The Silent Bullet

February 1, 2021
Twelve reprinted adventures starring scientific detective Craig Kennedy in a collection that might have been called CSI: 1912. As Leslie S. Klinger's Introduction notes, Kennedy, a professor of chemistry who presumably works at Columbia University, was not the first purely scientific detective, but together with his contemporaries Dr. Richard Thorndyke and Luther Trant, he paved the way for modern forensic investigators. Most of these dozen cases follow an identical formula: A client or friend brings Kennedy and his amanuensis, journalist Walter Jameson, an impossible crime to solve; he asks pertinent questions, performs mysterious experiments, and unmasks the thief or killer in a melodramatic denouement. The most impressive feature of the stories is their dazzling array of riddles, from how someone shot a victim in a crowded room without making a sound to how a young couple were struck down together without a mark before they could wed. Their most limiting factor is their science, which in hindsight must walk a narrow path between the all-too-predictable (modern readers being much more knowledgeable than their original audience) and the discredited (Klinger's conscientious notes to three stories pronounce their affordances "nonsense," "far-fetched," and "science fiction"). When Reeve (1880-1936) departs from this formula to show Kennedy dropping mescaline and using electroshock to revive a dead suspect, the results are more sensational than persuasive. So this collection, a cornerstone for historical completists and nostalgia buffs, is unlikely to appeal to anyone else. A tonic reminder from a century ago that nothing dates more rapidly than state-of-the-art forensics.

COPYRIGHT(2021) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.