Forgotten Book - Too Many Bottles

I share with Raymond Chandler and Ed Gorman, among others, an admiration for the work of Elisabeth Sanxay Holding, a crime novelist who has long been under-rated. Domestic suspense was her forte and it's at the heart of Too Many Bottles, published in 1951, towards the end of her career. This is a swift read, a short book that ranks as a minor work compared to her best novels, but not without interest (yes, I know that's damning with faint praise, but I think it's a fair summary).

We see things from the point of view of a youngish man called Brophy. He writes pulp fiction and for the past year he's been living with his new wife Lulu and her sister Norma. Lulu is good-looking and possesses a superficial charm, but she's also nervy and needy and Brophy isn't in love with her. The Brophys hold a party which goes badly and after it's over, Lulu is found dead. At first it seems as if she may have consumed a poison by mistake, but it soon becomes clear she was murdered.

Holding piles on a number of complications, and in due course there is another death. However,  I formed an opinion about what was going on during the early chapters and I was disappointed to find that I was right. The mystery isn't as complex as it might have been, and Brophy's denseness becomes rather irritating.

Yet there are some nice touches, especially during a conversation about the merits, or otherwise, of creative writing classes and in Brophy's ruminations about his own crime writing. And I did enjoy the ironic passage where Brophy thinks: 'I couldn't write a psychological novel. I wouldn't know how to motivate my people. I'm too healthy. Or maybe too dumb.'