He thought of the principal saying, “Right back to Sodom and Gomorrah.” Once in a while Maddox the pessimist took a long look at the average crowd along any street in the city, and the thought crossed his mind, Are they worth saving? — Something Wrong


What may be wrong, is that in our day, Barbara “Elizabeth” Linington, also known to crime and mystery aficionados as Dell Shannon and Lesley Egan, has not had the same renaissance as other mystery writers of the past, many of whom were neither as prolific, nor as talented, much less as successful. Series featuring Luis Mendoza, Vic Varallo, and Ivor Maddox and Sue Carstairs were both acclaimed by critics and gobbled up by the reading public, keeping her pen names of Dell Shannon and Lesley Egan, along with Elizabeth Linington, at the top of mystery bestseller charts for decades. Yes, decades. She was a favorite of mystery book clubs, because her crime and police procedurals were not only groundbreaking in helping shape the genre, but terrifically entertaining reads. Something Wrong was in fact touted as the finest police procedural of 1967 by none other than Anthony Boucher, a name familiar to any mystery and crime lover worth his or her salt.

Very much set in the 1960s at the outset, the Ivor Maddox series was distinguishable from others Linington wrote because it had a slightly younger and hipper vibe, and a somewhat breezier tone. Though it seems tame today, the Maddox/Carstairs series has a swingin’ ‘60s hue to it. Making Ivor Maddox a mystery book collector as well as a cop added to the fun. He’s old enough to wonder if he should marry soon, but still young enough to be enthused about high-end sports cars. He’s also a virtual magnet for every female he comes into contact with — other than policewoman Sue Carstairs, who likes Maddox, but plays it cool. This, in spite of what he himself and D’Arcy and Rodriguez consider rather ordinary looks, has them all wondering how he does it. Maddox sometimes finds the attention annoying, especially when it becomes a distraction during a case. Of course there’s good old Carstairs, reliable, pretty, yet seemingly uninterested.

A lot is going on at the Wilcox station in Hollywood in Something Wrong. A supermarket heist gone bad, and deadly, compete with the apparent suicide of a young girl jilted by her beau, a service station robbery, the random shooting of an elderly man from the window of a car, and a missing baby. A few other crimes pop up as well, including a shoplifting ring of young girls who may not be acting on their own. Ivor and the men try to get to the bottom of each case, especially the missing baby, because it won’t be long before the Feds take over. A hard woman named Janet Henry has a creepy, almost unnatural attachment to her vicious dobermans, and Maddox fears for the worst. And then there is Carol Ann Fisher, who was only fifteen and pregnant. How did she get the Quinidine? Was it cold blooded murder, or tragedy?

Linington is marvelous at juggling it all, keeping the narrative and the cases moving swiftly along, even when leads turn into dead ends. As always, Linington highlights the difficulties and the dangers of being a cop. Here, a patrolman named Bill Chernowsky is painted in a manner that’s real, and makes us like him. And then…he’s gone, shot during a holdup. He leaves behind a pregnant wife, the shock bringing about more tragedy, and a station keener than ever to find a cop killer. Linington knew how the silent majority of the public, and cops felt, which still holds true today. As a writer, she used the situation to give cops a voice, through Ivor’s boss, Captain Edwards:


“That was a good man,” he said. “One of my bright young men. This worthless bas*ard of a punk hood! This two-bit son-of-a-b*tch pro! And you know what’ll happen boys, you know it— Catch him and try him and a bunch of bleeding-heart do-gooders get up a petition—mustn’t gas the poor fellow, he came from a broken home, he’s got phobias, he might be rehabilitated! Let them for Christ’s sweet sake try to rehabilitate Bill Chernowsky from being dead! Let them—”


Finally there are breaks in the cases, each wrapping up with good police work, a bit of luck, and something Carstairs says to Maddox which makes something click. Carstairs has some fine moments in this one, and Linington has Maddox wondering if he should settle down while he searches for a snazzy new replacement for his aging Frazer-Nash. Because Maddox has gotten Rodriguez hooked on mysteries, he’s either reading The Saint Magazine, or, in a tip of the hat to Linington's chief rival in the genre, Ed McBain, he's engrossed in the 87th Precinct entry, Ax.

No one, and I mean no one, ever balanced the daily personal lives of cops with their professional lives any better than Linington. She was also very unique in her style — perhaps as unique as Bradbury. I’ve never read another writer in the mystery and crime field who used more hyphens in dialog; to convey thoughts of her protagonists in real time within the narrative. She understood how people thought, and how they spoke in real life, which is often in fits and spurts. Once you get into the rhythm of it, it’s marvelous, true-to-life, and for mystery fiction, quite unique.

It is in the conclusion, however, where Linington really shines as a writer. The solution to one crime is very dark — occult dark. The true horror of the aforementioned is made all the more powerful due to the adept manner Linington chooses to frame it; she suggests what happened, painting everything up to the act in such nuanced tones that she need not go into grisly detail. Linington the writer understood that what the mind could imagine, was far more horrific and disturbing than any graphic description. It is an important lesson to other writers that blood and gore and graphically described violence is not only unnecessary, it is a shortcut for writers either not skilled enough in their craft, or industrious enough in their work ethic, to paint with suggestion, and make the act all the more poignant and powerful for it’s very lack of gratuitous and graphic violence.

César Rodriguez will play a pivotal role in uncovering a murderer in the solution to the remaining unsolved case, which is more than a touch spooky. It leads to this exchange between Carstairs, Maddox, and D’Arcy near the end:


“I think psychiatrists are all mad,” said Sue. “Themselves.”

“ ‘I know a hawk from a handsaw,’ ” muttered Maddox. “No. No, Sue. But they’ve committed themselves to the premise that there’s no such thing as good and evil per se. All is relative. Which is right where their spectacles get fogged up and they stop seeing clear.”

“It looks to me,” said D’Arcy seriously, “that a lot of people nowadays, they’re trying to stay neutral—uncommitted—between God and Satan. Which same—I’m telling you—cannot be done forever. Or even a while.”


Fifty-plus years on, that insightful exchange rings even truer. But not all is gloom and doom in this outing. Maddox gets a new sports car, and you can sense him gradually gravitating toward the terrific Carstairs. Much will happen between them in coming books in this wonderful series. Highly recommended. ( )