MURDER INK: The Mystery Reader's Companion

We have not gotten past the first half of this book. It is a very long book. 544 pages. Big, shiny pages. (On the other hand, big print and lots of pictures and boxes.) It is also a very silly book--perhaps even (based, of course, only on the first half) the silliest book of all time. And maybe the least boring, which is why we're still reading the first half. Jacques Barzun reports on how he encountered the ghost of Edmund (""Who Cares Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?"") Wilson and socked it to him. John Leonard tells ""Why I'll Never Finish My Mystery."" And 150 more like that, some more serious, some, if possible, less so--by everybody who counts. Pictures of: the winner of the Miss Marple LookAlike Contest, John Creasey (25 times, same picture, once for each pseudonym), and ""Two Englishmen keeping a stiff upper lip as they view a crime scene."" Lists of: which mysteries you should read, which mysteries you should read aloud, sports mysteries, clergy mysteries, poisonous plants, police abbreviations. ""The Many Disguises of Freddy the Pig."" ""Are Girls More Inherently Evil Than Boys?"" Thousands of facts. Everything. In no particular order. But indexed. Mystery fans will go into paroxysms. Non-mystery fans will become mystery fans. If necessary, commit the murder of Roger Ackroyd, steal the Maltese Falcon, and housetrain the Hound of the Baskervilles to get this book.