The Arabian Nights Murder; The Burning Court; Gideon Fell 11 The Problem of the Wire Cage) PDF
Preview The Arabian Nights Murder; The Burning Court; Gideon Fell 11 The Problem of the Wire Cage)
c ^x^- In f THREE DETECTIVE NOVELS including THE ARABIAN NIGHTS MURDER THE BURNING COURT THE PROBLEM OF THE WIRE CAGE by JOHN DICKSON CARR Harper& Brothers, Publishers New York THREEDETECTIVE NOVELS © Copyright 1959 by Harper & Brothers THE ARABIAN NIGHTS MURDER: Copyright 1936 by John Dickson Carr THE BURNING COURT: Copyright 1937 by John Dickson Carr THEPROBLEMOFTHEWIRECAGE: Copyright 1939byJohnDicksonCarr Printed in the United States of America All rights in this book are reserved. No part of the book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written per- mission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address Harper & Brothers 49 East 33rd Street, New York 16, N. Y. FOREWORD By Howard Haycraft We all know what is meant by a musicians' musician, an actors' actor, or a ball players' ball player. In a similar sense it can truthfully be said that John Dickson Carr is a detective story writers' detective story writer. There canbe fewhigher professional compliments. John Carr is that rarity, a truly transatlantic author. American born, he has divided his writing life between his native country and England. He holds the unique distinction of having been (at different times) Honorary Secretary of the London Detection Club and President of the Mystery Writers of America. A lover of good talk, he is renowned in both groups for his coruscating wit, his doughty championship of the "pure" detective story against all comers, and his devotion to amateur theatricals (qualities by no means absent from his fiction). In the opinion of outstanding critics and thousands of readers. Dr. Gideon Fell, Carr's principal detective character, sups at detection's high table with Dupin, Sherlock Holmes, and Father Brown. In point of fact, his resem- blance to Father Brown's creator, the late and great Gilbert K. Chesterton, seems more than accidental. John Dickson Carr's mastery of the locked-room mystery has become so legendary that we tend to forget some of his other talents—the deft charac- terization and taste for the bizarre, the humor and unerring sense of the macabre, above all the contagious gusto and vitality—that have long made him a top favorite on both sides of the water. It was the publisher's happy idea to bring back in this volume three out- standing novels of Carr's earlier years, carefully chosen to give full play to all of the author's diverse talents. I am not sure which I would rather be: the readerwho meets these stories for the firsttime, with the joy of discovery still before him, or one who savors this hearty and heady fare for the second time. Digitized by tine Internet Archive in 2010 littp://www.archive.org/details/threedetectivenoOOcarr THE ARABIAN NIGHTS MURDER "You swear by the Beard of the Prophet. Then could not the teller of tales make us a curious story even out of a beard?" —Arabian Nights' Entertainment "I hesitated; and at length a single word, uttered distinctly but slowly, and as if breathlessly spoken, fell upon my ear; it was, 'Whiskersl'" —Life of the Rev. R. H. Barham
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