Trent's Last Case

Written by E. C. Bentley

Narrated by Frederick Davidson

Written in 1912 as a light-hearted reaction against the solemnity of the Sherlock Holmes stories, Trent’s Last Case, with its ingeniously twisting plot and cheerfully self-mocking hero, is the first classic of the golden age of English detective fiction.

When a powerful and ruthless American millionaire is found murdered in his English country garden, Philip Trent-English painter, poetry lover, and amateur detective- delves into the crime. He successively uncovers three different, plausible solutions to the murder, and in the process, comes face to face with his own fallibility, in detection and in romance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blackstone Audio
• Release date: Apr 16, 2009
• ISBN: 9780786119448

E. C. Bentley

Edmund Clerihew Bentley was born in London in 1875; most of his working life was spent at the Daily Telegraph and as a literary critic in.Later in life he became President of the Detection Club, and contributed to the early collaborative efforts of the Detection Club, Behind the Screen and The Scoop in 1930 and 1931. But his reputation as a detective story writer rests almost entirely on his first detective novel. He died in London in March 1956.

Reviews for Trent's Last Case

[ashleytylerjohn · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Well, you have to have an open mind and an appreciation for history, I think. For any modern mystery aficionado without these skills, they will likely be disappointed, just as those who don't care about bridges will be unmoved by examples of early bridges or Museums of Bridge Construction. So much is ridiculous by our standards--the detective, a newspaperman (not even a journalist, but an illustrator) is allowed unfettered access to roam the halls of a dead millionaire's home, questioning whomever, any suggestion that a lady might be less-than-honorable is met with horror from all parties, the stately home apparently has only two staff, and did you know the human bodies leaves fingerprints when they touch certain materials? It is assumed you don't, so early is this example.

It would be a two-star book if return today, because, well, it's just so awkward and kludgy, but I appreciate it in context, and it gets an extra bump for historical significance. Still, I hardly think anyone needs to read it--this is no classic of the stature of Dickens or Aeschylus, say--it's an early bridge, and that's about it.

(Note: 5 stars = amazing, wonderful, 4 = very good book, 3 = decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. I'm fairly good at picking for myself so end up with a lot of 4s).

[marcusbastos-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

How can you solve a mystery?Trent had a hard time in this story. The facts are unclear and the journalist detective, called an artist, struggled to grasp then. The death of an american millionaire and the characteristics of his life were at the center of this plot. The book has plenty of descriptions and the characters interacted in a crescendo. At the end, the murder was solved but now in a conventional way. This is a book written before de WWI. It contained the seeds of the british Golden Age mysteries. A good reading for mysteries lovers.

[marti.booker · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two main thoughts upon finishing this novel. One, the murderer, motive, and mysteries were much more complex than I guessed at when I was only a third of the way through. Two, if this is how people spoke at that point in time, the English language has undergone a sad sad diminishing. Enjoyed it, but it's filled with poetical references and "high falutin'" language, so it's not an easy read.

[overgaard-2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

end was complete - very funny - surprise

[vesper1931 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

An American financier Sigsbee Manderson has been found dead at White Gables, Marlstone, near Bishopsbridge. Inspector Murth investigates in 'competition' with private detective Philip Trent.
An entertaining historicalmurder mystery
Originally written in 1913

[susankrzywicki · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I read this about 30 years ago and had forgotten most of it. So, I decided to re-read it. I'm sorry I did. The attitudes of the author are so uncomfortably racist/imperialist that I just had to give up when I reached the limerick towards the end. I did some research...Bentley worked as a journalist for "The Outlook" - an imperialist newspaper supposedly financed by Cecil Rhodes, the noted believer in white supremacy. So maybe Bentley's casual use of language reflects his world view more that just an "of the times" thing. He is oddly out of date for the late 1920s in his views in other ways, too - towards women, towards science (that section about Mercury and Chalk, for example).

[datrappert · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This very enjoyable old-fashioned (because it is old) mystery introduces us to the great painter-detetective-newspaperman Philip Trent as he tries to solve the murder of an American multimillionaire at his British residence. There are lots of twists, lots of long conversations, and pages and pages of summing up, but it is a pleasure all the way (I read it in one day). If you have the version with the Dorothy Sayers introduction, DO NOT READ IT FIRST as it is full of semi-spoilers.

[ninieb-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

But for the fact that Marlowe (the dead man's private secretary) has to explain what a car's rearview mirror is, one would think this book was written in the 1930s, when many standards of the genre had already been established. Nope, the Golden Age was yet to happen. Trent is an artist, a gentleman, and an enthusiast at reasoning out mysteries, to the point that a London paper pays him occasionally to investigate and report on newsworthy crimes. Thus he finds himself investigating the puzzling death of Sigsbee Manderson, wealthy American businessman. Required reading for Golden Age fans.

[leslie398 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Who did it was a complete surprise to me! However, I found Trent to be a bit too "precious" for me and as a result found the story dragged in several places.

[auntieknickers · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Considered a bit of a breakthrough in the detective story because the sleuth is a bit of a bumbler, not the omniscient genius in the Sherlock Holmes mode. The classical education of the early twentieth-century British writer shows in the lengthy, but well-punctuated and readable, sentences. Although the somewhat florid writing would not pass muster with today's editors, it does not detract overmuch from the story. Trent, the detective, may have influenced Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey as he has the same propensity to "talk piffle," scattering allusions here and there. I more or less figured out the solution, but partly that's because the Dover edition I got from the library had a spoiler on the back cover! At the very end there is a distressing bit of that nearly unconscious racism that white writers were so prone to in those days (1913).

[mrslee_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Philip Trent has been called in by the newspaper to get to the bottom of a story and crime. He has has success on a few other cases, and everyone looks to him with high expectations. But somehow, the story never gets published. I enjoyed it, although it seemed a bit quaint in some of the mannerisms and language. Other parts seemed exceedingly modern for its times. As a murder mystery, it completely fooled me, and yet the author played fair all along. Reading it, I could certainly see the seeds of Lord Peter Wimsey, Poirot and many other detective stories of the Golden Age of mysteries. Loved the dedication to Chesterton, and Sayers' introduction was a good comparison and illustration to show why this is a special mystery. Also, I don't know who did the cover on my version, but I love the look of Philip Trent on it, even though I think the story said he had sandy tousled hair.

[gloria2010books · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fifty Classics of Crime Fiction series. Very Clever twists. The light, amusing patter style and gentleman-detective amateur nicely handled. The victim, Sigsbee Manderson, is a capitalist-toad sucking the life of the people and is universally unmourned. The reader is quickly maneuvered into hoping that the guilty party gets away with it.

[schmerguls · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This classic book deserves its reputation. Published in 1913, it involves a rich mean guy being killed on his south England estate and Phillip Trent is called in to solve the case. I had my own idea for the solution but of course it was not the author's--but was perfectly logical if one leaves aside the question of character. I almost gave this book five stars!

[susanamper · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Considered the grandaddy of 20th c. murder mysteries, this is Bentley's first novel written in 1912 in response his friend G. K. Chesterton's The Man Who was Thursday. Trent is a freelance reporter investigating the mysterious death of a wealthy English baron. This is a true whodunit, and you probably won't guess correctly. Agatha Christie obviously learned something from this Brit mystery, and she used it to write better, more clever novels.

[gerleliz · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A little dry but good