Can a single word constitute a dying clue? In Face to Face, the twenty-second entry in the Ellery Queen Detective series, narrated by Robert Fass, it is the only clue available. Gloria Guild, the singing sensation of the 1930s and the current millionairess wife of Count Carlos Armando, is murdered. Her husband, that collector of wealthy wives, has a perfect alibi. The only evidence is the word 'face,' scrawled in Gloria's dying hand. Ellery Queen inherits a puzzle with one piece and is invited to build the picture around it. This audiobook lands that setup with exactly the confidence that the best mid-series Queen novels achieve.
The Ellery Queen pseudonym has always been interesting to critics of Golden Age detective fiction because the cousins Frederic Dannay and Manfred Bennington Lee were meta-textual before that language existed. Queen himself, the fictional detective, is also a mystery novelist, and the books frequently embed commentary on the genre's own conventions into the plots. Face to Face is no exception: the challenge at the book's end, addressed directly to the reader, inviting you to identify the killer before Queen does, is the cousins reminding you that they consider this a fair-play puzzle. Anyone who nails the killer before Queen, the book tells you, is either a genius or a cheat.
Robert Fass is well-suited to this material. Ellery Queen's prose has a period particularity that requires a narrator who can deliver 1960s thriller idioms, 'the glory riddle,' 'the Bowery to a way-out wedding,' without either archaic stiffness or unnecessary modernization. Fass finds the register: committed to the period, clear in the plot mechanics, never overstating the dramatic moments that the books themselves understate deliberately. The voice he gives Queen carries the right balance of intellectual confidence and slightly removed observation that the character demands.
The murder victim herself is worth noting. Gloria Guild is described as the singing 'glory' of the 1930s and as a woman who has married wealth multiple times over. The specificity of her characterization in the opening chapters is one of the book's pleasures: she is not simply a cipher to be murdered. The Bowery-to-Park-Avenue arc of her life gives Ellery multiple social worlds to move through in the investigation, and the contrast between her origins and her current milieu produces the kind of class-inflected mystery texture that the best Golden Age fiction delivers.
Fass Nails the Period Idiom Without Stiffness
This is entry twenty-two in a long-running series, and one reviewer describes it as 'one of the best of the series,' which raises the reasonable question of whether it functions for readers coming in without prior Queen experience. The answer is qualified yes. The core mystery is self-contained. You do not need to know Ellery Queen's history to follow the investigation here. But the series' particular pleasure, watching Queen work, his specific habits of observation and his conversational relationship with his police inspector father, rewards prior reading. The book assumes a comfortable familiarity with the character that it does not stop to provide.
The seven-hour runtime is well-calibrated for this material. Queen novels are not rushed, but they are not indulgent either; the cousins built their plots architecturally rather than atmospherically, which means every scene is either evidence or misdirection. Fass navigates the misdirection sections, which in a lesser production might feel like filler, with sufficient investment that they maintain the sense of forward motion even when you cannot tell what they are contributing.
Entry Twenty-Two Still Welcomes New Listeners
Reviewer Leyla notes that this may be among the earlier books of the series, which contradicts its series position as number twenty-two in the Ellery Queen Detective list. That discrepancy likely reflects different series numbering conventions across editions. For listeners concerned with reading order, the safest approach is treating each novel as largely self-contained, which they mostly are, rather than as strict sequence-dependent entries.
One longtime Queen fan describes the plot as 'a tad unrealistic' while still rating it highly, which is an accurate characterization of the cousins' later period work. They prioritized the elegance of the puzzle solution over strictly plausible criminal psychology, and the final reveal in Face to Face reflects that priority. If you read Golden Age mysteries for clinical psychological realism, Ellery Queen is not the place to look. If you read them for the formal satisfaction of a fair-play puzzle constructed with care and resolved without cheating, this is exactly the right choice.
The Ellery Queen phenomenon as a publishing and cultural history is worth briefly noting, because it contextualizes what you are listening to. The cousins Dannay and Lee created not just a detective but an entire editorial empire: Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, which launched in 1941 and still publishes today, shaped the short mystery fiction field in America for decades. The novel Face to Face emerges from that context, from two writers who had spent their careers thinking about mystery construction from both sides of the editorial desk. The structural confidence of this audiobook reflects that depth of craft perspective, and Robert Fass's narration honors it.
Golden Age Newcomers Can Start Right Here
Ellery Queen enthusiasts already in the series will find this one of the stronger later entries. The Gloria Guild setup is more vivid than some mid-period Queen victims, the dying clue puzzle is constructed with the cousins' characteristic precision, and Fass's narration maintains momentum through the seven-hour runtime without flagging. Listeners new to Golden Age detective fiction who want to sample Ellery Queen can start here; they will be slightly more disoriented than established fans, but the mystery itself is self-contained enough to be followed without series background.
In Brief
- Voice: Robert Fass delivers the period idioms and Queen's intellectual remove with committed precision, navigating misdirection scenes without letting them feel like padding.
- Big ideas: dying clue construction, class mobility in 1930s New York, fair-play puzzle conventions
- Atmosphere: Brisk and architecturally tight, with the assured confidence of mid-period Golden Age craft
- Worth it?: A late-series Ellery Queen novel that delivers one of the genre's sharpest dying-clue setups; existing fans will rank it among the cousins' stronger outings.
Common Questions
How does Robert Fass's narration handle the period language and 1960s idioms in this audiobook?
Fass commits to the period without stiffness. The 1930s setting and the late 1960s writing style produce a particular register that he navigates cleanly, keeping the Queen voice intellectually assured without making it feel costumed or artificial.
Is the dying clue puzzle in this audiobook genuinely fair-play, or is the solution withheld from the listener?
The cousins designed their mysteries as fair-play puzzles and the book itself challenges readers to solve it before Queen does. All the evidence is presented; the test is whether you make the same inference Queen makes from the single word 'face.'
Does this audiobook stand alone, or do I need to have read earlier Ellery Queen novels to follow it?
The core mystery stands alone. You do not need series knowledge to follow the investigation. However, the pleasure of Queen's character, his methods and his relationship with his father, is richer with prior series experience.
