The Clue of the Twisted Candle

Description

The Clue of the Twisted Candle by Edgar Wallace is one of the best examples of the genre of Edwardian thrillers. Suspenseful, well-written, action-packed, sometimes philosophical and featuring interesting characters – these are the features that made the novel popular when it was first published in 1916 and make it popular today, too.

The principle character of the novel is John Lexman, a writer of murder mysteries. At the beginning of the story Lexman is at financial dire straits because of some bad decisions in the past. To solve his problems, he borrows money from an Albanian loan shark, which gets him into even more serious trouble. Lexman is also happily married and in the beginning unaware that a wealthy and handsome Greek aristocrat is secretly in love with his wife. The plot really takes off when the Greek aristocrat is murdered and Lexman is framed for the crime. Fortunately, the mystery writer is not left entirely alone with his troubles – the detective assigned to the case is his best friend, T. X. Meredith of the Scotland Yard.

What makes the plot quite unusual is that it takes place over a couple of years, with the narration moving freely back and forth in time. Some of the important characters in the book are also quite unusual – the super detective investigating the case is nothing like Sherlock Holmes and the murderer is not completely deplorable and villainous either.

The Clue of the Twisted Candle is the ninth novel written by Wallace and one of the first that brought him success. The King Kong novels that made his name world-famous are still about a decade away (the first King Kong stories weren’t published until the early 1930’s), but the extraordinary storytelling talent that brought Wallace fame later on is already obvious in this book written at the beginning of his career.
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