I was quite excited when I discovered that this sole mystery novel from Rudolph Fisher was to be republished under the revived Detective Club imprint. To my understanding it had impossible crime overtones with a vanishing body, and GAD fiction doesn’t exactly offer up a swathe of BAME authors, so this account of 1930s Harlem promised to fulfil all sorts of fascinating niches — not least how a black author would represent the experience of being a black man in America when times were not as enlightened as we hope them to be now. But, first things first, yes we do get an impossibly-vanishing body, provided by a Red Widow Murders-esque “How could he be talking if he was dead?” impossible murder for which there was no time in which it could have been committed; so do we have a classic on our hands?
It’s an interesting read, no doubt, and feels like a tentative step into the realm of detective fiction that really achieves the courage of its convictions at certain times: an atmospheric setting and discovery of his murder (forgive the Carr reference again, but it’s a bit Judas Window, too, in that we’re trusting the person in the room at the time isn’t guilty…) brings medical doctor John Archer to the scene where he meets the detective of the piece, from which point the two work in consort to unpick the mystery. Possibly the initial descriptive passages are a little too detailed, but once the plot gets moving and the investigation gets underway it becomes clear how well Fisher is going to handle things.
Of particular interest is how head-on he approaches the racial attitudes of the time, with it being suggested that the black Detective Perry Dart was promoted to such because “his generously pigmented skin rendered him invisible in the dark,” or having two characters arguing about how ugly one of them is, only for him to retort that his friend “ought to be back in Africa with the other dumb boogies”. Even more interestingly is how unsensationally, almost casually, this whole element is handled: Fisher is aware of the prejudice and inequality of the time in which he’s writing — he couldn’t not be — and chooses to simply treat it as a matter of fact around his mystery. It might be best summed up in the following exchange:
“What kind o’ detective is you?”
“A police detective, madam, of the City of New York. And please let me ask the questions while you confine yourself to the answers.”
“Police detective? ‘Tain’t so. They don’t have no black detectives.”
“Your informant was either ignorant or colour-blind, madam. Now would you care to give your answers here or around at the police station?”
Great that this is back in print, no question about it. Thanks JJ – hope to pick up a copy eventually …
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Always nice to have some classic GAD back in print; even nicer when it’s as enjoyable and eye-opening as this. Put it on the list…
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Will do JJ – I am hideously behind with my reading, but …
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Oh, yeah, aren’t we all?! My current TBR is probably enough to get me through another five years without the need to buy anything more. Frankly, I’m astonished I got to this as quickly as I did; clearly some sort of clerical error that needs looking into…
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I admire your energy chum, I really do.
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It’s not energy so much as an inability to operate within limits. When it comes to books, my ability to resist just…vanishes 🙂
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Reading your review has reminded me how complex I found the plot and solution in this book. Definitely need to be paying full attention when reading it.
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It’s a weird one, innit? Because there’s an argument that you don’t really need to pay attention too closely to get the plot since it’s not built on conventional grounds, yet at the same time you really need to pay attention to a couple of minor things or else you’re completely lost. And all this on top of not being completely sure what you’re getting in the first place…an unusual experience, for sure!
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