cimorene

The Longer Bodies (1930). 5/5. Fun and hilarious. An eccentric and wealthy old lady decides on a whim to leave her fortune to whichever great-nephew can break a world record in track and field first. She has a track and field built in her garden and hires an Olympic coach and invites relatives to stay. Just this premise is pretty good, but the overall tone is also pretty much like that.

The Saltmarsh Murders (1932) 2/5. Boring, told in an annoying 1st person voice, with some highly questionable psychology about violence, domestic abuse, temperamental "capacity" for murder, and a situation where everyone agrees that a murderer is "innocent" because someone manipulated them into committing the murder by telling them a lie that made them angry. Uhhhhhh. But. So. You aren't technically allowed to commit murder even if you're SUPER mad???? Nobody in the book notices this fact. Also there's a Black character who is, admittedly, portrayed... reasonably sympathetically... but with some cringey stereotypes the author no doubt believes to be accurate, plus some absolutely nails-on-the-chalkboard phonetic dialect and plentiful period-accurate use of the n-word in dialogue. Like, not by good and sympathetic characters, but still, it's not like it's there to make a point. Very uncomfortable to read, and not in the good way where the author was doing it on purpose to successfully make a good point.

The Devil at Saxon Wall (1935) 2/5. A bizarre thriller guessing game where apparently the reader is supposed to suspect the (third person limited) POV character of being the murderer, even though that would render most of the book up to that point into deliberate falsehood. Some dubious psychology in this book is so bizarre that it might actually be entertaining, although I didn't enjoy it. Plot features a man coming back to life as his (nonexistent) elder brother and a concerning picture of how adoption works. A big chunk later in the book feels vague and unfocused and kind of boring.

At least this demonstrates a very great range (of quality, and also variety of bad psychology) as well as an incredible level of productivity on Mitchell's part.