The Case Is Closed

Rating:
Summary: Hilary's Nightmare.
Review: Miss Maud Hephzibah Silver made her first appearance in 1929, predating Agatha Christie's more famous Miss Marple. Thereafter her creator, Patricia Wentworth, spelled her until 1937, when she allowed her a second appearance, in this book, "The Case Is Closed". She featured in only six of the book's 36 chapters, but the author never again allowed her a holiday, employing her in all her subsequent mystery novels.

Patricia Wentworth depicts her Miss Silver with a comic touch. The retired governess - with her polite cough, her occasional exclamation of "Dear Me!", her propensity to quote the poetry of Alfred Lord Tennyson, her knitting of baby clothes while conducting a consultation, her hen-like manner of running, and her quaint taste in clothing - is delineated with sure satirical skill. There is never a touch of wit or satire in the presentation of any other character in this novel, however. The earnest, the threatening, the tortured, the traumatized - the other characters seem to belong in the world of nightmares.

Indeed, much of the atmosphere here has the attributes of a nightmare. Hilary, the heroine convinced that her cousin's husband has been wrongly convicted of his uncle's murder seems to be living a nightmare. In strange, eerie ways she chances upon clues, and she seems to be relentlessly pursued by a monster of evil. Attempts to escape one threat land her in an even worse one. Dimensions have a nightmarish quality too. Happening to be in Glasgow, Hilary is somehow able to perceive the face of a character whose whereabouts she did not know at the fifth floor window of a large block of tenements. She can see, moreover, an expression of anguish and terror on the face. She feels impelled to climb the many flights of evil-smelling stairs to rescue, aid, question and investigate. Of course, a near death experience awaits her. These are absurd coincidences and impossibilities yet all are true to a nightmare mode...Patricia Wentworth wrote dozens of Miss Silver mysteries.

Rating:
Summary: Hilary's Nightmare.
Review: Miss Maud Hephzibah Silver made her first appearance in 1929, predating Agatha Christie's more famous Miss Marple. Thereafter her creator, Patricia Wentworth, spelled her until 1937, when she allowed her a second appearance, in this book, "The Case Is Closed". She featured in only six of the book's 36 chapters, but the author never again allowed her a holiday, employing her in all her subsequent mystery novels.

Patricia Wentworth depicts her Miss Silver with a comic touch. The retired governess - with her polite cough, her occasional exclamation of "Dear Me!", her propensity to quote the poetry of Alfred Lord Tennyson, her knitting of baby clothes while conducting a consultation, her hen-like manner of running, and her quaint taste in clothing - is delineated with sure satirical skill. There is never a touch of wit or satire in the presentation of any other character in this novel, however. The earnest, the threatening, the tortured, the traumatized - the other characters seem to belong in the world of nightmares.

Indeed, much of the atmosphere here has the attributes of a nightmare. Hilary, the heroine convinced that her cousin's husband has been wrongly convicted of his uncle's murder seems to be living a nightmare. In strange, eerie ways she chances upon clues, and she seems to be relentlessly pursued by a monster of evil. Attempts to escape one threat land her in an even worse one. Dimensions have a nightmarish quality too. Happening to be in Glasgow, Hilary is somehow able to perceive the face of a character whose whereabouts she did not know at the fifth floor window of a large block of tenements. She can see, moreover, an expression of anguish and terror on the face. She feels impelled to climb the many flights of evil-smelling stairs to rescue, aid, question and investigate. Of course, a near death experience awaits her. These are absurd coincidences and impossibilities yet all are true to a nightmare mode...Patricia Wentworth wrote dozens of Miss Silver mysteries.

Rating:
Summary: A charming period piece
Review: This Miss Silver mystery focuses on the struggle for power in male-female relationships - on the light-hearted side, in the signature "nice young couple" (Hilary and Henry), while a villain displays dominance and abuse. We gain a picture of life among the well-bred if not well-fed as we follow Hilary's attempts to clear her cousin's husband Geoffrey, who has been convicted of the murder of his uncle. The attitudes and sensitivities of a different time are on display as Hilary's cousin copes with the degradation of having to earn a living as a couturier's model, and the loss of not only her husband, but the children she had hoped to have. Henry is not at all sure that the conviction was unjust, but the villains behave sufficiently suspiciously that he brings in governess-turned-private-enquiry-agent-Miss Silver, who discovers a decidedly dated motive for the down-trodden housekeeper's behavior. Some near escapes, tricky timetables and elaborate plots complete this tale from mystery's Golden Age. And with Miss Silver taking a hand, the happy ending and the triumph of justice are a comfortable certainty.