Another worthwhile title from Agora Books, this time reproduced from the 1950s. Set in a Fleet Street archive, it provides an engaging insight into a pre-digital publishing and research world, dependent on both visual and oral recall. The focus is on detection, in this case, private detection by married couple Sally and Johnie. The police investigation progresses competently in the background and is accorded due respect by the author and our private sleuths.

We are given enough information about Sally and Johnie to want them to succeed and to empathise with their dilemmas. I didn’t develop the same sense of the other players, who we see largely through the eyes of Sally and Johnie. This was a bit of a limitation - they came and went a bit like minor players in a stage melodrama. Sally and Johnie are also sufficiently Middle Class to employ a nanny who keeps their children safely occupied and invisible for all but an hour or two a day. Sally appears to do all the cooking and there is presumably an invisible cleaner.

The plot was engaging and well-paced. The details of time and place could have been more succinctly presented, but I enjoyed following the logic and fact-checking. The husband-wife partnership is an interesting emerging perspective by the 1950s and, although there are inevitable attitudes of protection displayed, the partnership is more equal than most and the writing stands the test of time.

Thanks to NetGalley for the review copy - and I’m interested enough to look forward to reading more in this series.

I hadn’t heard of Henrietta Hamilton. Nor, it appears, have many people. Agora simply state “Henrietta Hamilton was an English writer known for her crime-solving husband-and-wife duo, Sally and Johnny Heldar. She was previously published by Hodder and Stoughton.” Julian Symons didn’t mention her in Bloody Murder. Martin Edwards is similarly silent in the Golden Age of Murder. However, Allen J. Hubin’s brilliant crimefictioniv.com tells us that Henrietta Hamilton was a pseudonym of Hester Denne Shepherd, 1920-1995. She published four novels between 1956-1959, all featuring a husband and wife team, Johnny and Sally Heldar. That’s all I can discover.

So kudos to Agora Books, then, for offering this novel by a little-known author, over sixty years after it was first published. Was it worth the wait?

Yes, I think so. Hamilton evokes a world that must have been disappearing even then, with Nanny looking after the children all day and Sally Heldar simply popping up to kiss the children good night. There are bombsites in Central London and characters’ war service is mentioned as they are introduced. There is the famous London smog. Everybody smokes. As I type this in 2020, even the typists have trodden the path of the dodo. However, I enjoyed this glimpse of a bygone world. And I did snigger at the name of the organisation: “Feelthee Peex” (Filthy Pics?!).

Although it wasn’t difficult to guess who the murderer was, the plot development was done nicely with a couple of interesting sub-plots centring on missing negatives and a possible IRA sympathiser. I’m not sure about the characters of the Heldars, though. Whilst they were pleasant enough, I felt they were almost cardboard cut-outs of a wholesome couple and they didn’t live in my imagination. I’d like to try another of Hamilton’s novels to see if they improve upon further acquaintance.

This is a very good classic crime story with amateur but excellent detectives.

Toby Lorn calls on his friends, Sally and Johnny Heldar to help. He works at the National Press Archives, and an archive assistant, Frank Morningside, is getting nasty letters and having tricks played on him. Someone has gotten the key to his office so they can leave the messages easily with no one seeing.

Sally and Johnny agree to help, and begin watching the office in the guise that they are doing research on the archives. They are being helped by Brigadier Camberley, who has been doing some research in the archives. When Morningside is found dead in the doorway of his office (from a box of glass negatives falling on his head), Scotland Yard is finally called. Chief Detective-Inspector Lindesay arrives on the scene. However, he lets Sally and Johnny continue to help. There are many suspects to watch - young Teddy, the errand boy who is somewhat unruly; Michael Knox, the hot tempered Irishman; Serena, Morningside's former fiance, the boss Silcutt, as well as possibly Toby, himself.

Then, Miss Quimper, the woman who was in charge of the negatives, is found in a bombed out cellar hole right across from the Archives building. Things get really dicey. They check everyone's alibis again and set up time tables, but are still stymied. Sally and Johnny have a meeting in their apartment, and suddenly they realize the killer is someone they never suspected, and figure out how and why.

Answer in the Negative by Henrietta Hamilton was a great read about a husband and wife sleuthing team in 1950's London. The plot moved swiftly, there were many intriguing suspects and the ending was satisfying. Besides the mystery, it was really interesting to get an insight into the way newspaper cuttings and photos were handled before computers and to get a peek into class warfare going on in Fleet Street

I hadn't hard of the author before so I was glad to rediscover a lost gem. I hope the publisher will republish some of her other works as I became quite fond of Sally and Johnny.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.