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The Red House Mystery
by A.A. Milne
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Methuen (1983-05-05)
ISBN: 0413520404
EAN: 9780413520401
Hardcover: 224 pages
Edition: New Ed
SKU: FL0638
Condition: Good
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Customer Reviews
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A fairly average British mystery
Rating  (3)
Date: 2008-03-25
The Red House Mystery is an amateur detective story written by the author of the Winnie the Pooh books. Milne wrote his only novel for his father, an avid reader of mysteries. Could the children's book author really write an entertaining mystery? Not especially.
Set in an English country house, the story begins by introducing the owner, Mark, having breakfast with his guests while complaining about a later meeting to be had with his estranged brother, Robert. Once the guests leave to play golf for the day, Anthony, a friend of one of the guests, wanders up to the house to discover Robert dead and Mark nowhere to be found. Anthony and his friend, Bill, one of the guests, take it upon themselves to investigate the mystery.
Antony is Sherlock Holmes-light; he shares some qualities with the famous sleuth (and even refers to his sidekick as "my Watson"), but he fails to really distinguish himself, hovering in Holmes' shadow. He knows he has a similar role; he just doesn't pull it off as masterly. After all, he's just playing detective for a little bit of adventure. The mystery itself seems intriguing initially, but the solving of it is pretty uninteresting. Antony makes some smart deductions along the way, but they're more tedious than exciting to read about. The stock characters added nothing except for Mark's cousin, whose interests aren't explained till the end. And once the mystery gets solved (in a rather cliche manner), there's little satisfaction to be had. Antony and Bill are just having fun with their first chance to solve a murder mystery, but the plot and simple style fail to convey their fun, nor do they present anything that hasn't already been done.
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A DELIGHTFUL MYSTERY
Rating  (5)
Date: 2004-12-29
4 out of 7 customers found this reveiw helpful
NOT REALLY A REVIEW JUST A VOTE FOR THIS DELIGHTFUL BOOK. THOSE WHO LOVE ENGLISH MYSTERIES WILL LIKE THIS.
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The Red Mystery
Rating (3)
Date: 2003-05-14
4 out of 9 customers found this reveiw helpful
The Red House Mystery by A.A Milne was a mystery set in the late 1900's. The story was about a lady named Miss Stevens in the red house. There is a man or a woman that is killing people, so the public has to try and figure out who did it, when and how. This is probably one of the best mystery stories I have ever read. This book really had a lot of suspense and surprising points. I think you'll be very shocked about what happens at the end. I recommend this book to whoever likes mysteries or who is at a high school level.
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Murderously Fun
Rating  (4)
Date: 2000-12-21
20 out of 21 customers found this reveiw helpful
This was the most fun I've had reading a mystery since I read the Hardy Boys as a kid. It seems you should be reading it under the covers with a flashlight. In The Red House Mystery, A.A. Milne (of Pooh fame) lets us pal around with Tony Gillingham, a jack-of-all-trades who is trying his hand a being a detective. The setting is an English country house loaded with guests, including the British major, the willful actress, and the dim-but-lovable young athlete. These are stock characters; Tony and his friend Bill even gleefully refer to each other as "Holmes" and "Watson". It's all very playful, despite the corpse. So much so that Tony and Bill are guilty about how much fun they are having. There are tons of mentions of amateur theatricals and acting. Tony is playing at being a detective and so is the reader, which draws you into the story alongside him. In a way you are competing with Tony and Bill to solve the crime. It's a fair contest: only amateurs allowed. Milne gives you all the clues, even to the point of saying things like "This would be important later." In the reader's head a siren goes off and a sign lights up saying "CLUE". Tony and Bill bounce theories off each other and the theories change as the clues mount up. Still, Tony is always ahead of Bill (and probably the reader). He knows the real question in a mystery is not "How?" but "Why?" The best parts are the gasps of surprise and moments of anticipation while we wait in darkness for the sounds of approaching footsteps. Milne has a great way of setting the mood, whether it's nervous tension or eager curiosity. A fun mystery is like opening up a big present: You can't wait to know what it is. Milne conveys this sense of "I need to know" in this his one-and-only mystery novel. If you're like me, you'll need to know and keep saying to yourself, "One more chapter and I'll put out the light."
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A tad overrated
Rating (3)
Date: 2000-10-15
10 out of 14 customers found this reveiw helpful
"I envy those readers who are coming to this lighthearted masterpiece for the first time," writes Douglas G. Greene in the introduction of A. A. Milne's "The Red House Mystery." Since Greene is considered the leading expert on John Dickson Carr--one of the greatest Golden Age detective novelists--I was tremendously excited by his recommendation and plunged into the book straightaway.It took me a little under two weeks to finish. Yes, for a book that isn't even two hundred pages. The story features Antony Gillingham and Bill Beverley as a rather unlikely Holmes and Watson who set out to unravel a bizarre murder at the Red House. Although Gillingham and Beverley make an interesting pair, the way they tackle the problem is a bit too languid and leisurely for my taste (and I usually thrive on cozy mysteries), and since there is virtually no action and almost no other major characters to focus on--well, it's not exactly a page-turner. There are a few nifty plot tricks--one twist involving a door key is particularly clever--but the resolution (which falls back on that most irritating of cliches, the letter of confession) doesn't carry much in the way of suspense or surprise. Still, it's all very witty and well-written, and the droll humor that spawned "Winnie-the-Pooh" is very much in evidence. Anglophiles will treasure it for its delineation of mid-1920s England alone. But I was expecting a masterpiece, and as a detective novel, "The Red House Mystery" is no masterpiece--but then again, Mr. Milne is no John Dickson Carr.
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