The House of the Vanishing Goblets: (A Golden-Age Mystery Reprint) - Paperback

by Arlo Channing Edington (Author), Carmen Ballen Edington (Author), Curtis Evans (Introduction by)

"The Edingtons have turned out an uncommonly good thriller in this murder tale, fresh in setting, solid and completely baffling in the mystery factor, unusually skillful in characterization.

"Written by movie people about the movie world, it projects the real atmosphere of behind-the-scenes in the cinema arena. A Hollywood cinema director, commanding a thousand ex-soldiers, is 'shooting' battle scenes on location near a weird, untenanted monstrosity, the exterior of which resembles a dilapidated French chateau. While filming this war spectacle, the enterprise is suddenly brought to a standstill, stunned, by the brutal killing of the director and his leading man.

"Death came to them apparently in two separate rooms of this mansion, where they had gone by weirdly mysterious and empty night to look over the ground for filming interiors the next day.

"When the crimes are discovered, the still living, wounded body of an unknown man is found in the room with the dead director, under circumstances which superficially suggest that he is the latter's murderer. The Los Angeles police sleuth who takes charge of the case does not impress one as a bloodhound exceptionally qualified for the job, but the reader should not be worried on his account since the story itself is so persistently engrossing as to center all one's attention closely on the unfolding action regardless of the detective's humdrum plotting.

"The House of the Vanishing Goblets, in which these murders occurred, has its exact counterpart in real life in the famous Winchester mystery house of San Jose, Calif., otherwise known as the eighth wonder of the world, its secret panels, hidden doors, oddly assorted and crazily planless rooms, and the gruesome rumors hovering about its past, it is a fitting locale for a story of queer and murderous doing this is.

"Of especial interest is this house, which is one of the weirdest buildings on record. Planned and built by the late Sarah L. Winchester, it took 36 years to be finished, the owner living in the belief that she would die when it was completed. The structure covers six acres, contains 160 rooms, and has thousands of doors and windows. It has three elevators, 40 stairways (most of them having 13 steps), 47 fireplaces, blind stairways and blind chimneys, trap doors and secret passageways.

"With such a perfect setting for this weird crime, the story with its chills and tremors ought to satisfy the most critical mystery story reader." (Quad City Times, June 8, 1930)

The House of the Vanishing Goblets was first published in 1930.

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