The Blind Barber

A madcap tale of murder on an ocean liner that offers “good mystery and lots of fun in the bargain” (The New York Times).

The majestic ocean liner Queen Victoria is halfway through another uneventful transatlantic crossing when bad weather drives most of the passengers to their cabins. Only six have the iron stomachs necessary to take a seat at the captain’s table. Of those six, one will die—and the rest will make utter fools of themselves.

The theft of a reel of top-secret government film sets off a chase involving stolen jewels, massive marionettes, and a corpse that won’t stay put. Murder has been committed, but the passengers can’t be sure who’s dead—and are too busy boozing, fighting, and robbing one another to be bothered. They do embark on an inadvisable attempt at amateur detective work—but every clue they turn up drives them deeper into madness. It will take the timely intervention of Dr. Gideon Fell to cut through the insanity and unmask a killer.

John Dickson Carr wrote some of the most brilliant mystery novels of the golden age of detective fiction, and this book shows him at his funniest. As Anthony Boucher warned, “Never was a reader more bedeviled with distractions from detection. Who observes clues while he’s wiping his laughter-streaming eyes?”

The Blind Barber is the 4th book in the Dr. Gideon Fell Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.