I don't know why I never read any Ellery Queen, but I hadn't. Ellery Queen is the pen name of a pair of writers. I'm not sure why they also made that the name of their detective. This is a collection of short stories that appeared on my kindle.
Queen solves mysteries by the application of logic and reason. In that he has much company in the genre - from Hercule Poirot to "The Mentalist" of current television. He is a rather irritating character, and the settings are quite dated. Like others, Queen has a solid connection with the police. His father is a senior officer of some sort and calls him in to consult.
Ellery Queen first appeared in 1928, and I haven't read much detective fiction from that period - I suppose I should. I'm afraid I was rather startled by the racial epithets on every page. A maid is never just a maid, she is always a "colored girl" and stupid as well as ignorant. Jews, Italians, and Germans also come in for the same treatment. Things have changed, I know, but that surprised me. It just seemed unnecessary - through the filter of many years of societal change. I have been reminded to consider the period and place and perhaps my shock is a little hypocritical given the way I reacted to the refusal of some members of the book club to read my last selection, but, the characters may have dropped the "f-bomb" with great frequency, but the writer did not reduce whole nationalities to ethnic jokes.
Ellery Queen and the "Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine" were definitely formative elements to the mystery genre, so I suppose more reading is in order, but I may find it rather difficult.
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