Appleby’s Answer by Michael Innes: A Review by Warren Bull

Appleby’s Answer by Michael Innes: A Review by Warren Bull

Appleby’s Answer was published in 1973. Michael Innes was the pen name of J.I.M. Stewart, a Scottish novelist and academic literary critic. In his “day job” he wrote in depth analyses of a number of writers including James Joyce, Joseph Conrad and Tomas Hardy. 

Stewart/Innes referred to his crime fiction works as “entertainments.” The protagonist in most of his mystery writing was John Appleby. The main character aged and progressed in his employment over the course of the novels. In Appleby’s Answer Sir john Appleby has recently retired from being Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police. 

The novel begins with Miss Priscilla Pringle, a moderately successful author of crime fiction novels riding in a first class railroad compartment. She shares the compartment with a stranger. An elderly gentleman who is reading one of her books. He recognizes her from the author photo. They chat. She learns that then man is Captain Bulkington  who describes himself as a tutor preparing young men for military service or university. During a long amusing conversation, it is clear to the reader that neither person quite understands what the other person is saying. The elderly gentleman seems to be trying to elicit a method by which a person might be murdered without risk of exposure. Toward the end of their interaction the Captain  offers her 500 pounds to co-write a mystery with him that involves a difficult-to-detect murder. Miss Pringle believes he is a bit balmy, if not completely insane. She engineers an escape, leaving him no way to contact her.

After this promising beginning, the author takes us to a Crook’s Colloquium meeting where mystery writers meet and where Appleby is the guest speaker. The author clearly knows mysteries and mystery writers, which is evident in his humorous description of the event. 

Later Miss Pringle decides she will see what is going on with the Captain without his notice. She plans a discrete visit to the village he lives in. Thinking attending a church service might allow her to meet the local citizens, she enters a church. Shortly thereafter, the Captain enters with two of his students.

I don’t want to give away the rest. Suffice it to say that Appleby extracts her from a dicey situation.