Marsh, Ngaio. Night at the Vulcan. Jove Books, 1977.
Reason read: I read somewhere that February is Theater Month. Read in honor of the stage.
Martyn Tarne, otherwise homeless in London, stumbles into the job of dresser for principle actress, Helena Hamilton. Martyn has come from New Zealand in the hopes of becoming a famous actress herself. Was it an accident that she ended up at a theater with bad luck? The building is shrouded in death. Even though she initially lands the job as a dresser for Helena Hamilton, three days later Marty finds herself on stage, acting in the production’s opening night. Does her supposed biological connection to another actor play a part in this new role?
As part of the Roderick Allyn Murder Mystery series, Night at the Vulcan is #16 in the series. A connection back to prior Roderick Allyn mysteries: Mike Lamprey lived in New Zealand and had an uncle who was murdered when he was eight. The same Mr. Allyn investigating the tragedy at the Vulcan handled Mike Lamprey’s uncle’s case.
As an aside, maybe I read this wrong but when Martyn was looking for Helena Hamilton’s cigarette case. Helena clearly said her husband had it. Martyn first goes to Adam Poole who doesn’t have the case. She then goes to Clark Bennington who is married to Helena on the stage. He introduces Martyn as his wife’s dresser. Maybe Martyn saw the flowers sent from Adam to Helena and made the assumption Adam was her husband. I didn’t know it then, but this scene with the cigarette case is pivotal to the plot.
As another aside, here is the most interesting copyright statement I have read thus far: “No part of this book in excess of 500 words may be reproduced in any form without written consent from the publisher.” 25 words used so far. I have 475 more to go.
Quotes to quote, “She could have screamed her hunger at him” (p 21), “Relax all over like a cat” (p 78), and another cat reference, “One never knew which way the cat would jump with Ben” (p 235).
Author fact: Marsh wrote a huge list of murder mysteries. I am only reading Night at the Vulcan for the Challenge.
Book trivia: Night at the Vulcan is also called Opening Night. Like a proper playbill the characters are introduced upfront. Night of the Vulcan was also adapted for South Pacific Television in 1977.
BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “All the World’s a Stage” (p 8).
~*LunaSea*~ 