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#1937Club – The Case is Closed (Miss Silver Mystery Book 2) by Patricia Wentworth #HistFic24 #ClassicClub

Posted on April 23, 2024 by J-LBRBSBLOGS

THE YEAR CLUBS: READING 1937

WEEK 15 – 21 APRIL 2024: THE 1937 CLUB

The 1937 Club

Karen at Kaggsy’s Bookish Ramblings and Simon at Stuck in a Book co-host the year clubs. The next challenge is the year 1937 and takes place from 15th to 21st of April. Karen will have a dedicated page on her site to provide links to people’s reviews, and Simon will also link on his blog. If you review by blog post on X/Twitter then please use the hashtag #1937Club.

Book blurb

The Everton murder case has long been closed. The culprit has been charged with the murder of his uncle and has served a year of his sentence already. Or has he?

The evidence against Geoffrey Grey is convincing but his wife believes in his innocence. And so does her young cousin, Hilary, who decides to solve the mystery herself.

But when Hilary herself is nearly murdered she turns in desperation to her ex-fiance for help. He calls upon the services of Miss Silver to help solve another mystery, which she does in her own original style..

Miss Maud Silver, perhaps Patricia Wentworth’s best known character, was the main protagonist in the 32 Miss Silver novels. The Case is Closed is the second in the series.

Miss Silver is a spinster and retired governess who has opened a private detective agency. She has a network of people especially in the police to call upon. She is efficient, starts a new notebook for each case and is often knitting. Her clients are usually from the middle and upper classes.

My thoughts

Whilst this book is of its time in many ways – language, attitude and practices, such as hanging, are accepted – it is still a good example of a crime novel, well written and interestingly the main protagonist, Miss Silver, doesn’t initially appear in the book. It is Hilary Carew who is the teller of this story.

It begins when Hilary is on the wrong train. It was Henry’s fault, of course, if she hadn’t seen him on the platform she would not have hurried into the carriage without checking first. It was too late and she would just have to wait it out, get off at some point and find her way home.

She was wondering about that when one of the other two passengers in the carriage, a man, steps out into the corridor. She turns to the woman and asks where the train is for, Ledlington she is told but then the woman says she recognises Hilary and starts up a conversation about Marion. Marion, Hilary’s cousin, wife of Geoffrey Grey convicted a year ago of killing his uncle. Hilary is incensed, how dare she! She gets up to move carriage. The woman stops her and Hilary realises she is not a ghoul but still finds her rather strange. They talk, the woman asks after Marion and Geoffrey and Hilary is intrigued with something the woman says.

Once home she tells Marion about seeing Henry and getting the wrong train. Describing the woman Marion shows her a photo. The woman is in it. She is Mrs Mercer once housekeeper to Mr James Everton, Geoffrey’s uncle, whose damning testimony helped convict Geoffrey! He had been imprisoned, convicted but not sentenced to hang something that surprised some.

From here on in Hilary conducts an investigation into the murder. She reads the papers Marion has and speaks to various people connected to the trial and what happened on the night of the murder. Hilary is sure Geoffrey is innocent even though the evidence seems watertight. She has strong feelings about the Mercer’s testimony believing that they have lied.

Someone, however, is obviously concerned about Hilary’s investigations. She is followed. She ropes Henry in to help. He advises her to stop looking into the matter but, of course, she doesn’t. Henry enlists the help of Miss Silver, engaging her to look into the case.

The book up to here has been very much from Hilary’s point of view and whilst we continue to have her telling the story it is supported by what Henry and Miss Silver discuss. Miss Silver is very adept at obtaining information and astute with regard to its meaning.

It is after a near death experience for Hilary that Henry brings her to see Miss Silver. It is from this meeting that we ultimately find out what happened and whether Geoffrey did actually murder his uncle.

The beginning of the book is quite leisurely we are introduced to the characters and the trial of Geoffrey Grey. We also have the story of Hilary and Henry who were engaged. I found it very easy to understand why Hilary would break off the engagement. Yet this is a story of its time which means male attitudes in this instance Henry and indeed Henrys mother’s implied attitude whilst being annoying to say the least are, sadly, to be expected. In the end Henry is, well perhaps you should make your own mind up.

