead POV, the female characters are not always very well rounded. Sometimes they’re just there to drop a few lines or, you know, move the plot forward in some way. But Joan is, she’s very interesting. I enjoyed reading about her. She’s sporty. That’s not something that you see a whole lot in Golden Age fiction. And I think it was sort of a new take on a character, something that wasn’t seen a lot at that time. She’s a team player; she was on hockey teams, mixed cricket teams and swimming teams. She rides a motorbike. And she teaches Sunday school to a group of boys who she calls “the duckiest little devils on earth.” Which I just loved. And it’s Joan who notices this gap in the timeline of what happened on the day that the murder occurred. And that’s critical to helping them figure out what really happened. So she’s not just a pretty face. She’s not there just to be the love interest. And I kind of she was a serious character and I could read more about her.

All right. So let’s move on to tropes. In Sloane Square Mystery, I think there’s a couple of fun tropes.

One is the High Society Murder, which I’m always on board for. It’s set in the early 1920s in this really affluent world in the opening scene, we get that right away. Bruce and Ed or Ned are strolling home from a party in the early hours of the morning, and they’re described as wearing the uniform of well-to-do respectability. And here’s how it’s described, “Their white shirts and white waistcoats, only partially concealed by their unbuttoned overcoats, suggested that t hey had left some festive gather in that fashionable part of Belgravia . . .” So they’re dressed up in their evening ware even though, you know, it’s pretty, pretty late. They’re out strolling along and that’s when they found the dead body. So it does give us a look at this really exclusive set of people and how they lived in London in the early 1920s. And there are some characters that are more on the fringes of that type of society. But the main characters, Spider and Ned and Joan and Rollo, are all the Bright Young Things from the early 1920s.

Another trope that we have is Broken Up, But It’s Not Over. And that’s, of course, Joan and Rollo. They were engaged, but Joan broke it off and for very good reason. But despite the broken engagement, she’s still definitely in Rollo’s corner and she works just as hard to clear his name as his other two friends.

Another trope we have in this one is the Foolish Sidekick, and that is the comic relief of Ned. And it’s a lot of fun. He is using mystery novels as his guide for how to detect and how to help his friend. So they’re not much help actually with the sleuthing, but it’s very entertaining.

Quotes

For a quote to end with, I’m going to give you a sample of Ned’s detecting skills. So the book says, “Ned Lamport, who, still attired in his dressing-gown and slippers and with a large piece of toast in his hand, had apparently rushed from his breakfast-table to bring his tidings to the flat on the floor above.”
{Which is where his friend Rollo went. Once he gets to Spider’s rooms and gets let in, he says:}
“We know Rollo is innocent, but the question is who is guilty. That is where we are all stuck. I’ve been trying to think it out for myself, Spider. Yesterday I bought five mystery books and read every word of them. Now I see a great light.”
“That’s good, laddie. Diffuse it.”
“The point is this. In every case the fellow who did  the dirty work was the last fellow you’ll think of suspecting.”

So of course, he thinks that it is the least likely character. And he comes up with this crazy idea of somebody who’s only tangentially related to the story because that’s the least likely person. And of course, he’s not right. But it is funny and entertaining to watch him. And he has several of these ideas, these brainstorms, none of them are quite right.

So here’s my question for you this week. Who is your favorite plucky female character in fiction? It doesn’t have to be someone in mystery fiction; it could be in any genre. So let me know. You can find me on Instagram at Sara Rosett. That’s no H on Sara and no E on Rosett. Or you can leave a comment on the show notes for this episode, which will be at sararosett.com/sloane.

I hope this podcast has let you revisit a favorite book or perhaps helped you discover a new author to try.  If you’ve enjoyed this podcast,  I hope you’ll tell a fellow mystery reader. Thanks for listening and see you next time!