Keep It Quiet

When a vexatious member is found dead (and possibly poisoned) in the Club Library, the Secretary of the Whitehall Club is desperate to just (shhh!) keep it quiet. 

It was just like Morrison to be a nuisance even when he was dead.
Ford, the harried Secretary of the Whitehall Club, is desperate to please even the most disagreeable members just to be left in peace. So, it is a huge inconvenience for Ford when one of the club’s most vexatious members is found possibly poisoned and most definitely dead. It will be terrible for the club’s reputation and it seems easier for all if he finds a way to keep it quiet.
Dr Anstruther is enlisted to help him cover up the death. He finds Ford irksome and ultimately useless but the Club means too much to him to see it dragged through a media frenzy. And besides, Anstruther was the victim’s doctor: as far as he’s concerned, Morrison may have even had a heart condition…
But Cardonnel, the club lawyer (and stickler for protocol), is sniffing too close to the cover-up. And when Ford and Anstruther start receiving blackmailing notes, they begin acting very odd indeed. With so many eyes on them, will they really be able to keep it quiet?

Keep It Quiet was first published in 1935.

PRAISE FOR RICHARD HULL & KEEP IT QUIET

‘It is astonishing that even an impeccable sense of fun should have made so uncomfortable a story produce a smile on every page’ — Observer

‘Did you read The Murder of My Aunt? That was Mr Hull’s first thriller, very ingenious, very unusual and very well written. Keep It Quiet is just as good… the ending is excellent, the fun is good and the grimness is subtle.’ — Morning Post

‘The most amusing way to begin the New Year is by reading Richard Hull’s Keep It Quiet. Mr. Hull began 1935 with the most viciously humorous detective story of recent times (The Murder of My Aunt) and this new one is a worthy successor… a magnificent novelty’ — Christopher Morley

‘None better. A delightful demonstration of how a joke may go too far. Witty, decorously exciting, and brilliantly written.’ — Saturday Review of Literature

‘Here’s one that you miss at your own risk… Why can’t we have more mysteries by entertaining author who write with the same kind of brains used in other books? It’s murderous fun of a high order’ — Will Cuppy, New York Herald Tribune

‘Required reading’ — Saturday Review of Literature

‘A model for mystery writers’ — The New Yorker

‘utterly original’ — John Cournos

‘well worth reading’ — Isaac Anderson, New York Times

‘how delightfully witty Mr. Hull can be’ — Charles Hannon Towne, NY American

‘Most assured… splendid writing’ — New York Sunday News