Friday, April 01, 2016

Friday's Forgotten Books, April 1, 2016





                                       THE WHISPERING WALL, Patricia Carlon

Patricia Carlon's THE WHISPERING WALL tells the story of a wealthy, paralyzed, bed-ridden woman who, thanks to a vent in the wall, overhears murderous conversations. The Phippses plan to murder singer, Roderick Palmer.  A niece discovers  Sarah can blink in response to questions.  But the Phippses realize Sarah has overheard their plot and determine to kill her, too. With enormous effort, using letter games and Scrabble, Sarah attempts to warn Roderick in the only way she can.

Carlon proved herself to be a first class suspense writer with this novel. Carlon is Australian and wrote most of her books in the sixties. Occasionally I run across one, although less and less over time.Carlon was deaf from age 11 onward and kept out of the public eye her whole life. This may also explain why so many of her books used disabilities of some type as a feature.

Here is an interesting article about her. 

Sergio Angelini, LEAVE HER TO HELL, Fletcher Flora
Joe Barone, PIETR, THE LATVIAN, Georges Simenon
Les Blatt, CASE WITHOUT A CORPSE, Leo Bruce
Brian Busby, THE HOUSE IN BROOK STREET, Ronald Cocking
Bill Crider, HORRIBLE BEGINNINGS, Steven H. Silver and Martin Greenberg
Scott Cupp, AMAZON PLANET, Mack Reynolds
Martin Edwards, THE ORGAN SPEAKS, E.C.R. Lorac
Kurt Evans, HASTY PUDDING, Mignon Eberhart
Ed Gorman, THE CRIMES OF JORDAN WISE, Bill Pronzini
Rick Horton, Sanctuary in the Sky, by John Brunner/The Secret Martians, by Jack Sharkey
Jerry House, DEATH TAKES THE STAGE, Agatha Christie
Nick Jones, THE DASHELL HAMMETT OMNIBUS 
George Kelley, DOUBLE IN TROUBLE, Richard S. Prather, Stephen Marlowe
Margot Kinberg, THE HOT ROCK, Donald Westlake
B.V. Lawson, THIS'LL KILL YOU, Peter Chambers
Steve Lewis/Barry Gardner, VOODOO, LTD, Ross Thomas
Todd Mason, SHORT STORY INTERNATIONAL, February 1965 edited by Samuel Tankel; THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E MAGAZINE, February 1966 edited by Cylvia Kleinman
Neer, THE WORST WITCH. Jill Murphy
J.F. Norris, SKULDOGERY, Fletcher Flora
Mathew Paust, I'VE BEEN DEADER, Adam Sifre
James Reasoner, THE DEATH MISER, John Creasey
Richard Robinson, THE EXILES TRILOGY, Ben Bova
Gerard Saylor, FATE OF THE UNION, Max Allan Collins and Matthew Clemens
Kerrie Smith, STAGESTRUCK, Peter Lovesey
Kevin Tipple, TILT-A-WHIRL, Chris Grabenstein
TomCat, NOT TO BE TAKEN, Anthony Berkeley
TracyK, THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD, John LeCarre

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

As always, Patti, I do love this variety. And thanks for including my post.

Sergio (Tipping My Fedora) said...

Thanks Patti - hope you have a very merry 1st of April!

Charles Gramlich said...

I'm going to have to try some Carlon. I've never read one.

J F Norris said...

You reviewed what I think is Carlon's finest novel. I read it over twenty years ago and still remember it vividly.

You got the links up so early this morning and you caught me off guard while I was making last minute changes. You have my post from yesterday. Will you please change the link to my FFB post that I just finished?

Skuldoggery by Fletcher Flora

Thanks!

Mathew Paust said...

Fascinating piece on Carlon, whom I had not known of. I shall look for her books. Thanks for the introduction, Patti.

pattinase (abbott) said...

Maybe hard to find, Matt.

Mathew Paust said...

I'm up for the challenge, Patti. We have a pretty good used bookstore here in the stix.

TracyK said...

I have been interested in trying a book by Patricia Carlon, so thanks for the reminder. If I don't find copies at the annual big book sale, I am sure I can find some at ABEBOOKS.

I was recently reading about a new author who is deaf, Sara Novic, and she was talking about the difficulty of writing dialogue and the difficulties of doing signings and readings. It was very interesting.

Thanks for including my post.