The Usual Suspects Mystery Reading Group will be discussing Westport author Dorothy Gilman’s The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax next Sunday afternoon at two.
New faces are always welcome. To reserve a copy of the book, call 291-4821.
The St. James Guide to Crime & Mystery Writers explains the enduring popularity of Gilman‘s detective Mrs. Pollifax so perfectly: “Emily Pollifax is more than the wish-fulfillment persona of aging women; she is a character with traits that anyone might emulate: she is courageous, clever, intuitive, open to new experiences, and, above all, to new friends of any age, of any race or creed.”
We meet this sweet, sixty-something widow from New Brunswick, New Jersey who has tired of a monotonous routine of volunteer work, garden club and women's associations in The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax, the first of 14 titles in the series, which was published in 1966 and became an instant hit with young and old alike.
Remembering a childhood dream of becoming a spy, Mrs. P. takes a bus to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia and applies for a job.
Many of her adventures take place in the Cold War era and are set in Iron Curtain countries. The first book takes place in Albania, where the detective ends up in prison after her first assignment, a “meet” with a bookstore owner/secret agent in Mexico City, does not go as planned.
As the St. James Guide tells us, “By a series of coincidences that would seem merely absurd were it not for the author's charming and delightful way of telling a tale, Emily Pollifax is taken on as a courier for a single mission. She is hired because she looks and acts so completely unlike an agent, and becomes a part-timer whose brilliant improvisations and stunning successes are nothing short of fantastic.”
Another of the versatile Gilman’s series put her in the vanguard of the “woo-woo” or supernatural mystery genre. Madame Karitska, a clairvoyant who solves crimes for the police, made her debut in 1987 in The Clairvoyant Countess.
