Reading her novels chronologically, I’m moved to declare that 1942 was a big year for Craig Rice. Prior to then, she had written five fast-moving, wildly inventive mysteries featuring wisecracking lawyer John J. Malone and Jake and Helene Justus, but 1942 saw Rice diversify with (not necessarily in this order) a Malone novel in The Big Midget Murders (1942) that ramped up plot complexity, The Sunday Pigeon Murders (1942) taking on a new setting with a more dim-bulb presence at its core, atmosphere overwhelming the slow-moving Telefair (1942) and now, with The Man Who Slept All Day (1942), long character-work taking over from plot mechanics so that you really do care about the people involved. That noise you hear is the stretching of some wings.

It’s clear that plot is not Rice’s purpose here, because the essential pattern is set early and does not vary until a fairly predictable — though fairly-prepared — twist changes things with about a tenth of the book remaining. Seven people are invited to a drinks party at Ravensmoor, the home of the wealthy Frank Faulkner. The only drawback is that Frank’s odious brother George, who appears to have his hooks into every guest in his own way, will also be present. And so, the morning after a heavy night’s drinking it is discovered, by each of the guests in turn, that George is not sleeping off his excesses but has in fact been murdered in the night.

A repeated refrain is then given the chance to establish itself: firstly, every guest, searching George’s room for the evidence he holds over them, becomes convinced that they are the only person who will be arrested for the murder; secondly, they leave the room and continue to pretend, as the title suggests, that George is merely sleeping. Rinse and repeat, interspersed with reflections and reminiscences that fill out backstories and generate much sympathy for these people trapped in this situation. But, well, who did murder him?

It’s true that this does get a little wearisome in the book’s third quarter, but for most of the rest the little wrinkles that Rice adds to her characters are honestly beautifully uncommon, and superbly written. There’s a real focus here on love, and on what a transformative thing that is when you find it, with there being little doubt that everyone is acting not in the typically selfish idiom of a possible killer in a GAD novel but out of a genuine desire to do the best for any by the other person in the house who they love so dearly. It’s especially wonderful, too, to see characters screw up the courage to confess their misdeeds and have their dark secrets treated with such empathy, and even for the little flashes of sadness that come hand-in-hand with this delicate observation of love, such as the way ex-chorus girl Kitten Riley is, at the age of 38, written about like she’s a faded and obsolete geriatric who’s lucky to still be able to subsist on the good graces of the people around her.

It’s Rice, though, so none of this is handled clumsily, with some citrus-sharp turns of phrase…

“Reno’s folks didn’t come over on the Mayflower because they were too proud to ride on anything but their own boat.”

…and a handful of very good jokes:

“George is harmful, and he is vicious, and he is criminal. He can’t help it, but he is. And he isn’t insane; no doctor in the world would judge him insane.”

No, Tom Dixon thought, but any doctor in the world would pronounce him dead.

I felt the characters here in a way that I haven’t done for a combined cast since Murder in the Family (1936) by James Ronald. Even the butler Bletsom and literally and figuratively colourless Mr. Melville Fairr, both of whom have their own interesting perspectives to bring to proceedings, have plenty of time to shine amidst Rice hitting the nails of love so acutely on the head time and again.

The finale, then, fits perfectly with what has come before it, even if it is an arguable cop-out to wind things up with a heavy dose of ipsedixitism. Rice has well and truly achieved what she wanted to by this point, however, and the way she would carry these lessons forward into the one book of hers I’ve read out of chronology — Home Sweet Homicide (1944), perhaps one of the ten best GAD novels ever written — more than justifies the slightly slick handling of the plot conclusions here. It’ll make more sense in the context of Rice’s wider career, but as a piece of character work this deserves studying, and should really be better known. Ten novels into her output, and I find myself only more intrigued by Rice’s oeuvre; colour me very excited for her output in 1943.

~

See also

John @ Pretty Sinister: Many of the secrets are related to crimes, some are only lapses in character but with possibly long lasting damage to reputation and social standing if the secret were ever made public. What Craig Rice…has done with this set-up is to explore guilty consciences as Christie did in [And Then There Were None], but with considerably less at stake than having everyone be a secret killer. Really what is delved into is the devotion of married and soon-to-be married partners and their complicated relationships. Repeatedly we are told that each couple belongs with each other, that each couple recognizes in the others an example of “true love,” of fidelity over all else, of devotion that take the phrase “till death do us part” to literal extremes.

Featuring Melville Fairr [a.p.a. by Michael Venning]:

Featuring Bingo Riggs and Handsome Kusak:

Standalone: