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A review by paul_cornelius
The Chinese Nail Murders by Robert van Gulik
5.0
More than ever, Judge Dee begins to doubt himself and question his capabilities to solve crimes correctly and timely. (In his postscript, van Gulik argues that this was his intent, especially in Nail Murders.) Not only that but the price he pays for being slow on the uptake is the loss of one of his long-time lieutenants. It's one of the more shocking scenes in any Judge Dee mystery, when this dependable ally is murdered towards the end of the book. So, full of regrets, second guesses, and missed chances, the Dee of Nail Murders has a modern air about him, a detective vulnerable to misdirection and even intimidation. (Also modern is the style of writing. In the past, I've noted how especially in the later novels van Gulik seems to employ a hardboiled way of expressing himself. Again, in the postscript, he comments on turning the old Chinese detective stories into pieces of action, with "concise" depictions of the settings and movements.)
Nail Murders apparently is also the final book in the five series of fictional Dee novels van Gulik first penned. It has a sense of conclusion about it, in fact. As with the others in the "first five" Nail Murders is longer and more complicated. This also is something van Gulik addresses in one of the postscripts, noting how he reduced from 20 or 24 the number of characters to merely a dozen in the next series of Dee novels he was preparing at the time this story went off to the publishers. For these reasons, I must admit that it is the earlier Dee stories I most enjoy. The problem was that van Gulik felt he was overwhelming the majority of his readers with novels too involved with difficult to remember characters and situations. Was he wrong? Probably not. The market for paperback mysteries preferred shorter and shorter efforts as the 60s and 70s came upon the scene. Van Gulik would not have been the only author to take this path, either.
Nail Murders apparently is also the final book in the five series of fictional Dee novels van Gulik first penned. It has a sense of conclusion about it, in fact. As with the others in the "first five" Nail Murders is longer and more complicated. This also is something van Gulik addresses in one of the postscripts, noting how he reduced from 20 or 24 the number of characters to merely a dozen in the next series of Dee novels he was preparing at the time this story went off to the publishers. For these reasons, I must admit that it is the earlier Dee stories I most enjoy. The problem was that van Gulik felt he was overwhelming the majority of his readers with novels too involved with difficult to remember characters and situations. Was he wrong? Probably not. The market for paperback mysteries preferred shorter and shorter efforts as the 60s and 70s came upon the scene. Van Gulik would not have been the only author to take this path, either.