A Family Affair

Rex Stout's A FAMILY AFFAIR enjoys veteran actor/audio narrator Michael Prichard's compelling voice as a new Nero Wolfe mystery evolves. Here a waiter's death in Nero's own home involves him in a murder disguised as a personal attack. A FAMILY AFFAIR is the last novel published before Stout's death and provides what might be the best of all.

We read the entire (and considerable) collection of Nero Wolfe stories nearly forty years ago, some contemporaneous with their original publication. "Family Affair", released in 1975, turned out to be Rex Stout's last novel, even though his estate paid Robert Goldsborough to do a credible job of writing seven more entries in the Wolfe series. Stout was in his early 80's as of this writing, but his plot and vocabulary were as excellent as ever, with quite a surprising twist and sense of justice at the close of the story. During our recent re-read, we were a little surprised to see political commentary about Watergate and (then President) Nixon - obviously the author was upset at the scandalous turn of events, and uses Wolfe's dialogue to register his severe chagrin. This book reminds us of several things. One - it's amazing how much fun, mystery, and suspense some of the classic writers of fifty years ago could pack into a 150-200 page volume. Few words were wasted, and no filler or irrelevant subplots were deployed to compile the 400-700 page tomes we so often get today. Two - it occurs to us, that characters were revealed ever so slowly over the course of multiple stories. So one can't just pick up this novel and even begin to understand the complexities of our genius detective and his affable sidekick; it takes reading several entries in the set to really get to know these guys in a way that eventually seals their place in our hearts and minds as "best friends!" Lastly, there is a certain predictability we come to enjoy - not from guessing the outcome (difficult!) but rather just enjoying the eccentricities and habits of the familiar people and places: Wolfe's bottle caps, his globe, Cramer's cigars, the old brownstone, etc. In the story, a waiter is bombed to death (!) in Wolfe's guest bedroom, causing both he and Archie a sense of outrage so strong they commit to finding the killer on their own with no client in sight. They soon deduce the police will never figure it out, and somewhat uncharacteristically refuse completely to cooperate with the police. Wolfe leaves the house (amazing!) to speed along the investigation, and even spends a night in jail - incredible! While these seeming inconsistencies irk some of Stout's fans, we found them acceptable in terms of the unusual nature of this plot, which we don't intend to spoil an iota with further commentary. We found ourselves as pleased as ever with Wolfe and Stout. We were partially moved by nostalgia, but that had nothing to do with the sheer enjoyment and entertainment value found in this fine conclusion to the tales of one of the greatest detectives in modern fiction.

I didn't see in this book that characters were out of character or that the plot or whatnot had problems. Archie is his usual capable smartass self, and Wolfe's diction and grammar remain laser-precise (to use a metaphor he would scorn). The difference from the other novels is that this one has a somber note, and it sounded from Stout's deep disappointment with Watergate. (Wolfe fans know of his respect for words: "somber" goes back to a near-identical French word that means "grave.") Stout was thinking about issues of patriotism and betrayal when he penned this novel, and it shows. It should. Nixon was given control of the ship of state, and while steering it he indulged in wrecklessness and flummery.Wolfe does break some of his cherished rules; but can't we allow him to in Archie's last report of his doings? And he breaks them because the case is "a family affair." His self-esteem, as large as his fabled seventh of a ton, has been tweaked. A murder has happened in his own home--and, twice as indigestible, the victim is mighty Nero's own waiter at Rusterman's. He requires satisfaction and will halt his planetary momentum at nothing--not even jail time--to get it. Being a male chauvinist lookalike, as Saul Panzer would have it (and not just a lookalike, unfortunately), Archie's machismo could never allow him to comment at length on how he felt about where the investigation led. His lapses say it for him. A question implicit in what he and Wolfe discover is: how does one come to terms with finding betrayal where one expected sincerity? It can be an anguishing question, and the stylish solution devised by "the family" leaves behind it both a mystery solved but a lesson learned about the need to be critical of those who claim to uphold the law of the land.

Why do people say that Stout's age was showing when he wrote this book? To me, it's just as clever as any of the previous Wolfe tomes, and it has a surprising, killer ending. Very courageous of Stout to plot it like he did. An excellent book.