Tree of Evil - a Paperback Library Gothic

This is one of those books where, from the very first page, there is tension and suspense that holds strong throughout the entire story!  I was not familiar with the author Roberta Morrison prior to picking up this book, and it turns out this is Morrison's only book - although it is NOT the author's only book.  How, you ask, can that be?  Well, obviously, "Roberta Morrison" turns out to be just one of many pseudonyms used by prolific author Jean Francis Webb III (1910-1991), which is a name I have seen before.  Webb wrote mysteries (1930s), nurse romances (1950s), and a number of Gothics (1960s), using not only the pen name Ethel Hamill (his mother's name), but also his own name (which many probably mistook for a woman's name).  He also wrote a short story for the first issue of Dell's Gothic Romances magazine published in 1970.  You can find out more about Webb from this vintage nurse romance novel blog page (Jean Francis Webb III).

 

Tree of Evil was published in 1966 by Paperback Library, Inc. as "A Paperback Library Gothic."  This is the only Gothic that Webb wrote using the pseudonym Roberta Morrison, which was  play on his maternal grandfather's name (Robert Morrison).  The story is set on a remote island in Hawaii, where young Nell Jordan goes to perform research for a book she has been hired to write about the history of the Drakewood family.  The family patriarch, Calvin Drakewood, has hired her to go through all of the family's papers and compile a comprehensive history - but upon her arrival at the isolated Drakewood mansion, she is met with outright hostility by members of the family who clearly do not want her there. Calvin is back on the main island, and the only person who could possibly help Nell, Roy Walker (a friend of Calvin who ferried Nell through the treacherous waters to the remote island), is unable to stay on the island.  Thus, our poor heroine is left to face the regal yet austere Cornelia Drakewood, her adopted son Dr. Horton McGrath, and her niece Bernice "Bunty" Drakewood, all by herself.

 

Despite the resentment towards her intrusion into their private lives, Nell is determined to move forward with her work.  But, from the moment she arrives at the dark estate, she is plagued by uncertainty and fear.  The horrific screams that haunt the night ... the cloaked figure that seems to stare up at her room from the garden ... that dark, foreboding tree on the lanai that seems to keep the house in darkness ... the strange drums that sound at night, frightening the native staff ... and the ghost of Bunty's dead sister, Lila, who seems to haunt the halls of the mansion.  Nell realizes there is a deeper mystery to be solved here on the island, and the longer she stays in the house, the more danger she finds she faces!  Soon enough, Nell starts to suspect that accident that took Lila's life was not necessarily and accident - and perhaps it did not even take her life at all!

 

Webb (a/k/a Morrison) truly plays up Nell's fears throughout the whole story, using the bumps in the night, shadowy figures, and the menacing tree to increase the terror of what his main character faces.  The isolation she feels in a house where she is not wanted, surrounded by strangers who seem to menace her at every turn - the morbid curiosity that continually grows within her concerning Lila Drakewood's death and the possibility that the girl may be alive, yet somehow mentally damaged by her accident - and the mystery surrounding the Drakewood's history and exactly what it is within those family papers that could warrant the deadly attacks on her person - all of it combines to make for a very suspenseful tale of true Gothic terror.

 

The author does a nice job of misleading the reader in a number of ways; however, any true fan of these '6s and '70s Gothic novels will immediately start to pick up on the clues and figure out that the real villain or villains will not be the most obvious suspects (rarely does it play out so conveniently in these books). The  mystery surrounding Lila Drakewood (is she, or isn't she, alive?) is very well done, and the climax provides the readers with some nice and somewhat unexpected surprises.  

 

The cover, with its heavy use of black shadows, features Nell looking back tentatively at a house barely visible through the branches of that ever-menacing tree.  A light is visible in an upstairs room (of course, what Gothic cover would not have that?), and the sky is a dark shade of blue.  There is no signature on the cover art, and the copyright page does not identify the artist.   

 

I definitely want to find more of Webb's books, as this was a fantastic read, and I suspect his other books will be just as enjoyable.

 

RATING:  10 garnet-colored, velvet gowns out of 10 for a wonderfully crafted tale of Gothic horror and mystery that keeps the readers on the edge of his or her seat until the very end! 

 

A Zebra Mystery Puzzler #4 - Is This Coffin Taken?

With this fourth Zebra Mystery Puzzler, published in October 1978, we not only get a different kind of mystery, but also get our fourth author - Jean Francis Webb (1910-1991).  While I could not find any direct information on Webb, I found a number of blogs and other sources that reveal much about his writing career.  It seems  Webb began hiswriting career early on, having tales of mystery published in those infamous pulp magazines of the '30s and '40s.  From what I can gather, he created one of the first female detectives, Grace "Redsie" Culver.  This character appeared in a number of issues of The Shadow Magazine, from 1934 - 1937, all written under the pen name of Roswell Brown.  Webb also wrote several gothic novels during their heyday of the '60s and '70s, as well as various other books, including this one for Zebra's "Mystery Puzzler" line and a novel in the Guiding Light series (based on the TV show).  This is the only book Webb wrote for this series.

