Queens Full: Stories

“Three novellas and two short stories featuring the prince of American detective fiction . . . He’s one of the great who never palls” (Kirkus Reviews). The amateur theater company of Wrightsville is dying a slow and painful death. Every production is worse than the last, and the backers are about to pull the plug when the director reaches for his ace in the the always-reliable production TheDeath of Don Juan. For the lead, he digs up faded Broadway star Foster Benedict, whose name is enough to sell out the run. But on opening night, Benedict makes a hash of the first act, and doesn’t show up for the second. When he’s found in his dressing room with a knife buried in his back, it’s clear that the libertine’s death has come a bit too soon. World-famous detective Ellery Queen is in the audience, and in this novella—as well as in the other stories collected in Queens Full—he proves that Don Juan doesn’t have a monopoly on adventure.