  ace
to Face (1967)
Ellery remembered Glory
Guild very well. Not only did he remember her, but he had listened to her as
enchanted in his youth. And now he was in the bedroom of GeeGee - as she was
called by her intimate friends, to which Ellery, unfortunately, had never
belonged -, in the bedroom of a dead person. But on a piece of paper she had
managed to write one more word, a word of four almost illegible letters: the
most enigmatic letters Ellery had ever seen.
 The only clue to the murder of Gloria Guild, the singing "Glory" of the Thirties, is her dying scrawl, the letters
Even the great
detective-writer Ellery Queen can't read the riddle. Attempting to break the
Glory Code, he whisks us on a marathon search from the Bowery to the
kickiest happenings in town. And after the glamour of a Broadway opening
night, the takes us to a way-out wedding night in his own apartment - where
he closes in on the killer. What Ellery Queen reveals at the wedding makes for a chilling climax in a tale as absorbing as it is entertaining Face to Face is a mystery maze cunningly constructed by the master of detective fiction. All the evidence is there. Follow the right path and it will lead you straight to the killer. Take one wrong turn, however slight, and you'll be caught up in a merry murder-go-round of mystery. |
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“If the solution doesn't surprise you, you've peeked ahead to the finish.” -- Houston Chronicle “A fine fantastic farrago... Technically faultless construction (one expects no less), admirable final twist and one lovely private joke for old-line Queen fans (as aren’t we all?).” -- Anthony Boucher, New York Times "For puzzle addicts this suave and tantalizing brain teaser is rare and glorious fare.” -- Baltimore News American “As usual Queen has played fair... punctiliously revealing any clue he finds , every theory he develops... every iota of evidence he uncovers, and challenges the reader to predict the solution. And I'll bet you aren't right.” -- The Florida Times Union “Today's master of ingenuity presents the most ingenious form of twist or double cross he has devised. ... Some mystery mongers never let us down... This is the best Ellery Queen since Calamity Town.” -- Harper Magazine |
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| Above from top left to bottom right: dust and hardcover New American Library (1967); dust cover Gollancz edition (1967); Signet (1968, 1st), Penguin (1971), Signet (1976) and Signet Double Mystery (1982). * | |
| A good story on its own, but elements seem like replays from former novels. At least the solution is satisfying and clever, but haven't we seen the Showdown at a Wedding Ceremony bit before? Again one of the novels which may have been ghostwritten. Some have mentioned the name of Jack Vance. He did write a sci-fi-novel called The Face, but to this date we've found no evidence to sustain the claim Vance had anything to do with this book. | |
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| The
Canberra Times, Geoffrey Sawer, February 24, 1968. "Ellery Queen unfolds another crispy whodunit which is neither disguised literary criticism or sugar-coated social history; it would be quite good but for a disastrous Scottish hero who talks rather like an American stage Australian. He should stick exclusively to his familiar New Yorkers." |
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| Above: Face to Face was published in Star Weekly in two parts on March 25. and April 1. 1967 (Illustration by Dick Marvin). | |
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 Other articles on this book (1) Reading Ellery Queen - Face to Face Jon Mathewson (May 2016) (2) Tipping My Fedora Cavershamragu (June 28. 2012) (3) In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel Puzzle Doctor (March 22. 2015) |
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