 

Is This Coffin Taken? is set in the beautiful, lush paradise of Hawaii, where protagonist EileenTracy (erroneously identified as "Ellen" Tracy on the description set forth on the back cover) lives and works as a photographer. The book opens with Eileen driving her sister, Rosemary, and young nephew, Toby, back to her secluded up high atop the cliffs overlooking Honolulu.  Her sister and nephew are sound asleep in the back after a long day of traipsing along after Eileen as she pursued photographs of a spewing volcano for her publisher.  Eileen's thoughts as she is driving, however, are focused on the fact that her sister fled to Hawaii to escape her husband - an up-and-coming film director who she claims is threatening to kill her in order to get his hands on the inheritance the sisters received from their grandmother.  She has yet to give Eileen the details, but it is clear Rosemary is frightened for her own safety, as well as that of her son.

By the end of the first chapter, Webb sets up the mystery - Rosemary, who got out of Eileen's car and walked the short distance from the car to the house, entered the house, never came back out, yet disappeared!  Eileen searches relentlessly every room in the house, the outside yards, and finds nothing but a set of footprints in the front yard where her sister stepped into the yard rather than walk around on the concrete walk.  The police are called, but the lieutenant who comes to the scene (Dave Atwater) is not exactly helpful.  Calm and detached, he does not take the disappearance seriously, suggesting that perhaps Rosemary simply wandered off or left of her own accord.  Even after explaining her sister's fear of her husband, Eileen finds herself a potential suspect when Atwater asks her whether there was any rift between them concerning the inheritance.  From this interaction, the reader immediately realizes Eileen is going to have to take matters into her own hands if she wants to find her sister.

From the beginning, this is more of a missing person's case than it is a murder mystery.  Eileen spends the first half of the book scared for her sister, wondering what is happening to her; however, about half-way through, she becomes so irate at the lack of concern from the police and their "by-the-book" way of handling the case, that she decides to search for her sister on her own.  This, of course, takes her to a seedy boarding house where she confronts a witness; to the carnival that is going up  to raise funds for the local hospital; and to the restaurant that was the last place she and her sister were actually together.  And Webb does not hold back with the danger, either.  At one point, Eileen is tied up in her own shed-turned-darkroom behind her house and left with a bomb set to go off in ten minutes!  Talk about some suspenseful reading as Eileen tries to figure a way out of it!  And not one, but two potential witnesses turn up dead before the end of the story, showing readers just how much danger Eileen (and her sister!) are truly facing!

I have to give Webb kudos for working so hard to keep the identity of the kidnapper / murderer fairly well hidden until the big reveal in that final, sealed chapter.  Yes, I had some suspicions, but those suspicions fell on two different characters (and, yes, one of them did actually turn out to be the culprit).  Early on, though, I admit, I was debating whether Rosemary ran off or whether she really was kidnapped.  

 

It has to be noted that Eileen is described as having "copper" and "red" hair.  In the previous book, Terry Spring is described as having "long auburn" hair.  And in the first book, Maxine Reynolds is said to have "long red" hair.  So, I have to ask - why did these authors give all of these amateur sleuths red or reddish colored hair?  Was it perhaps a slight nod to a certain teen detective who was famous for her "titian" colored hair?  It is a rather large coincidence that three out of the first four books in this series have protagonists with the same hair color.

The internal illustrations are beautifully rendered, although, again, like with some of the previous books, the scenes depicted do not necessarily match the story.  I really have to wonder if the artists are not given exact details, but merely general descriptions of what to draw, and so that is why they don't mirror the narrative of the story.  For instance, when Eileen first spots the footprints in the flower bed that borders the lanai, they are described as "clear as a perfectly matched pair of spike-heeled slippers..." (p. 39). Yet, in the illustration, the footprints appear to be that of a normal shoe (male, more than female).  Later, when Eileen and her publisher are looking at a photograph she took at the restaurant the night of the disappearance, the description given in the book by no means matches the illustration of the photograph at all.  If only they identified the artists, so that they could be contacted to learn inside information such as this!

Of the first four Zebra Mystery Puzzlers, I would have to say, this is, by far, my favorite.  And sadly, this is the only one written by Webb and starring Eileen Tracy.  This is a shame, as the writing was so good, and the character so likable, I would have loved to have seen more mysteries with this sleuth!

***Interesting side note is that sources online indicate Webb was married to "Nancy" Webb (with her names in quotes on the website I found), and I have an old paperback titled Marcia Blake, Publicity Girl that is written by one Nancy Webb.  I have to wonder if it is one and the same...

RATING:  10 yellow paper chrysanthemums out of 10 for a wonderfully written missing person mystery that is so much more than a simple murder mystery, making is a fantastic read.