The Roman Hat Mystery

By: Ellery Queen

Narrated by: Robert Fass

Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's summary

Despite the dismal Broadway season, Gunplay continues to draw crowds. A gangland spectacle, it's packed to the gills with action, explosions, and gunfire. In fact, Gunplay is so loud that no one notices the killing of Monte Field. In a sold-out theater, Field is found dead partway through the second act, surrounded by empty seats. The police hold the crowd and call for the one man who can untangle this daring murder: Inspector Richard Queen. With the help of his son Ellery, a bibliophile and novelist whose imagination can solve any crime, the Inspector attacks this seemingly impenetrable mystery. Anyone in the theater could have killed the unscrupulous lawyer, and several had the motive. Only Ellery Queen, in his debut novel, can decipher the clue of the dead man's missing top hat.

©2013 Ellery Queen (P)2013 AudioGO

Wonderful "logic puzzle"--great listen, great fun!

This was my first Ellery Queen. Loving mysteries, I have long intended to get to these books because they're a significant part of the American contributions during the classic mystery writing period. (This one was originally published in 1929). Being a lover of mysteries from that time, so far as I can tell, this is about as good as it gets.

This is the "fun" kind of mystery--where it is laid out as a pure logic problem for the reader from beginning to end. Clues and suspects are plentiful, but the author has (now looking back on it) been very clever in creating a straightforward mystery that the reader could [theoretically] solve along with them. (Clues are everywhere but few red herrings). Toward the end, the author has an aside to the reader, stating that now, at this point, we know as much as the detectives do--there will be no surprises thrown in at the end--and invites the reader to use their own deductive powers to solve the murder/puzzle. Quite a fun book, really--like a giant cerebral murder puzzle. It's "Clue" on steroids. If you know how to pay attention, you can solve the mystery (but fair warning--it is far from obvious and I won't say if I was smart enough to figure it out :-) .

Richard Queen (the father) is a member of the homicide squad--greatly respected by all his peers and superiors (there's a different idea--modern detective stories so often have the main characters butting up against forces that do not support them--so they become lone wolves). But not here--this is a book with "class". Ellery Queen is the son, who for all practical purposes is not a detective, but a book lover, but father & son are unusually close, and Ellery does a great deal of the "detecting" in the team. The book is written without a single swear word, in fact I would call it "polite" much of the time because it is not meant as a series of shocks, but a series of clues to the reader.

It is peppered with some literary allusions, and the occasional Latin phrase (to point out how erudite the father & son are). I feel the need to just comment on how it has a small amount of what would today be viewed as a sort of political incorrectness--a very few comments by characters left me cringing and sad, but I finally decided that the writing represents mindsets of that era, and I believe the authors would be sensitive enough to present a couple of offhand remarks differently today. Although noticeable, it didn't take away from the overall enjoyment.

So there were two authors for the Ellery Queen series. I looked that part up--and it sounds like two men wrote the books--one came up with the logic puzzle sort of setup and the clues, while the other wrote the dialogue and fleshed the books out. I'm old, and have read hundreds of good mysteries in my life. I had heard of Ellery Queen, but never before read one. I was beyond thrilled with this discovery, I'm groggy with lack of sleep this morning because I listened till the wee hours to hear the end, and I cannot wait till I can listen to the next one! I so highly recommend--I wish I could give it all 10 stars!

Good story, product of its time

I'm new to Ellery Queen, and I found this to be a good story with an interesting plotline. It was written early last century and shows it - the action doesn't move extremely quickly and the discussions move at a slower pace. The villain is a surprise, not because the author 'cheated', but because the plot twists and clues are subtle. Possibly once I have read a number of these I will be better at predicting the ending, but I doubt it. I very much enjoyed the plot and most of the characters.

One note: this book was written in a time when minorities were often portrayed almost as caricatures. I can generally overlook a certain number of these types of references, but this book has some scenes and descriptions that are pretty shocking by today's standards. Djuna the houseboy is of gypsy origin, according to Wikipedia, but that is not clear in the text. Djuna is not a major character in the story (he is supposed to be comic relief, I think, but I didn't find him funny) and is portrayed with affection like a pet. If this upsets you, consider reading Rex Stout instead, or at least skipping the few scenes involving Djuna.
I took a star off my overall rating because of the way Djuna was portrayed. He did detract from my enjoyment of the book in spite of my efforts to overlook those scenes.

Bottom line: the story is good, the characters are interesting, and the book is worth reading if you can take a scholarly approach to the portrayal of Djuna as a product of that time. I am going to try a few more of the series and hope for the best.

A classic with all the trappings of age

If you could sum up The Roman Hat Mystery in three words, what would they be?

