3 Plots for Asey Mayo

This volume consists of three separate novellas of about 100 pages each. The first, "The Headacre Plot: is the weakest of the three although there are two murders committed with a unique weapon but because the story is told quickly the characters are not very defined. The second, "The Wander Bird Plot" is my favorite of the three. The wander bird is an early version of a travel trailer in which a young woman is travelling around the Cape with her Uncle Wilber, a man who lost all his money in the stock crash, but he won the trailer in a cereal contest. There are the usual colorful characters, the very wealthy widow, Nora Latimer, who has a young man protege each summer and Mrs. Lizzie Chatfield, an annual tourist, who loves to survey the views from her inn with her binoculars. There's one murder with the ever popular blunt instrument, an arson to destroy evidence, and a second attempted murder, as well as a romance. Asey takes charge, of course, and sorts it all out. The third story, "The Swan Boat Plot", is unique in that it takes place in Boston, rather than on the Cape -- the only Mayo story as far as I can remember, that isn't set on the Cape. Asey is picking Jenny up in Boston at 5:30 am as she returns from a family funeral in Chicago, but Jenny has mis-calculated the time difference and arrives early. She goes into the Public Garden to feed the ducks and look at the Swan boats and witnesses the shooting of a photographer. He's working early before the park gets crowded. Jenny thinks his glamorous model has shot him and runs after her. Asey follows a trial of Jenny's possessions, suitcase, pocketbook, hat, etc. The model has a rich, jealous fiance, who objects to her possing. There's the former model, now secretary to the photographer, who's in love with the model's brother, and a retired judge who used to have a summer place on the Cape and gave it up. This story has many red herrings, two victims and complex situations, so it is not as relaxing a read as the earlier two. I think it may have been written later because when Asey wraps it up, he has to return to the Porter factory which is starting to construct big tanks. None-the-less, you can't beat three good stories for the price of one.