Polar Badge Update #1
A book, a podcast, Lovecraft update & more
“But my dear Miss Withers, a detective would look funny dragging around a woman with him. Things aren’t done that way. Besides, you do have your school, you know.”
“I can get a substitute for a few weeks,” suggested Miss Withers eagerly. “I’m having the time of my life. And I tell you for your own good that some person like me, who doesn’t look at all like a detective, could find out more in ten minutes from most people than any three of your operatives. And besides, after the way you were fooled by that man Seymour’s fake confession yesterday, you need a nurse!”
—The Penguin Pool Murder, by Stuart Parker
Reading
The Penguin Pool Murder, by Stuart Palmer
Polar badge content: Uhhhh… penguins?
I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before: I’m a big fan of the American Mystery Classics series of reprints. I consider myself somewhat well-read in the mystery genre, but I’m definitely stronger on British titles, and this series highlights so many titles that I’ve never even heard of.
First published in 1931, The Penguin Pool Murder introduces Hildegarde Withers, a third-grade teacher in New York City who gets embroiled in a murder mystery while on a field trip at the aquarium—not only does she discover the body, but it turns out that her own hatpin was the murder weapon!
Overall, for me, the reading experience was a mixed bag.
Negatives first:
1. I identified the murderer the moment they first appeared. (But it’s an older book, so that’s just a matter of knowing the conventions of the genre. So that’s not a ding on the book.)
2. The techniques and strategies used by the police detective that Miss Withers teams up with are largely gross, as is his general demeanor and attitude in a lot of moments:
The guard unlocked the iron door for them, and in a moment they were inside the dimly-lit cell. The pickpocket cowered away from them as if he feared attack. Piper felt like using a nightstick on the fellow, and resisted the temptation with difficulty.
(I’d chalk that up to 1931, buuuuut based on the endless news cycle, I can’t say that it feels like this would be unimaginable in a modern-day novel. That’s one of those things that’s going to depend on the reader, though, so I’m considering it a My Stuff reaction.)
3. Descriptions and language and attitudes around a number of things, but disability in particular. (Again, 1931. So: gross, but in context, not necessarily egregious.)
And now for the fun stuff!:
1. Some absolutely wonderful character descriptions, like:
In a moment there was a knock on the office door, and at Piper’s “Come in” there entered a plump, redhaired young lady with a great many freckles and a good deal of chewing gum.
2. The depiction of childhood in the 1930s, in that not only do the kids pretty much scatter when the murder happens—like, Hildegarde basically ditches this giant group of third-graders and they’re pretty much left to fend for themselves in re: finishing up the school trip and getting home and so on, and it’s not even remotely an issue. Which I found weirdly charming and hilarious.
Also, she ends up including them, and I can never resist the idea of Kid Detectives:
The children of Grade Three at Jefferson were playing detective in deadly earnest. Miss Withers watched them go with pride in her heart.
3. It’s set in a world where murder mysteries actually exist, so it gets a little meta, which always makes me happy:
“I’m a detective, not a super-sleuth. Sherlock Holmes would know all about this case in no time, what with a magnifying glass and his knowledge of the bone structure of Polynesian aborigines. Philo Vance would solve it between puffs of a Regie cigarette, from simple deductions based on the squawks of those penguins we met up with yesterday. But not me. I don’t know any more than you do. Maybe less, only I know how to act wise. I’m just blundering ahead, trying not to miss any of the more apparent lines of approach. Sooner or later the murderer will leave something open, and I’ll stumble in. It works, lady, where the gum-shoes and the shag-tobacco and violin combination don’t. Remember this one thing, the sleuth has one tremendous advantage always. It’s that sooner or later the criminal will get either scared or reckless, and show his hand thinking that we know as much as we pretend to know. Then we nab him.”
There are apparently a few movies based on these books, too, so I’m going to poke around and see what I can find?
Note: Even though she’s only in her 30s, Hildegarde Withers is considered a Spinster Sleuth, because The Past. Did reading this book spur me to start researching the subgenre to find a million more single lady detectives I’ve somehow missed? You know it.
Have a fave? Let me know. (I’m including widows, too, because I feel like they use the same cultural assumptions and social invisibility to their advantage—particularly in that both groups are generally underestimated by the villains.)
Listening
You’re Wrong About
Flight 571: Survival in the Andes with Blair Braverman
Polar badge content: Not set in a polar region, set in a place with polar CONDITIONS
You’re Wrong About is one of my regular podcasts, but I have so many regular listens that I’m constantly behind on everything. This one is a few episodes back in the feed, but it’s absolutely worth looking up if you haven’t gotten to it yet. In it, Blair Braverman, writer and dogsled racer, tells the story of Flight 571, the Uruguayan flight carrying a rugby team that went down in the Andes in 1972, and how the survivors managed to, well, survive.
By the time she reached the point in the story where it was clear that the remaining boys—many of the passengers were in their late teens and early twenties—were going to survive, I fully burst into tears… even though I already knew the basic beats of the narrative. It’s a wonderfully empathetic retelling, and Braverman does a particularly wonderful job of contextualizing the WHYS of how they survived, not just the HOWS.
At the Mountains of Madness, by H.P. Lovecraft
Polar badge content: Set in Antarctica!
Last week, I mentioned that I was midway through this one, and I finished it up. Things I did not remotely expect:
Subterranean giant penguins
For the narrator to actually acknowledge the innate humanity of the beings that he’d previously assumed were monsters
The climatic retreat from the mountains themselves, which I found scarier and more fast-paced than I usually expect from Old Howard
I was also really jazzed that the narrator brought up Edgar Allan Poe’s The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket—and treated as a piece of nonfiction, which was a great touch—because it was already next up on my audiobook list.
Crafty Nonsense
Am I still behind on my temperature afghan? Obviously. But I’ve also already blown through multiple skeins of yarn, so I’ll be putting in an order right after I finish writing this. In the photo above, the front half represents the low of each day, and the part that’s folded under represents the highs.
Also, the above snowflake is a example of a technique I introduced at our library craft table as a part of our Polar Badge festivities—originally, I used polar-themed words like WINTER and SNOW, but then in a crabby moment I made this one, which spells out NOPE. (No one has noticed yet, heh.)
PHEW. That is a lot of chilly content, but if you’ve got some related suggestions, I’m here for more. Also, I just noticed that it’s snowing, so I’d better throw my boots on and bring in another load of wood.
Talk soon,
Leila
That snowflake is just SUCH A MOOD.
I do love a good British window/spinster mystery - and they really are all unencumbered by men somehow. MAKES ONE WONDER, doesn't it...? (Well, I don't WONDER about Mrs. Bradley; I'm pretty sure she conveniently did away with hers...)