The Diamond Cross Mystery

Description

The Diamond Cross Mystery is an excellent detective novel for adults published by the Stratemeyer Syndicate under the pseudonym Chester K. Steele – one out of the many pen-names used by the producer.

The story starts with a murder – a woman is found dead in her own jewelry shop. Her cousin, Mr. Darcy is suspected to have committed the murder, but the first and most obvious suspect is always innocent in good murder mysteries, so the suspect’s fiancée hires the American version of Inspector Clouseau, Colonel Lee Ashley to carry out an investigation of his own. Though everything continues to point to Darcy, the Colonel eventually reveals the identity of the murderer, but not before lots of suspense, unexpected twists and some amazing action. The murder is surrounded by some very strange circumstances – the cause of death is difficult to identify and all the clocks in the shop stop at different times, to mention just two of the puzzles to be ingeniously solved. The detective’s private interests are also involved in the investigation – it is Ashley’s his passion for fishing will help him solve the case eventually.

The Diamond Cross Mystery is the second book published by the Syndicate and the first one in the line of five books altogether written by ghostwriters (the first book was The Mystery of the Mansion, the only novel in the series written by Edward Stratemeyer himself, the founder of the Syndicate). Besides murder mysteries that were obviously aimed at adult audiences, the Syndicate published numerous adventure stories for children. What all the stories published by them have in common is a very strict set of rules followed by the ghostwriters – rules that were meant to assure the same high standard of quality that brought the books of the Syndicate the appreciation of the readers during the first decades of the 20th century and today as well.
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