The Wooden Overcoat

by Pamela Branch

Other authorsTom Schantz (Introduction), Enid Schantz (Introduction)

Paperback, 1951

Status

Available

Call number

823.912

Publication

Rue Morgue (2006), 191 pages

Description

Clifford Flush founded the Asterisk Club in Chelsea to provide a home for wrongfully acquitted murderers, being one himself. Qualified prospective members need only name the club as beneficiary in their wills in order to avail themselves of its comforts and unique services. Unfortunately, there isn't room for Benjamin Cann, a gentleman's outfitter newly acquitted of murdering his mistress. So Flush arranges for Benjamin to be temporarily quartered next door in a rat-infested house inhabited by two artistic couples. When Benjamin and a female member of the Asterisk Club turn up dead, the two households both have reason to avoid the police and dispose of the bodies ... 'Ingenious and successful farce' Sunday Times

Media reviews

Chocolate Cobwebs

User reviews

LibraryThing member cbl_tn

In most mysteries, when an amateur is confronted with a dead body, he or she spends the rest of the novel looking for clues to identify the culprit. Not in this mystery! Miscommunication, suspicion, and false assumptions lead to absurdity as two couples who share a house try to hide the bodies of

the strangers who are making a habit of dying on their premises. The corpses have something in common. They were members of the Asterisk Club next door, with a membership roll filled with wrongly-acquitted murderers. The story is as much farce as it is mystery, and it's full of black humor. It's the sort of book you don't want to put down once the action starts. It's the perfect book for an afternoon or evening escape.

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LibraryThing member face_at_the_window

Clifford Flush, falsely acquitted murderer, has to help out the amateurs next door when they bungle a body disposal. A deliciously ghoulish, helplessly hilarious crime novel!

LibraryThing member maepress

This novel is a hoot. It's a perfect old-fashioned who-done-it. Lots of silly stumbling around in the dark, polite shouting, and eating and drinking. For most of the book the characters are not trying to figure out where the bodies came from, but where to put them.

LibraryThing member cmbohn

This book started off kind of slow. Benjamin Cain was just acquitted of murder. He's adjusting to life outside of prison and thinking about what to do next when a stranger approaches and invites him to lunch at his club.

Cain enjoys his meal at the Asterisk Club until he learns that all the members

there are also acquitted murderers - at least one charged with multiple murderers. He begins to wonder if the soup tasted a little off.

His new friend finds him a room in a boarding house just next door to the club. After one night in the house, his new landlady discovers Cain - dead.

As I said, the book got off to a slow start, and I was almost ready to give in. Then it started getting interesting. Then not much later, it got funny. Then it got completely hilarious! In a dark way, all right, but still - hilarious. An unexpectedly great read.

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LibraryThing member Riyale

Love, love, love it. Witty, ghoulish, intelligent, hilarious.

LibraryThing member thornton37814

The Asterisk Club is a home for murderers who were acquitted. Newly released Benji Cann finds himself living with the artistic couples next door when there is not room for him at the club. When bodies (including Cann's) begin to turn up, both homes find themselves trying to hide the corpses. The

emphasis is on comedy rather than mystery. Unfortunately, I don't think I was in the mood for this sort of book at the time I read it, and it didn't work all that well for me. I did recognize that it would be loved by persons who enjoy farces as well as many mystery lovers.

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