Saratoga Mantrap & Classification: Homicide

Armchair Fiction presents extra large editions of classic mystery-crime double novels. The first novel is “Saratoga Mantrap” by Dexter St. Claire. It didn’t take Keene Madden long to discover that in colorful Saratoga it was foolish to bet on a horse, and fatal to bet on a woman—especially when that woman was Cynthia Larmin, who had the body of a thoroughbred and the morals of a million loose dollars. Madden knew someone was fixing the races, that someone had died rudely, and, even worse, that he was next on the killer’s list. But when Madden actually got fingered for one of the murders, it gave him an added “incentive” to bring the killer to justice. However, standing in his way was a seemingly endless maze of mis-turns and half-clues, all intermixed with a long list of low-life characters. Who would have thought lust, death, and playing the ponies would go hand and hand? The second novel is a true classic of nail-biting suspense, “Classification: Homicide” by another well-known mystery writer, Jonathan Craig. Her name was Barbara Lawson, a gorgeous young model with lots of friends and a great life in front of her. Then one morning the police found her dead body on an apartment building rooftop—the victim of a brutal stabbing. Veteran detective Steve Manning was called in to examine the crime scene and turn up a suspect or two—of which there were plenty. Could the killer have been beautiful Anne Tyner, a fellow model and Barbara Lawson’s “best friend?” Or there was Gus Brokaw, the aloof superintendent of the apartment building who was very aware of Lawson’s physical beauty and personal charm. Then there was Edward Henderson, the man who found the body. He claimed he liked going up on the rooftop “just for the view.” But most of all there was Benny Thomas, who had a rap sheet a mile long and seemed perfect for the part of a street-wise assassin. Manning had to eyeball these suspects under a magnifying glass and sift through endless clues in an effort to bring a ruthless killer to justice.