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With a rich man footing the bills and a handsome lover on the side, Isabel Kerr seemed to have the perfect setup. Now the well-kept lady is stone-cold dead, and the cops have nabbed a Manhattan private eye who just happens to be an acquaintance of Nero Wolfe. Unable to refuse a friend in need, the great detective deigns to get the gumshoe off the hook. Little does Wolfe realize that in a matter of hours he'll be entertaining a party of fools and lovers connected with the doxy's death, including a mystery blackmailer, a sexy lounge singer, and a cold-blooded lady-killer. Introduction by Sandra West Prowell "It is always a treat to read a Nero Wolfe mystery. The man has entered our folklore."--The New York Times Book Review A grand master of the form, Rex Stout is one of America's greatest mystery writers, and his literary creation Nero Wolfe is one of the greatest fictional detectives of all time. Together, Stout and Wolfe have entertained--and puzzled--millions of mystery fans around the world. Now, with his perambulatory man-about-town, Archie Goodwin, the arrogant, gourmandizing, sedentary sleuth is back in the original seventy-three cases of crime and detection written by the inimitable master himself, Rex Stout.… (more)
User reviews
One reason I really like Rex Stout’s books is the characters. Nero Wolfe is a larger-than-life misogynistic genius who can only function on a schedule or risk getting indigestion from getting upset at meals. Archie Goodwin is the wise-cracking optimist who retains his good humor in all situations. In Death of a Doxy, the minor characters also get a chance to shine: Saul Panzer, Fred Durkin and Inspector Cramer are all in good form.
If you’ve read Rex Stout, you’ll like Death of a Doxy; if you’re thinking about reading one, this is as good a place to start as any.
Later in the story Wolf picks up [The Jungle Book] by Rudyard Kipling. And he also consults the [Encyclopedia Britannica].
Naturally, this story deals with someone falsely accused; Wolf's occasional helper Orrie Cather.
But there were quite a few details in this one that I had trouble buying into as we went along. Maybe the villain would really have been foolish enough to choose a pseudonym that could be linked back to him, but the link was subtle enough that I don't think even Nero Wolfe could realistically have picked it up. But we have our usual fun with Archie's wisecracks and womanizing, and Wolfe's ability to handle the people in his office. It's not the best, nor the worst Wolfe story. As good as any I suppose.
Rex Stout was a genius at defining characters through their interactions with others. He never left his main characters with simple shallow stereotypes. Nero Wolfe is a misogynist, but in this
Its a great novel. But I love it because of the relationship that develops between Wolfe and the showgirl.
My copy of Death of a Doxy is a 1972 seventh reprinting of the book’s original paperback edition. The little plot summary on the first page of the book captures both the basic premise of the mystery and the tone of the times:
“Poor Orrie Cather. He was being held for a murder he swore he hadn’t committed. Poor Avery Ballou. He’d been paying the rent of the victim’s apartment and if anyone found out, Orried’d be free and Ballou would be suspect #1. But most of all, poor Isabel Kerr. She was so young, so beautiful, so stone-cold dead.
Then, of course, there was poor Nero Wolfe. Orrie was a friend, Balllou was his client, and the real murderer was playing hard-to-get….”
As for as teasers go, that’s a pretty good one. The only quibble I have with it, and it’s a minor one, is that Ballou only even became a provisional client of Wolfe’s very near the end of the book – and only if taking him own did not at all interfere with Wolfe’s determination to clear Orrie Cather’s name with the police. But this little book (155 pages) is much more complicated than the blurb makes it sound.
Once again, the rather large and set-in-his-ways Nero Wolfe stays at home and dispatches his minions, led by right-hand man Archie Goodwin, to do all the leg work and to haul witnesses and suspects back to the Wolfe residence on New York’s 35th street as required to move the investigation along. This time, however, Wolfe is one minion short because Mr. Cather spends the entire novel in police custody. But Wolfe and the available boys are still well up to their task.
Isabel Kerr was a doxy, a kept woman, and there is no way she was able to pay the $300 monthly rent of the luxury apartment in which the body of this ex-showgirl was found. All the police have to work with is Isabel’s diary, but there is evidently enough in it to tell them that she was pressuring Wolfe’s friend into marrying her and not his fiancé – the woman he preferred to marry. Orrie Cather, however, is not a man with enough money to be the Isabel’s sugar daddy - and that man’s life would be ruined if he were somehow connected to the dead woman. Was he desperate enough, or angry enough, to be her killer?
Now it’s up to Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin to figure out a way to solve the murder that will earn them the conditional $50,000 fee they have been promised. Depending on how it all works out, Death of a Doxy is a case that Wolfe will solve for free or for $50,000 – and that’s a heck of a big difference in 1966.
Isabel Kerr lived a luxurious life paid for by someone with a lot of money. Someone didn't like the idea and put an end to it. What brought Nero Wolfe and Archie into the case was the arrest of Orrie Cather, one of
An interesting cast of characters who all tie back to Isabel on some level, yet know hardly anything about each other: a sister and brother-in-law, the rich man footing the bills, Isabel's best friend - a showgirl who isn't afraid to say what she thinks and isn't afraid of Nero Wolfe, a police captain looking to solve the case but can't come up with any definite evidence, and blackmail all combine to provide a tight and tangled tale of murder.