A true classic.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

I would not change a thing. While it does not meet current ideas of political correctness, it is a great representation of the times in which it is set and was written.

What does Robert Fass bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The narrator does not go overboard with the vocal representations of the characters, but still manages to convey tone and intent.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Listened to it non-stop on a trip across Nevada from Utah to San Jose. Great listen!

Any additional comments?

If you enjoy the Ellery Queen method and don't mind a period piece that shows its age in places, you will enjoy this production.

Not as eloquent as they think they are.

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

The cousins who wrote as Ellery Queen waste a lot of words and your time with this. Definitely not as concise as Agatha Christie or Sir Arthur C. Doyle, they drag the listener through a lot that adds nothing to the plot. It's a bit of a snoozer.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

Pretty good narration.

An old fashioned whodunit

I bought this based on my fond memories of the Ellery Queen mysteries on TV. I always thought they were intelligently written, reasonably well scripted and smartly done and hoped that the books would be the same.

There were two things that struck me about this book in particular. One was that the language and social attitudes were very dated with both words and ideas that are now considered at the very least archaic if not something worse. The second is that the mystery itself was as well constructed as I remembered the TV shows to be with all of the needed hints provided along with a lot of red herrings. All in all it was fun although at times a bit tiring trying to deal with the old language.

While I was able to guess what was going on and who, in general, was the villain, the mystery was deep enough to make me stop and think about who it might be for some time before I came to a reasonable conclusion.

The book is well read and I enjoyed it, but I do not believe I will buy any more. One was enough to satisfy my curiosity.

Just remember it was written in the 20's...

It's an excellent detective/mystery story. I had to remind myself several times that it was written a long time ago to keep from getting too annoyed at the way women (dainty, fragile, forgetting their place, etc) are written in this story to finish. If that kind of thing bothers you, skip it. Otherwise, it was a pretty good story and the narration was excellently done

A good mystery

The reader is excellent and every character is recognizable. I remember reading Ellery Queen mysteries as a teenager. My father subscribed to the magazine. Now, 60 years later, I enjoy not only the story and the powers of deduction Ellery and his father use, but the historical significance of the setting. Men no longer all wear hats so this plot would not work today. That does not take anything away from the story. I will certainly listen to others in the series.

Overt racism, misogynist interrogation, plot holes

I am not in favor of banning books, but I do think some could use a retirement, and at the very least some trigger warnings for a more modern society. I am sad to say, this is one of these books. I have long wanted to dive into the Ellery Queen series, but I was disappointed with how overtly racist this book was. So much of it was unnecessary, bordering on exposing the author as a possible follower of eugenics. From a "houseboy" being compared to a primate, and other racist themes woven deeper into this story, I was really sad to hear this stuff and couldn't let it slip by. Misogyny is always expected in novels from the 1920s, but the elder Inspector Queen was disappointingly lascivious when interrogating a young woman. So often these themes are well explored and noted in books by Raymond Chandler, but not here. I think the character development or lack thereof is partly to blame. My other complaints include tremendous plot holes (amateurish!), overly didactic and verbose dialogues, and some cringeworthy moments between an insecure father and son and over hyping the intellect of Ellery. Racism aside, this novel could have easily been a short story. So much editing needed. So many sentences alone devoted to the snorting of snuff and polishing of pince nez to the point of ridiculous that it could be used as a drinking game. The bulk of this book made the story harder to follow, and not an interesting puzzle to solve. I can see how this series fit into a remade 60 minute TV episode and radio series. Editing got it there. In short, subpar writing cannot gloss over this book's other offenses. It's just a bad book.

A Theater, an Audience and a Corpse

What more could you ask for?

The Roman Hat Mystery is a classic. A completely satisfying tale of intrigue and murder. It features carefully crafted characters, believable dialogue, and well-rendered atmosphere. The frustrations of a police investigation (one chapter is even titled, “Stalemate”), the extended exercises in logic, the pointless errands and dead ends all contribute to the listener’s sense of “being there”. We share—or at least I shared—in every setback, as well as the yeasty sense of triumph at the end.

Up till now I’ve only dabbled in the Ellery Queen short story collections. While I found these very entertaining (and perplexing), the shorter time frame sometimes made it necessary for conclusions to be jumped to a little quicker than seemed natural. And where the story was a tad too pat, Ellery resembled “Encyclopedia Brown” the precocious boy-hero of those mysteries we read as kids. So I was intrigued to see what Ellery and his father were like in a full-scale novel. I wasn’t disappointed.