Hilary goes about her investigation as a rather naive but bright and enthusiastic amateur sleuth would. She gets into something that she can’t control although she does do a pretty good job of it. The story picks up pace and tension as she continues to investigate.

It’s quite a dark story as is often the case with what is described as ‘cosy’ crime fiction. It simply doesn’t get gruesome but it does get quite tense. I think some will find coincidences that happen in the story a bit far fetched but it’s no more so, in my opinion, than happens in some more modern crime fiction writing. This is a well written book, it’s engaging and one that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Book: Purchased

The Case is Closed by Patricia Wentworth also counts to my #HistFic24 challenge and is the first read of my Classic Club challenge.

Thomas the Rhymer

For those of you who wondered when you read about it in the book here’s a version of the folk tune from Steeleye Span.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Here’s the poem from which Maude Silver quotes when speaking to Hilary for the first time.

All in All

In Love, if Love be Love, if Love be ours,

Faith and unfaith can ne’er be equal powers:

Unfaith in aught is want of faith in all.

It is the little rift within the lute,

That by and by will make the music mute,

And ever widening slowly silence all.

The little rift within the lover’s lute,

Or little pitted speck in garner’d fruit,

That rotting inward slowly moulders all.

It is not worth the keeping: let it go:

But shall it? answer, darling, answer, no.

And trust me not at all or all in all.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Comparing Miss Silver with Miss Marple

When reading around this book I came across this piece ‘Miss Marple and Miss Silver—a comparison’ on the Promoting Crime Fiction blog by Carol Westron.

Information

Published: Hodder & Stoughton; New Ed edition (12 Sept. 2005) | 316 pp | ISBN:1504047842

Author

Patricia Wentworth was born Dora Amy Elles in Mussoorie, India in 1877. She was the only daughter of Lieutenant-General Sir Edmond and Lady Elles. Her father served most of his career in the British Army in India, where she spent the major part of her early life. She received a high school education at Blackheath High School in London where she and her two brothers were sent to live with her grandmother. After her graduation, she returned to India. She published her first work in the Civil and Military Gazette there. She married Colonel George Dillon in 1906. He died shortly after and left her with a young daughter and three stepsons. She and her children returned to England. She began writing and published six historical fiction novels between 1910 and 1915. Her first novel, A Marriage under the Terror, appeared in 1910. It was an instant success and won for her a prize for best first novel.

In 1920 she married Lieutenant George Oliver Turnbull and moved to Surrey. Turnbull encouraged her writing and she would dictate her novels to him. Wentworth wrote her first mystery novel The Astonishing Adventure of Jane Smith in 1923. Her first Maud Silver book, Grey Mask was written in 1928. Nine years and fifteen mystery novels later, she returned to Maud Silver, who became her most popular character. Patricia Wentworth wrote over seventy novels. She died on January 28, 1961. She is recognized today as one of the pre-eminent exponents of the classic British golden age mystery novel. Her novels are definitely cozy, and are frequently set in English villages.

Miss Silver was so popular in the US during the 1940’s that Lippincott of Philadelphia became her primary publisher and released the Miss Silver novels in the US before their release in England.

Patricia Wentworth’s other characters include Ernest Lamb, a chief investigator who sometimes works with Miss Silver, and Randal March, the chief constable of the county where many of Miss Silver’s cases occur.

Patricia Wentworth (Estate) – Andrew Nurnberg Associates | DSP Patricia Wentworth page | AmazonSmileUK – Author page

Titles with year of publication

‘Maud Silver’ Novels

Other Novels

There were a further thirty three (33) full-length mysteries by Patricia Wentworth, books 2 – 34 below – that did not feature Miss Silver the entire run of these is now reissued by Dean Street Press.

Benbow Smith Books*

Fool Errant (1929) | Danger Calling (1931) | Walk with Care (1933) | Down Under (1937)

Ernest Lamb Books**

The Blind Side (1939) | Who Pays the Piper? (1940) | Pursuit of a Parcel (1942)

Frank Garrett Books***

Dead or Alive (1936) | Rolling Stone (1940)