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    The Leavenworth Case
    The Leavenworth Case
    The Leavenworth Case
    Audiobook11 hours

    The Leavenworth Case

    Written by Anna Katharine Green

    Narrated by Rebecca Burns

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    Horatio Leavenworth is a New York merchant whose material wealth is matched by his eminence in the community and reputation for good works. He is also the guardian of two striking nieces who share his Fifth Avenue mansion. Mary, her uncle's favorite, is to inherit his fortune at his death.

    As this mystery opens, that lamentable event has just occurred: Leavenworth has been shot to death, and circumstances point to one of his young wards. But is that the trail to follow?

    This classic mystery novel-a tribute to Anna Katharine Green's exceptional plotting and legal accuracy-was famously put to use by Yale University's law school to demonstrate the fallibility of circumstantial evidence.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateNov 23, 2009
    ISBN9781400181285
    Author

    Anna Katharine Green

    Anna Katharine Green (1846–1935) was an American writer and one of the first authors of detective fiction in the United States. Her book The Leavenworth Case, published in 1878, became a wildly successful bestseller. Green went on to write dozens of mysteries and detective novels. She died in Buffalo, New York. 

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    Reviews for The Leavenworth Case

    3.5/5

    10 ratings8 reviews

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    • 2/5
      The Victorian era gender norms overwhelmed me. Paragraphs extolling the feminine ideal and how the narrator constrained his thinking by them were incredibly boring. I think I would gave enjoyed this more if it had been from Gryce's perspective. As for the mystery itself, not bad, not great, but not bad.
    • 3/5
      I thought all the characters were somewhat annoying for about the first third of the book, but they gradually grew on me. Everett Raymond was unnecessarily clueless, and I didn't really identify with Eleanore or Mary. The language was also a bit too flowery for my taste; I usually don't mind Victorian Era language so I'm not sure what was different this time. I was a little disappointed in the end of the book, but I can't say why without giving it away.
    • 4/5
      Generally regarded as an early American classic mystery novel, with the "miilionaire shot in his library" adopted to a New York City setting, investigated by a young lawyer, Mr. Raymond, who tells the story, and the police detective Mr. Gryce. the Penguin edition quotes the British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin as saying in 1928 that it was still one of the bet mysteries ever written. I would not go that far, but it is a good period piece, if you like the period, and I do. After all, it appeared the same year as A Study in Scarlet
    • 4/5
      This has been called the first American detective novel, however it seems that's probably not quite true but Anna Katherine Green may have been the first author to develop the series detective as she wrote several series featuring different detectives. The Leavenworth Case, first published in 1878, is the first in a 12 book series featuring Ebenezer Gryce, a New York detective:"And here let me say that Mr. Gryce, the detective, was not the thin, wiry individual with the piercing eye you are doubtless expecting to see. On the contrary, Mr. Gryce was a portly, comfortable personage with an eye that never pierced, that did not even rest on you. If it rested anywhere, it was always on some insignificant object in the vicinity, some vase, inkstand, book, or button. These things he would seem to take into his confidence, make the repositories of his conclusions; but as for you—you might as well be the steeple on Trinity Church, for all connection you ever appeared to have with him or his thoughts. At present, then, Mr. Gryce was, as I have already suggested, on intimate terms with the door-knob."Mr Gryce, though, takes something of a back seat in this story which is narrated by the young lawyer, Everett Raymond, who is called in to provide advice and assistance to Mr Leavenworth's young and beautiful nieces after Mr Leavenworth has been found shot, sitting at his desk in his study. It transpires that the house was locked up for the night and there are no signs of forced entry leading to the shocking conclusion that it may have been someone inside the house who did the deed. Evidence is produced at the inquest which even more shockingly seems to point to one of Mr Leavenworth's nieces as the killer leading Raymond Everett to declare that he will clear the young lady's name by any means necessary (I had to wonder at this point whether he would have been as easily convinced of the lady's innocence if she hadn't been quite so beautiful).It's a fairly melodramatic story but one which I enjoyed a lot until the solution which seemed to come out of nowhere. Recommended for anyone who likes early detective stories like the Sherlock Holmes tales but be aware that the writing style is quite different.
    • 5/5
      Great old-timey mystery that takes place in New York City during the Victorian era--this does not read like a modern novel. Any afficionado of Patricia Wentworth or Agatha Christie would enjoy this.
    • 4/5
      I must admit to rather ambivalent feelings here. On the one hand this is a seminal work in the genre of murder and detection,being written nine years before Conan Doyle's great detective, Sherlock Holmes appeared on the scene. In her own detective,Ebenezer Gryce and his Watson-like assistant Everett Raymond,Green has written an ideal team. Briefly, the whole tale hinges upon the murder of the wealthy Horatio Leavenworth who's body is discovered within his locked library,shot through the head. The main members of the family living with him at that time are his two nieces Mary and Eleanore and both are prime suspects in the murder. So far so good,but on the other side of the coin,and a great detraction for me to this basically excellent story,is the large amount of melodrama and what I would describe as 'fainting and shrieking' moments. William Le Queux can get away with it but Anna Katherine Green cannot.So,5✯ in many ways,but I must deduct a star for the melodrama. Thus 4✯ is my final (and difficult) verdict.
    • 3/5
      This is another book that helped shape the detective and mystery genre. When eventually published in 1878 it became a wild success, selling a million copies and becoming a required text at Yale Law School. Must have been quite a blow to Green’s father whose disapproval of novels caused his daughter write it in secret which took years. Oh and he was a trial lawyer too. Funny.While not perfect, the book does a good job of illustrating how easy it is to fit facts to a hypothesis and not the other way around. Though Ebenezer Gryce is the official detective, he lets junior attorney Everett Raymond pursue his own line of inquiry driven by his utter conviction that Eleanore Leavenworth must be innocent. The circumstantial evidence against her coupled with her own stubborn silence makes it a hard case to prove. He goes at it doggedly and rationally though his whole supposition is flawed and he’s man enough to admit he was wrong when Gryce confronts him with the fruits of his own investigation.
    • 4/5
      A fascinating tale of misleading clues despite showing its age.