The first in a series of books featuring successful, well-beloved characters is always a treat. We want to know how Archie Goodwin and Nero Wolfe, Bertie Wooster and Jeeves, or Holmes and Watson started out. Oddly enough, this first novel begins at what should be the end of the father-and-son team’s career. I’ll be interested to see how that’s handled in the next volume. In this first installment, the father-son relationship reads as true as the love/hate interplay between Wolfe and Goodwin; the father knows his son is a little too pretentious, a mite too self-satisfied. He also recognizes that Ellery has uncommon gifts and is hugely proud of him. Being younger, Ellery is less reflective on personal matters and simply venerates his parent. Thanks to the story being set before Oprah, however, their mutual affection is never discussed and always genuinely felt.

This being a mystery, I won’t say much more except that, unlike some reviewers, I was neither shocked, horrified or upset by the racial attitudes expressed in the story. Being published in 1929, I would have been surprised if they hadn’t been there. The past is a foreign country inhabited by people to whom we are related. And it's always healthy to remember that very soon (sooner than you think) you and I might seem just as foreign. Will you be horrified that the police toxicology lab tests the efficacy of a little-known poison on a live rabbit? The future might recoil just as much at our daily disposal of human life (how many millions since 1973?). Is it terrible that one character is blackmailed for fathering a child out of wedlock? Yes. But how has our modern embrace of illegitimacy (and the consequent devaluing of the “traditional” family) made things any better? On the other hand, I thoroughly enjoyed the book’s complete lack of sex scenes and absolute irreducible minimum of foul language. While no prude, I like decorum when I can get it, tagging along with Aristotle in preferring all the rough stuff to happen offstage.

In the meantime, I’m willing to bet that, as the series develops, changing social attitudes will be faithfully reflected in later stories.

Lastly, Robert Fass does a fine job here, not overdoing the semi-stock characters (like the gangster nicknamed "Parson" or his girlfriend) and doing full justice to the more three-dimensional roles. Like any accomplished reader, he gives you an almost visual image of everyone.

Slow going with racism. What more could you want?

What disappointed you about The Roman Hat Mystery?

The long deductive analysis was boring. The scenes were all the same: Father comes up against a mental log jam. Seemingly brilliant son solves it in his aloof manner. Father endlessly grateful. Easy enough to figure out the distractors. Plus the institutional racism--hard to read. I know it was a book of its time, but still.

Horrific racism - content warning

Towards the end of the novel there is suddenly an upsetting and horrendous passage of racism. So awful 😞

Slow but Satisfying

This crime mystery will not keep you at the edge of your seat, but it does deliver in lots of little satisfying ways. If you are into crime novels, but don't want to be subjected to all the contemporary sexual violence and social realism, this audio book is good company, with one exception.

Spoiler: in the unfolding of the solution at the end of the book there is a section of racist remarks regarding "the negro race", which must have been of the time, but were absolutely abhorrent. The arrogant and misconceived racism is only expressed in this one small section and is not a theme throughout the book.

Very dated and rather dull

I grew up with the Ellery Queen TV show which I loved but this is a rather laboured tale about pretty unpleasant characters

An interesting insight into American society

How times have changed, or have they? Prejudices run deep. Clever piece of deductive detection.

Very disappointing

an appalling piece of racism is part of the denouement at the end of this book.

Didn't get through the first chapter...

...which is a shame as I've wanted to listen to this for quite a while.

Tha narrator's voice is just wrong for me. Nasal, and too sing-song, I found it impossible to actually follow the narrative. It became just a series of words that failed to combine in a logical sentence.

Era warning but enjoyable

I remember by mother reading these when I was a child and thought I would try it.

Skip the preface aka chapter’1’ and start at the next chapter.

Some of the material is of its time -1929, and place -USA. Attitudes and customs have changed, but overall enjoyable although the detail of the denouement came from left field for me.

Of it’s time.

An easy listen if you’re ok with the golden age of crime. A slightly frustrating story for the modern listener as they tend to draw out lesser points and almost ignore the elephants in the the room clues until late in the day. Ideal for radio serialisation. Robert Fass does a great job across the many characters and the sometimes stodgy dialogue. His delivery throughout is with enthusiasm, zeal and zest. He kept me going to the end.

Great to get to sleep with

The orator has such a sleepy voice he’d be great doing bed time stories. I’d be off in 5 mins. There was no story in first hour so I gave up. Boring…..

Excellent Queen mystery

I love the writing of Ellery Queen - always so evocative of the era in which the story is set. Solid characters and plot lines without resort to cliches. Yes there is one distasteful view expressed towards the end of the story which has to be viewed in the context of the limited scientific and cultural views of the time. What i consider to be sad is that there are still people in the world who would have no problem with the expressed view.
The narration was excellent with just some minor blips in the recording in chapter 13 and the last chapter.
I thoroughly enjoyed this tale whilst recovering from a bout of flu.