Books: Mysteries

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Of the December-January crop, the following stood out as best bets:

PUZZLE FOR PLAYERS—Patrick Quentin —Simon & Schuster ($2). Murder interrupts the rehearsals of a Broadway show. Rich plot, crackling dialogue, authentic Broadway setting.

THE BIGGER THEY COME—A. A. Fair—Morrow ($2). Introducing fat, profane Detective Bertha Cool and her runty assistant Donald Lam. Slot-machine racketeers in a Southwestern locale, with a jackpot ending that turns on a neat legal trick.

FATAL DESCENT—John Rhode & Carter Dickson—Dodd, Mead ($2). A meticulous Scotland Yard inspector and a theorizing police surgeon solve the shooting of a London publisher in his private elevator. Humorous, with an ingenious solution of the hermetically-sealed-room problem.

DEATH PLAYS SOLITAIRE—R. L. Goldman— Coward-McCann ($2). News Publisher Asaph Clume and Reporter Rufus Reed again team up, crack the secret behind the shooting of a criminal lawyer. Tough, but not bogus tough.

FOUR FRIGHTENED WOMEN — George Harmon Coxe—Knopf ($2). News Photographer Kent Murdock gets seriously involved with the murder of a comic actor's exwife. Two more murders and a kidnapping before the payoff.

EVEN DOCTORS DIE—Lindsay Anson—Crime Club ($2). Reporter Peter Allen sticks his neck out when he tries to solve the murders of two famed British doctors and a nurse. Provocative plot, mixing a hard-boiled American manner with stiffish Scotland Yard technique.