The Second Confession (Nero Wolfe)

Once again Wolfe receives a phone call from the mysterious Arnold Zeck, warning him that he's getting too close with an unwanted investigation. On this occasion, Wolfe is involved in a request from a leading industrialist to investigate the background of his daughter's current suitor. When Wolfe refuses to back down, Zeck backs up his warning with violence that hits Nero where it hurts... Communists, orchids and a manor-house mystery dropped on its head. This is one of Stout's stronger Wolfe novels on its own, and also makes a powerful second punch in his Zeck trilogy of books. I've seen quite a bit of commentary that criticizes what they perceive as Stout's anti-Communist agenda in the book. All I can say to that is "read it again". While not a fan of Communists, Wolfe and Archie are not friends to people spouting off about the red menace either. Mickey Spillane he isn't, thank goodness. Consider this a measured glance at the politics of the era by a writer who was trying to show the issues from a position of (relative) neutrality. Note his nod to the middle way with the treatment of the Paul Emerson character. Recommended.

Rex Stout's THE SECOND CONFESSION receives a fine uninterrupted continuation by pairing Los Angeles actor Michael Prichard with another fine Nero Wolfe mystery: this revolving around a warning shot to Wolfe from a gangland boss. His investigation of a lawyer boyfriend of a millionaire's daughter may be placing his own life in jeopardy.

I don't understand the reviewers who complain about loose ends. Do you normally expect the second book in a trilogy to wrap everything up? I'm guessing that those reviewers didn't realize that Zeck appears in three books (And Be a Villain, The Second Confession, and In the Best of Families, in that order). At any rate, any ends left loose in this book are tied up in the third.But even if you know and care nothing about Zeck, you should still be able to enjoy this books; he does not dominate it. Wolfe and Archie are both in top form, and the ploy Wolfe uses to expose the murder is both enjoyable and clever.

Nero Wolfe's favorite drink, beer, is not a beverage you can come to like on the first taste. You will find beer bitter and repugnant, but if you keep at it you will eventually begin to tolerate it, then to like it. So it is with Nero Wolfe. At first taste you will find him arrogant, eccentric, and thoroughly unlikeable. Keep at him. Because Rex Stout chose the novella as the format for most Wolfe stories you can read the stories at a sitting. After three novellas you will come to tolerate the corpulent crimefighter. After five, you will even come to have some affection for him."The Second Confession" might better be named "The Second Confrontation," because Wolfe faces his archnemesis, Arnold Zeck, for the second time. ("And be a Villain" chronicled the first confrontation). When Sherlock Holmes discovered the existence of Professor Moriarty, he immediately undertook to destroy the professor's criminal empire. When Nero Wolfe discovered the existence of Arnold Zeck, he immediately began to avoid Zeck at all costs. Holmes' course of action led to the Reichenbach Falls. Wolfe's led -- you'll have to find out in the final novella of the trilogy, "In the Best Families." Suffice it to say that Wolfe undertakes to expose a communist, runs afoul of Arnold Zeck, gets his orchids machine-gunned, and winds up trying to solve a murder for Zeck. Along the way Archie gets in deep trouble with the local constabulary, Wolfe confounds the police, the two manage to outright break several laws, and they severely bend a few more.

Rex Stout's Second Confession provides a fine Nero Wolfe mystery, with Michael Prichard's strong narrative skills bringing alive the detective story of Wolfe's encounter with a gangland boss. Murder and his investigation of a lawyer blend in this vivid story.